People who watch strangers playing machines

explayer · Post by **explayer** » Sun May 25, 2008 3:25 pm

i realise that this probably comes up in a lot of threads but i want to ask a few questions about it - WTF is it with people who stand at your shoulder watching you play? - i dont play AWP's or FOBT's but i do play AWP's in the pub and wont have people watching whether they are quiet or interferring. I saw a punter object to someone watching the other day in the bookies and the shop manager asked them to move away , which i have rarely seen before - my questions are what have you said to people watching you play? , whats the most amount of aggro this has caused? and have you seen funny situations develop with people objecting to being watched? - in bookies FOBT players are often watched by 6 or 8 strangers at one time , which is bizarre!

Scott · Post by **Scott** » Sun May 25, 2008 3:33 pm

I hate being watched and have said something before when in a bad mood, try telling 10-15 foreigners (no exaggeration) when your doing lucky 8 to f*ck off, got surrounded by them, end result they were doing pots on as little as £30 and hogging the machine for hours on end, cue lots of moaning from the shop manager and your no longer allowed to play roulette.

Mattb · Post by **Mattb** » Sun May 25, 2008 3:35 pm

I find it annoying too, at least if i feel like snaking someone i'll do it from distance so it ain't bleedin' obvious. A lot of the time its mugs, if you get players watching often they'll come over. I usually go and speak in person to people who know what they're doing just out of curiosity.

trayhop123 · Post by **trayhop123** » Sun May 25, 2008 4:28 pm

as pro players, we can watch munters from afar, without them even realising it, the occasional sneaky glance is often all thats required from us to know whether its worth waiting for or not,

anyone thats watching us over our shoulder is clearly a munter after info/playing tips
now if its a method ie reel setups a la cash atacks ill stop playing for a gulp of my tactical coke/j20 or make a phone call, any thing until they get the message and piss off ,

but iff its skill ie guac etc then let em watch, this can and has lead to a munter saying thats easy, and pumping a dead machine to get the feature only to fail miserabley and walk away leaving it ready once more for me ,

plus we all must have had that group of saturday night lads about town that are blown away by your skills and cant believe what they are seeing, slinging praise at you, and that makes you head swell and feel like an elite slotting god,
any 1 that says they dont get a kick out of that is full of shit ,

as long as no sensitive methods are being given away, it dont bother me but i can see why it would bother some ,

a very double edged sword of a topic me thinks

wildcat · Post by **wildcat** » Sun May 25, 2008 5:17 pm

it really gets on my nerves when someone stands by you and tells you wot to do on the machine "collect that £3 quid cos youll lose next mate" or "you cant lose on a red no, go higher!!" for f***s sake its my money and im playing so f*** off!!! :x

JG · Post by JG » Sun May 25, 2008 5:31 pm

If they were so good, they'd have money to play with.

Eddie - that's the main reaon I barely played Lucky 8 after they changed the format from letters, to POT. You'll get the helpful advice. Bet £5 on black now, not £1. No, **** off. Flies around poo.

lol@ The Saturday Night Lads. "Hey mate do you know the cycles and that?"

In the most part a tactical combination of phone using and loafing around should throw the average irritant off the scent. "Hey mate, you got nudges for the bars there." "Yeah thanks".

The worst irritants are stupid doinks who would do something like relaying your every move to their mate on Hot Wheels. "Yeah 'ees got that clue feature..yeah he's thinking now......."

The correct move here is to accidentally swing a chair around and kill them. Apologise profusely then quietly take your jackpot.

betchrider · Post by **betchrider** » Mon May 26, 2008 12:41 pm

Just ask em"whats up?"or"do you wanna play it mate?"summat like that.They normally get message and f off

Alpine021 · Post by **Alpine021** » Tue May 27, 2008 12:15 pm

Well I've had a mixture of all the above.

I'd happily approach a player - even if just to ask where he's been.

Saturday night lads, lol - I have to admit a few months ago I got a £50 top off a Rocket Money then got nudges for green lines. 2 lads were watching me and i let it time out for SnS (ahh they were the days).

Anyway hit the fast one and one of the lads just couldn't believe his eyes, lol - he just couldn't stop saying "How did u do that?" I had to smile

But people watching is annoying. Especially when u're losing and ESPECIALLY when u're getting an absolute kicking.

I have said stuff in the past after doing the old phone call etc I just say "you ok there mate?"

