Slot Payback and Frequency

One of my friends was complaining to me that he has not hit any big slot jackpots lately. Jim is an avid slot player who had a great run of luck for several years. He thinks that the lack of the big jackpots is because the casino where he plays has been replacing all the older machines with the new multi-line machines. He complained that the casino must have lowered the overall payback on the new machines.

He said that although he has a lot of winning spins, most of the time he does not even get back the number of coins he wagered on the each spin. For example he would bet 20 coins per spin but may only win back 10 or 12 effectively making it a losing spin even though he "won."

I told him that the casino may not have lowered the overall payback it was just that he was playing a machine with a high hit frequency. Machines with a high hit frequency pay out small wins frequently while machines with a lower hit frequency usually pay out larger wins less frequently. This has no relation to the overall payback of the machine. If he want the bigger jackpots he needs to read the pay tables before he plays to pick machine that will give him a chance at the bigger jackpots.