Almost all casino games are based on numbers. Even in games such as blackjack and baccarat the non-numbered picture cards are given their own numbers, 10 and 0 respectively. Who says math isn’t important? It certainly is in casino games.

Still many casino players are not fully aware of how all these numbers work. Many players will make bets that the numbers tell us are poor or, to be totally honest, terrible. Players get so caught up in the games that numbers are just some dreamlike side issue when such numbers are in fact the main purpose of the games.

Take a look at the payouts in roulette. A hit on a number pays 35-to-1 when the true payout in a game with no house edge should be 37-to-1 on the American double-zero wheel and 36-to-1 on the European single-zero wheel. The difference in those numbers shows clearly that one game is far better than the other game.

Dollars and cents make sense to the casinos and these should make sense to the players as well. Make bets with the wrong numbers, meaning house edge percentages, and you are asking for trouble if not tonight then as time goes on. Poor bets inevitably lead to poor monetary expectation. Adding more speed to the games, meaning more decisions per hour, will make even small house edges more difficult to overcome.

Craps is a game totally built on the numbers. There are 11 of them 2-3-4-5-6-7-8-9-10-11-12. These are made with two dice, each with six sides showing six pits, one, two, three, four, five and six. The combinations of these pips make up the 11 numbers shown above.

[Please note: With two dice of six sides each, there are 36 possible combinations as six times six equals 36. All of craps exists within those 36 numbers. These 11 numbers are made with combinations of the following pips:

2 = 1:1
3 = 2:1, 1:2
4 = 2:2, 3:1, 1:3
5 = 3:2, 2:3, 4:1, 1:4
6 = 3:3, 4:2, 2:4, 5:1, 1:5
7 = 4:3, 3:4, 5:2, 2:5, 6:1, 1:6
8 = 4:4, 5:3, 3:5, 6:2, 2:6
9 = 5:4, 4:5, 6:3, 3:6
10 = 5:5, 6:4, 4:6
11 = 6:5, 5:6
12 = 6:6

Interestingly enough all these numbers have select nicknames which I will discuss in another column.]

THE MORE THE LESS MERRY

Typical craps players will tend to make combinations of bets. Most will go with three. Such players will make their Pass Line bets with two Come bets and/or Place bets. Some players will go further by consistently putting out Come bets until the Craps shooter sevens-out. Still other players will add “Crazy Crapper” bets such as the Horn, Any Craps, Any Seven, and the Hardway bets among a host of others. These bets come in with astounding house edges – meaning large numbers which will ultimately soak a player’s bankroll.

The more bets a player makes at craps, the less merry that player will be in a relatively short period of time. You can’t beat a game with a house edge by making multiple wagers and you certainly can’t beat such a game by making more and more outrageous selections.

In the past I used to recommend the three-bet wagering technique at the game but over recent years I have changed my mind. I am, in short, an old dog that has learned a new trick. I still use the Captain’s 5-Count before I bet on any shooters other than me, but I no longer subscribe to the multi-bet syndrome. (I shall discuss the Captain’s 5-Count in a future column.) 

So what is my new method of playing craps? Strap yourselves in!

ONE IS NOT THE LONELIEST NUMBER

I am now suggesting that instead of making multiple bets at the game of craps that you limit yourself to one. That’s correct; one bet on one shooter. My reasoning is simple – your negative expectation is lowered significantly by just going up against the house edge on a single number. Consequently it becomes a completely focused game for you; your single number versus the casino’s single number, the seven.

If the player makes two of the best bets at craps, the Pass Line and Come bet, and goes on three of them at once, he will face a house edge of 1.41 percent on each of the numbers he bets. So a $10 bettor’s expectation is to lose around 42 cents. If the player only makes one such bet, his expectation is to lose 14 cents.

Take a look at players who make more than three bets; say these players go up on four numbers? Five numbers? Six numbers? Throw in some Crazy Crapper bets for icing on the poisonous cake and what have you? The casino’s dream player.

Now start multiplying, not bets, but how much a player comparatively loses over time based on the number of bets he makes. When I write one Pass and one Come bet (or more) that can actually be multiple Come bets with no Pass Line bet. Now watch how scary this can get:

[Please note: Obviously winning and losing is not a smooth process. It’s up and down, in and out, but the above figures give you an idea of how bad the best bets can get over a rather short period of time. Most craps players, even those only betting $10 on the Pass and Come wagers, can see a lot of money being worked on by a rather small house edge.]

The above totals are indicative of how the losses grow based on the amount of money being wagered. A $10 bettor of the best bets will get to that $1,000 mark quite quickly.

Now think of attaching poorer bets such as Place bets instead of Come bets. The Place bets will come in with the following edges: 6.67 percent on the 4 and 10; four percent on the 5 and 9, and 1.52 percent on the 6 and 8. These edges will add significantly to a player’s losses.

Okay, let me go the route: Think of adding Crazy Crapper bets with edges of 16.67 percent, 13.89 percent, 12.5 percent, 11.11 percent, 9.09 and 5.56 percent, etc., to get an idea of how hard it is to come out just a little behind, or even or perhaps slightly ahead with a multiple bet approach to the game. A player trying that approach is just asking for trouble and he will get it too.