That seems to be enough to show u're not happy without going over the top.

Alpine021 · Post by **Alpine021** » Tue May 27, 2008 12:21 pm

Havin said that some guy slotted Cluedo the other day and I was miles away with my paper.

As soon as hit took Hi-lo cash in red I knew I didn't have to keep watchin.

Anyway he got off it and left. I gave it 5 mins then went on it. Got lines within a tenner and back in he came in the middle of mega streak.

Oops. Not really much I could say - i couldn't say i'd slotted it.

He was like "I've just put quite a lot in that"

I just said "oh - I lost on it earlier" - I say that quite a lot. Seems to make people feel better.

rocket · Post by **rocket** » Tue May 27, 2008 2:34 pm

I understand why it can be annoying, but if I'm being honest I quite enjoy watching people on machines. I work behind a bar and will sometimes stop and see how they're getting on if I'm out collecting glasses. I usually just say 'is it doing much mate?' or something similar, and I'll happily tell them if it's just dropped £100 quid or just had £100 put through it without a win. I'm not sharking - whether they win or lose doesn't make a difference to me, I just like seeing how the machines playing.

Something I don't do is start telling people what they should or shouldn't have taken (unless they're a complete novice and I've given the odd basic tip) and something I would never do is start pressing the buttons for them!

Stevie S · Post by **Stevie S** » Tue May 27, 2008 3:45 pm

I walked in a boozer once, half pissed, straight over to the fruity quid in on the board £4 cash side everything red etc etc, big smile on me face shouting over to the lads, then some fella tapped me on the shoulder with a face like he was gona nut me as he'd been waiting just behind me at the bar for change. LOL. JP'd it within a fiver. what could i do?

Alpine021 · Post by **Alpine021** » Tue May 27, 2008 7:28 pm

I've nearly hit a bird that started pressing the buttons once.

I was getting killed and said to her mate "get her away from me - seriously."

Which was a mistake as her mate was hammered and proceeded to tell me I had an attitude.

I half calmy tried to explain I'd put about £80 or whatever in it and that was followed by "you're an idiot then"

$$%^*% - I can't explain how close to hitting her I was...

JG · Post by JG » Tue May 27, 2008 11:09 pm

Surprised it doesn't happen more often. I can see the allure to the pissed person of whacking random buttons especially when some random is on the machine and especially, well especially, just especially really.

I've had it happen once to me. I was playing a BIG GAME (Barcrest) and some random (sticking with the word random) bint (branching out into the word bint there) just thwucked the MR BARCREST button on her way into the ladies (machine was next to entrance to ladies toilet. Ooh errr.).

It made not one jot of difference to the gameplay, not one iota of irritation. That button was not active and thwacking it did nothing. So that was that. End of story. Had it done something, I guess there wouldn't be much I could do, apart from vigorously grope her breasts, If she was trying to press my buttons, I'll try and press hers, no seriously, perils of playing at peak times.

I guess it'd be annoying, well the classic lower than a 2, let's say when it's a steal, gambling up to superhold on a semi-dead (but positive run of nap) Duff Beer Guide that'll just.....eeek.....just about allow the 2 to go.

Then the next board costs £20. That'd be very irksome.

What can you do?

Matt Vinyl · Post by **Matt Vinyl** » Wed May 28, 2008 8:57 am

Gah, that is most irksome!

The main problem I seem to have, and I don't want to be offensive here, is with the 'mentally incapables' that seem to find thier way into a lot of the pubs around here.

One guy consistently telling me to collect the £2/£3 on a Red as 'it'll kill you on that 11!' and then dribbling into his pint. (Seriously!)

Another character is the one who has a fascination with numbers (not to mention gold coins!) as he has his digital camera with him, and as soon as someone (usually me!) starts playing a machine, he roars in and starts taking close up pictures of the number reel! I've humoured him many times, but when trying to hit skills and number runner, having a drooling David Bailey in between me and my machine does not help one wit!

Then, as soon as I collect any coins, he dives to the coin tray and tries to make off with it all!

Thankfully, his 'mum' is always with him, and she always ensures that he gives 'that nice man' his money back...

ma71lda · Post by **ma71lda** » Wed May 28, 2008 2:31 pm

Thats funny.

Its normally the 'dribblers' who stick a pound in and get a flukey flash, the Nosey Nigel at the bar runs over and shows Marty McDribbler what to do.