Zodiac Lion & Zodiac Dragon Advantage Play Strategy

Manufacturer: IGT

How the advantage works

Zodiac Lion and its lesser-known clone, Zodiac Dragon, feature persistent gold frames that lock on the reels. Landing a lion head symbol (or dragon head in Zodiac Dragon) creates the initial gold frame. Then, when another lion head symbol lands within any gold frame, all connecting gold frames will turn wild. The gold frames will then disappear on the next spin.

When to play

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Additional notes on Zodiac Lion & Zodiac Dragon

Zodiac Lion is one of the most popular AP games in casinos, but it’s also one that is poorly played by most people. Many hustlers just play whenever there are a bunch of gold frames, regardless of their position. You really want to get at least four-of-a-kind line hits, or preferably five-of-a-kind line hits. Three-of-a-kind line hits barely pay anything. Therefore, you want the gold frames to be connected horizontally rather than vertically (spanning left to right rather than up and down).
The top row bets on the bet panel (the ones without the Zodiac Wheel) pay much better but landing lion heads is more difficult. Even the $0.60 bet can pay out quite well when you land five-of-a-kind wilds (going left to right).
You can take more chances trying to connect clumps of gold frames on the bottom row bet levels because there is a chance you could get the Zodiac Wheel to connect them.
The more gold frames you have on the screen, regardless of their position, the better chance you have of landing the three lion symbols needed to enter the bonus when the Lion Spin Bonus randomly appears.
Zodiac Lion has an RTP that ranges from...
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Attempting to connect gold frames on the left side to gold frames on the right side is risky. Scroll down to see the results of this attempt.

I landed a lion head on the right clump, which resulted in a $0 win. The play is now dead. I would avoid playing situations like this where you are more likely to land a lion head in the existing unconnected clump than you are to land a lion head that connects the two clumps.

I would definitely still play this, but having holes in the middle like this really cut into the payout.

I considered playing this but decided to pass. If there was one more gold frame connecting horizontally on either the top or bottom clump, then I would play.

Avoid plays like this where the gold frames are concentrated in reels three, four and five.

Watch for plays like this that are the result of the previous player cashing out after the Lion Spin Bonus. Scroll down to see what the next spin will look like.

The leftover lion heads from the Lion Spin Bonus are now gold frames.

Landing 22 lion heads on the lion spin bonus resulted in a $1,700.75 handpay. I made sure to keep playing after this because all those leftover lion heads from the bonus turn into gold frames on the next spin.

Zodiac Dragon isn’t nearly as common as Zodiac Lion, but it plays exactly the same.

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