Low variance means targets are harder to hit

I learned another lesson yesterday. Europa offered me a 100%/$200, 12x WR bonus, but Blackjack and War were both ineligible (as were the typically excluded games of Baccarat, Roulette, and Craps). I set my target at $1000, which would put me +$600. Which game to play?

Game	House Edge	Variance
Three Card Poker	2.32%	8.4681
Pai Gow	2.73%	0.5625
Red Dog	2.80%	2.56
Let it Ride	3.51%	1.64

I chose Pai Gow.

With it's dramatically low variance (it seems that about 60% of all hands are pushes), I zoomed past the $4800 WR with my $50 bets, but wasn't going anywhere fast. I hovered between $100 and $600 in the process. When I hit the WR, I was at about my starting $400, and when I dropped down to $250, which was below the table limit of $300, I pushed my whole stack in -- and lost.

In retrospect, I should have probably played Pai Gow to hit the WR, then jumped to a higher variance game (Red Dog?) to hope for a hot streak. With the low, low variance of Pai Gow, I'd have had to be betting $200 a hand to bring my target down to within 1 standard deviation.

Europa 100% $200 bonus: -$200
Something-out-of-nothing to date: $4,341