If you are interested in learning a bit more about the slot games, how you should play them, what makes a good slot and every other question that bothers you and doesn’t let you sleep at night, you will struggle no more! Here, at SlotsWise, we have all the information, the questions that are asked the most by all the players, and tonnes and tonnes of game reviews, casinos with the best promotions and bonuses, as well as providers that will make you start loving the games.
This time, we will stick to one small part of the whole slot game, as we often get the question: What is a paytable?
We will try to cover everything related to the paytable, what is there to be seen and the meaning of all the numbers on the paytable itself, so if you are eager to learn more, stick around.
What Is A Paytable
As soon as you enter a slot game, you will be greeted by the welcome screen and once that loads, you will see the reels and paylines of the game as well as the logo and all the adjustable features. Among those features, you will see a small button, usually located somewhere at the bottom of the screen, which states Paytable. That’s what we will speak about in this article, so, what is a paytable?
As soon as you click that button, you will see the symbols of the game next to some numbers. This is the paytable, and it indicates what your payouts will be as soon as you land them on an active payline. If you are one of the older slot players, or sometimes it’s the case with the new ones which want to replicate the old slot machines, the paytable is placed directly on the main screen. It is because there are too few symbols that the slot machine has, so there is no need to create a new screen for that. It’s usually placed around the reel, most of the times on the left-hand side of the screen.
The table shows the numbers for each combination of symbols and the number of coins bet how many coins or credits the player will win if that particular combination lands on the screen. You need to land the particular symbols directly on a paytable of the screen to get a payout. Video slot machines generally will only display the payline for lines that are winners.
Depending on the game, the number of symbols and the type of symbols, you have different paytables that give out different information.
Just before we close this section and move to explain the symbols on the paytable, let’s mention that not all games have paytables indicated, for unknown reasons. All the games actually have to have paytables, as that’s how they work, they are simply not included in the screen of the game.
Symbols
The small images you see once you open the paytables are the symbols of the slot game. The symbols are your tool in making the winning combination, and you need to land 2 or more of them on an active payline to make a winning combination. The paytable indicates the number of symbols you need to land in order to get the winning combination on the screen. It also tells the amount that you will win for a single coin wagered, usually displayed in percentages.
There are several categories of symbols that you should be aware of that are always displayed on the paytable:
Lower valued Symbols
The lower valued symbols are the symbols that pay out the least in the slot game. They are the symbols that keep you in the game and give you a small amount of coins so that you will be able to survive few more rounds with the same amount of coins. All the symbols are different as every slot game is unique, but in almost all of the slot gams the lower valued symbols are represented by the deck of playing cards and their symbols. The Jack, King, Queen or Ace are the most used symbols while sometimes we can find the 10, 9 or even number 8 in the symbols. Often, the fruits as one of the very 1st symbols that appear in the land-based slot machines are also included in the lower valued symbols.
They are all unique and have different design. You can see the amount you will get if you land three, four or five of the same symbols on an active payline, and in some games even two of the symbols would make a payout.
Higher Valued Symbols
On the other hand, the higher valued symbols are the symbols which will give you the prizes of the game. They are almost always related to the theme and represent something from the topic of the slot. The logo of the game is often taken as the most valuable symbol, and you can see how the prizes drastically change when you compare them to the lower valued symbols. Same as the previous ones, you need three or more on an active payline to grab the prize, while some games award for two of them as well.
Special Symbols
In this category of symbols, we can place the wild, scatter, bonus, free spins or whatever the name of the special symbols are. They are special symbols and they have different purpose, for example, the wild replaces the normal symbols that we just mentioned above, and acts as a substitute in their winning combination, while the scatter and the bonus or free spins symbols trigger the bonus features of the game. This is all stated in the paytable, usually when you turn the page to the right.
If the wild symbol pays out, it will be indicated with the coin multiplier there as well.