Can you improve your odds at slots?

Experts will always tell you that you should expect to lose - not win - when you gamble, and that a trip to a casino is for entertainment only.

Of course, what makes gambling so entertaining is the possibility of winning. And what keeps gamblers flocking to Indiana casinos is seeing other gamblers winning.

How to reconcile the two?

Gambling expert Anthony Curtis, who publishes a monthly newsletter and runs the Web site www.LasVegasAdvisor.com, says the idea is not to beat the house, which can't be done, but to lower its advantage. That lets you stretch your gambling dollar further and delay its inevitable demise.

Gamblers can also lower the house's advantage dramatically in slot machines simply by choosing which machine they play.

Slots are by far the most popular type of casino gambling there is, and they are also the biggest money-maker for casinos because they have the biggest mathematical advantage.

But some machines have much smaller advantages: One pair of machines in Indiana kept less than 1 percent of the money put into them last year, and in some months they paid out more than they took in, according to a Journal Gazette analysis of state gambling data.

"That's the whole idea behind gambling. The best advertising, without question, is winners," Curtis said. "That's what makes it so brilliant."

The newspaper analyzed 12 months of reports filed with the Indiana Gaming Commission for every electronic gambling device in the state's 11 casinos and two racinos.

"In certain games, the casino is always going to win," Curtis said. "There are beatable games, like blackjack, poker and video poker. The race book and sports book are potentially beatable. But everything else, unless you're cheating or using coupons, there's a negative expectation."

"Negative expectation" should be translated as "you're going to lose money."

The question is how much you're going to lose and how to find ways to minimize those losses.

For the people operating casinos, Curtis said, the equation is easy - take the most money from the games that are the most popular. The most popular games are the slots, and the most popular slots, by far, are the penny slots. That makes the most popular game the biggest loser for those who play it.

"The lower the denomination (of coin the machine takes), the higher the hold," or profit, Curtis said. For penny slots, the house's hold is the highest in the casino, and yet they are enormously popular - popular enough that while casinos may have just a few dozen or fewer of some machines, they often have hundreds of penny slots.

For example, The Ameristar casino boat in East Chicago has 1,285 1-cent slots, according to its November report to state officials.

Statewide, gamblers dropped $639.2 million into 1-cent slot machines in November alone, according to state data. If that was all in pennies, they would make a stack that would circle the Earth - twice.

Of the $6.9 billion put into 1-cent slots at Hoosier casinos from December 2008 through November 2009, the casinos on average kept more than 11 percent, making a tidy profit of $790.8 million between them.

Curtis said another way to look at that number is that every time you put a dollar into a machine with that payout, the machine keeps 11 cents. While that's not true on every spin, it is true over time, and you can use that number to gauge how long your gambling bankroll will last.

"The percentage is mathematically engineered over hundreds of thousands of spins," he said. "So it pulls that money out from you without you feeling it."

But you don't have to give up that 11 percent of your bankroll. State data show you can give up as little as 4.8 percent. While that still pales against the 0.3 percent edge the house can have on games such as blackjack, it's still a dramatic improvement. So which slots pay the best?

According to state data, the house advantage generally declines with every increase in denomination. In other words, nickel slots pay better than penny slots, quarter slots pay better than nickel slots and dollar slots pay better than quarters.

On average, the best-paying machines in Indiana last year were the $5 slots.

Curtis said that is typical.

"They get about as loose as they're willing to get around $1, $2 and $5," he said. "After that, they go, 'Phooey on it.' "

The very best paying machines in the state last year were the $100 slots at the Casino Aztar riverboat in Evansville, which last year paid out 99.2 percent of what was put into them.

But at $100 per spin, the riverboat's two machines get very little use, and their payouts vary widely from month to month: For three months, they paid out more than they took in, including April, when they paid out 111.8 percent of their income, while in December 2008 they paid out only 81.2 percent.

The state data, available online at www.in.gov/igc/index.htm, also let you see which casino actually has the loosest slots overall - a popular claim, and one that no matter which casino makes would not be far from the truth, as less than 2 percent separated the highest payout from the lowest.

From December 2008 to November 2009, the crown for highest payout was held by Hoosier Park racino in Anderson, where the slots paid out 92 percent of what they took in.

That was followed closely by the Indiana Live! racino in Shelbyville, which paid out 91.9 percent. Both casinos are the newest in the state, and as Curtis said, nothing encourages people to gamble more than seeing other people win.

The lowest overall slot payouts came at the Ameristar, which were 90.2 percent.

Of course, the real question is whether the numbers really matter to those who love playing the slots. Anyone who has spent time playing them, after all, knows the house always wins in the end.

"I think slot players have their favorites," said Ted Garvin, a Fort Wayne business owner who was enjoying lunch between table games recently at the American Legion Post 82. "A lot of 'em even pay attention to the number on the machine, and they'll go back and play that machine if they did well on it."

Garvin, who said he travels to a casino to hit the slots about once every other week, said he generally plays the $5 machines because they seem to pay out more. He was pleasantly surprised to hear that the numbers backed up his hunch but admitted he wouldn't change even if they didn't.

"If it's your lucky day, it's your lucky day," he said.

Casino Association of Indiana President Mike Smith said that while it's nice to know payout schedules, people will play what they want to play, largely regardless.

"I think it goes back to the whole point that it's entertainment. It is entertainment no different than if you take your money to a football game or a hockey game," Smith said.

And Curtis said gamblers should not look at the data and then switch from penny slots to $5 machines just because the payouts are better.

"If you want to take a risk and expect to win, buy and hold stocks," Curtis said. "Your expectation in a casino is to lose - you're paying for entertainment just as surely if you bought a movie ticket."

The better strategy, he said, is to slow down and enjoy yourself.

"The slower the better. When a casino takes that money out of every play, you want to play as slowly as you can," he said. "Stay within your means and don't be seduced by the slightly better payback."

dstockman@jg.net