Great starting guide for understanding how to play slots. Always remember the keys to any slot systems or slot strategy.

1. Understand the game your playing.
2. Money Management.
3. Have fun. Remember this is suppose to be entertainment.
4. Walk away when the Gods are being unkind.

The most important thing about any slots system is first money management and second knowing when to walk away from an unlucky machine. You can last forever on a good machine and take home a good chunk of cash.

So remember a dash of good sense always goes a long way with any slot system and helps in learning how to play slots.

Slot Strategy - Understand what you are playing.

This is very important, be sure to always read the pay table of the machine you are playing so that you know what you are looking for and the jackpot requirements.

On some slots connected to jackpots you have to bet maximum coins / credits and get the winning symbols to collect the jackpot. There's nothing worse than getting the jackpot symbols and realising that for one dollar more you would have won $100000 instead of $1000.

The same goes for slots that offer free spins or bonus features, if you understand what you need to get you won't walk away only a few spins from getting them. Understanding what your playing can greatly increase the enjoyment.

Slot Strategy - Changing your bet size

This strategy is good for all slots but is not an advised method of play on progressives. Rather than staying at the same amount of coins /credits per spin try changing your bet sizes around.

For example bet, 1 coin, 2 coins, 3 coins, 2 coins and so on. On a 1 cent slot with 20 pay lines, playing all pay lines you would bet 20, 100, 200, 400, 500, 400, 200 and so on.

This gives you the chance of getting the higher win multiplier without using too much money. If you are lucky you will hit winning pay lines when you are on the higher bets.

This strategy is great for machines that offer free spins or bonus rounds because you can get free spins at a higher bet level than you would usually play. It does not change the odds of winning in any way.

Slot Strategy - Maximum Bet

In general it is best to play at the maximum bet available. By this we mean the maximum amount of credits or coins per spin. It is a myth however that your bet size affects the outcome of any spin.

The only exception we have to this rule is when playing multi pay line slots with more than 3 reels. On these slots max bet can quickly reduce even the biggest bankroll.

With this in mind you can easily find a slot machine to suit any budget. With a smaller bankroll look for games where there is a max bet of two coins. Or change the coin size of the slot you wish to play, go from dollar slots to quarter games and max bet is less than one coin on the dollar game. Always look around and find a slot that suits you.

Especially with progressive slots max bet is the only way to play. Why? Almost all progressive require max bet to be played to win the jackpot. Without max coins you can hit the right symbols and miss out.

These strategies for slot machine play may work for you, or they may not, but they do give you a framework to work on.

Pulls on any one machine, especialy the high end machines, $1.00 $5.00 and up. If you want to set a higher limit that's up to you. Sometimes I will play more than 3 or 5 depending on what's happening and how I feel. On quarter nachines you can allow yourself a little more leaway, on nickle machines you can steam away and not get hurt too badly.

Maximumn coin play, on some machines it is best to play the maximum number of coins, depending on you and your bank roll. Only you can decide how many coins you want to play.

Run, if you get a good hit, play another couple of pulls and run.

Money Management, know where you stand at all times. Use the counters on the slots to your advantage. Don't play credits. cash in and play coins it's slower and you can use the counters to keep track of where you stand.

Wander around, if you're not hitting, stop and wander around, take a break. walk around, enjoy watching others play.

Specialize, find machines that you understand and play them. Don't play just any machine. Learn what machines appeal to you and stick with them, we all have favourites that's part of the fun.

Take a chance, if you are up you can afford to take a chance on high end machines even the 5.00 slots. If you do get a hit...run.

Read the machine, make sure you understand the payoff schedule on any slot you play, you will avoid disappointment. Once you have done this you will avoid certain machines.

One coin play, you don't need to play three coins at all times, particularly on high end machines, $1.00 $5.00 and up. Find machines that will allow one coin play and still payout the maximum. I am not talking about pay for play type machines nor three or five liners. I am talking about single line machines that payout on all symbols for 1 coin. You will sometimes think, gee if I had played three coins I would have won three times as much, beware the Casinos main weapon.... Greed.

Set your own rules, because a machine takes up to 5 plus coins does not mean you have to play that many. If you read the machine you will see, in many cases, that the payout per coin is exactly the same relative value. In other words many slots will pay X for 1 coin and 2X for 2 coins and 3X for 3 coins.

Read the machine cycles, this one is still up for grabs but my experience says that slots pay-off in cycles. They go through a "take" cycle and they go through a "pay"cycle. Needless to say the "take" cycle lasts much longer than the "pay" cycle.

Big hits, in all of my experience the "big hits" have come in the first few pulls. Latest example: Aug 04/97 on a 2 coin quarter machine. Inserted 2 quarters and got 3 blue sevens for 300 quarters on the first pull.Example 2 Sep 24 in Vegas 4th spin on a triple diamond quarter machine..Jackpot 4000 quarters ..LUCK??...You bet.

Luck, do not underestimate the luck factor. If you win you are just Plain lucky. A $50.00 book on winning at slots won't give better advice.