Why your Stake VIP progress bar says 46% when you have wagered more than half

[rakebackpaid]

This one comes from a real screenshot and it has caught out every Stake player I have shown it to, so it is worth a thread of its own.

A Bronze player wrote to me confused. His VIP page said he was 46.8% of the way to Silver. Silver needs $50,000 of lifetime wagering. He read the bar as "46.8% of $50,000", which is about $23,400, and he knew he had wagered more than that. Either the bar was broken or Stake was short-changing him.

Neither. The bar does not run from zero to the next level. It runs from the level you are on to the next one. Bronze is $10,000 and Silver is $50,000, so the bar for a Bronze player spans the $40,000 in between. 46.8% of $40,000 is $18,720, which put him at roughly $28,700 lifetime, about $21,300 short of Silver. He checked his own figures and it matched to the dollar.

The general rule, for any level:

Code:

lifetime wagered = current level threshold + (bar percentage x gap to next level)

Stake's thresholds, from their own VIP page: Bronze $10k, Silver $50k, Gold $100k, Platinum I $250k, and it keeps climbing from there. So the same 46.8% means $28,700 for a Bronze player, $73,400 for a Silver player, and $170,200 for a Gold player. The percentage on its own tells you almost nothing until you know which two thresholds it sits between.

Why it matters beyond curiosity: people decide whether to push for the next level based on that bar, and the money involved is real. A Bronze player who thinks he is $26,600 short when he is actually $21,300 short has misjudged by $5,000 of wagering, which on 4% slots is about $200 of expected loss either way. Read the bar properly before you make that call, and ideally do not make that call at all, because the level bonuses are a small fraction of what the wagering to reach them costs.

As far as I can find, Stake does not document this anywhere. If someone has seen it written down by Stake, I would like the link.

[alani123]

OP that's a lot of text just to explain how a progress bar works. There is nothing wrong from Stake's part here.

The issue most people don't take into account with VIP levels in general is that... It's an added bonus and shouldn't lead you to gamble more than you would anyway. Regardless of limits people will fall for timeless tricks and be lured to lose even more. So that's the most important thing to consider. If someone isn't considering simple arithmetic when gambling and is just lured by a progress bar, what can I say?

[Hispo]

OP that's a lot of text just to explain how a progress bar works. There is nothing wrong from Stake's part here.

The issue most people don't take into account with VIP levels in general is that... It's an added bonus and shouldn't lead you to gamble more than you would anyway. Regardless of limits people will fall for timeless tricks and be lured to lose even more. So that's the most important thing to consider. If someone isn't considering simple arithmetic when gambling and is just lured by a progress bar, what can I say?

There is something appealing when comes to seeing a progress bar to slowly getting filled, it is pure psychological strategy for casinos in general to keep their gamblers engaged.
Funnily enough it is also applied to other media, like videogames, that is why developers keep the same mechanic of progress bars when it comes to missions and experience in order to advance to the next level.

I think OP did nothing wrong by bringing this information to people, but in the end you are right... It would be more important to discuss how those bars are used to lure people to gamble beyond their own limits.

[rakebackpaid]

There is nothing wrong from Stake's part here. The issue most people don't take into account with VIP levels in general is that... It's an added bonus and shouldn't lead you to gamble more than you would anyway.

Agreed on both counts, and I did not say Stake had done anything wrong. The bar is correct, it is just read wrong by most of the people looking at it. Your second point is the one that matters and it is why I bothered writing it up: the bar is the single most effective nudge on the page, and a nudge you can put a dollar figure on is weaker than one you cannot. "46%" feels close. "$21,300 of wagering, which on slots costs you about $850 in expected loss to unlock a level bonus worth a fraction of that" does not feel close at all. The arithmetic is not there to defend Stake or attack them. It is there to make the lure smaller.

[Cointxz]

There is nothing wrong from Stake's part here. The issue most people don't take into account with VIP levels in general is that... It's an added bonus and shouldn't lead you to gamble more than you would anyway.

Agreed on both counts, and I did not say Stake had done anything wrong. The bar is correct, it is just read wrong by most of the people looking at it. Your second point is the one that matters and it is why I bothered writing it up: the bar is the single most effective nudge on the page, and a nudge you can put a dollar figure on is weaker than one you cannot. "46%" feels close. "$21,300 of wagering, which on slots costs you about $850 in expected loss to unlock a level bonus worth a fraction of that" does not feel close at all. The arithmetic is not there to defend Stake or attack them. It is there to make the lure smaller.

The problem is the narrative especially this one.

Either the bar was broken or Stake was short-changing him.

There’s a time that our assumed wagered count is not accurate since Stake is just showing the progress based on the user total wager. But I believe including the actual wager count together with the progress bar will solve this kind of conflict.
 

[Bryan jessy]

These progressive leads keeps people trying so hard to get to their desired level because of the benefits that comes with it, somehow it entices players, few years back there was this Ponzi scheme that year that some of my friends in school was into even after knowing it was a Ponzi scheme they kept investment their money, and the game has leads it goes progressively with the Benefits increasing as a player levels up and the higher level offers cool profit than the lower level so knowing it was a Ponzi scheme people where trying to get to the highest level and get their profit before the game crashes and at the end lot of persons lost their money, so these levels are really significant tool to keep people playing the game.

[danherbias07]

Years ago, I did try doing that. Forcing my way to the next VIP level because I was curious about how much bonus I would receive. Upon receiving the bonus, that's when I realized it was not that much. That is when I decided to just simply play games or bet on sports without even thinking about that VIP bar.
It's a perk. Not something that will enhance our chances of winning. The house edge will be the same, and our chances in sports betting are still 50-50. It will be so much better if we just enjoy the games, and when that bonus comes or the VIP bar is filled, we will also enjoy it more.

[348Judah]

Sometimes you go to be more cautious on the progress bar to see your achievement based on what you have, and the more you are taking the risk to gamble and play more to increase your chances of having a higher VIP level, but not considering the risk this might be causing while trying to achieve, which is automated to process every transaction in relation to how you gamble and the level you should be, this shows that it is either your performance level or the system automation is yet to reflect your accurate VIP level, and this means nothing.

[swogerino]

When it comes to wagering I don't think anyone will do it through slots to reach the next level as it takes a lot of time and only people who did not spend sometime searching for wagering strategies may end up trying to level up through slots. So for informed people they will always be reading through forums or Youtube and will always end up using a dice strategy, usually the 98% one or some strategy with many conditions created by enthusiasts who loves wagering and passing levels fast.

[SportbetOne]

The arithmetic is not there to defend Stake or attack them. It is there to make the lure smaller.

Good breakdown on the math. Most people just see a percentage and assume they're almost there, not realizing they still have to bleed tens of thousands in handle to close the gap.
The level-up bonus never covers the expected loss from forcing that extra volume anyway. Useful sanity check for anyone tempted to churn slots just for a rank badge.