Now look at this chart and see how a single bet works based on what number you are betting. Dead time is the appearance of all numbers except the two that count for you, meaning the 7 and your specific number. 

PLAYERS’ QUESTIONS ON SINGLE NUMBER BETTING

Question: Shouldn’t I go up on some other numbers because watching all those other numbers appearing will cause me to be bored?

Answer: The key is not to think of those numbers as actual numbers. They are not a part of your game. Right now as you read this article numbers are being rolled all over the world. Those numbers are dead time to you right now. You aren’t concerned with them. You aren’t even thinking about them. The numbers rolled while you are at your table don’t count; it’s as if they are being rolled on another table. By the way, the same holds true if you are taking a break and while you are away from the table a friend of yours tells you about his or her great roll. So what? There’s a great rolls going on right now in many casinos across the world and you really don’t care about them.

Question: Do I take Odds on the number that is mine or do I just go with a plain Pass Line or Come bet?

Answer: I recommend taking Odds on your bet. If you are playing at a 5X Odds game and you want to bet $60, you are better doing that with a $10 Pass or Come bet with $50 in Odds. Your expected loss is only 14 cents. If you bet $60 on the 6 or 8 your expected loss is 91 cents. That’s a big difference. The differences are much bigger using Place bets on the 4, 5, 9 and 10.

Question: What if my number doesn’t hit? How will that make me feel? I’ll be missing out on something.

Answer: Once you get used to playing this way, you will feel nothing. You will also feel nothing when the shooter sevens-out and everyone takes a thumping at the table and you have lost only a single bet. You will also feel nothing when your number hits and then a quick seven-out occurs and everyone is moaning and groaning because they have lost multiple bets. The key thing to remember: Play your game and ignore what happens to everyone else. They don’t exist and those other numbers don’t exist either. Getting in that mindset will take a little while but you’ll hopefully get there.

Question: Won’t I lose comp time if I bet this way? 

Answer: Probably. Remember that your comps are based on the size and number of bets you make and how much time you are at the table. But so what? Comps are given based on your expected losses over time. They aren’t given to you because you are a heck of a nice person. You’re better off buying your own sandwich or gourmet dinner than losing so much money you could be a partner in the restaurant.

Question: How did you come up with this idea? It is as radical as I can think and I have a feeling very, very few craps players ever think of playing this way. What gave you this concept?

Answer: Over the years I looked at various gamblers and types of gambling and one thing stuck in my mind; part of the fun of gambling is the anticipation of the decision or event. Lottery players dream about winning the big one and they can’t wait for the drawing of the numbers. Slot players can’t wait to get to the casinos to play. This holds true of sports bettors, craps players and every other type of gambling. The anticipation is a large part of the fun!

But something happens when you play too much, you become somewhat numb to what’s happening. Before you go to the craps table you are supercharged but once you make countless multiple bets you seemingly become immune to that anticipatory set. You have too much happening. You are kind of numb. So playing that one-number bet continues the anticipatory set more strongly than throwing multiple bets out time and again. 

Aside from being the best money-management system, the single bet rewards you in a more emotional context. Anyway that’s the origin of the idea, a mixture of emotion and math.

All the best in and out of the casinos!

Very few players alive today had the privilege that I had; that is, knowing and learning from the legendary Captain of craps, the late, great dice player, craps expert and teacher who called Atlantic City his domain. I was lucky to know him, play with him, and learn the game of craps and casino gambling in general under his tutelage. 

There are only two living members of his great “crew,” Satch and me. At the time of our early 1990’s dealings with the Captain we two were basically low rollers; in short, five-dollar bettors. The 22-member Captain’s Crew that we joined were high rollers of the really, really high sort. There were more orange chips on the table than red that is for sure. And browns! Many gamblers were intimidated by such wagering levels. I know I was.

Of course, Satch’s wife and my wife the Beautiful AP were with us every step of the way with the Captain. So that leaves four of us. It was some ride! 

Satch has more or less retired from playing craps so I am the only active member still playing the game remaining, I do find that sad but life has a way of taking all of us out of itself as time swiftly passes everybody by. Craps games do not last forever.

 

WHAT’S SO SPECIAL ABOUT SHOOTING THE DICE? 

Everyone at a craps table knows one thing for sure; the casino will pass the dice to him or her and give them a chance to beat the house. This is a wonderful thing if the shooter does well and a horrible thing if the shooter does not do well.

There are only two games in the casinos (one of them will also apply to a licensed online casino) where the player has the opportunity to take the bull by horns and try to beat the house. The first is the high-roller room baccarat of the big table where players actually get to deal the cards. The second is the game of craps where every player is given the opportunity to shoot the dice in order to try to bring home the money.

[Please note: In high-roller baccarat, the players get to deal the cards but all decisions are prescribed by the rules of the game. Since the game is dealt out of a shoe, the player who is dealer has no control over anything although, yes, dealing is fun.]

Most players will take their turn shooting those cubes. There are a few individuals who won’t and they will pass up their turn with the dice. If you do play craps by all means take those dice and try to make some money from your own roll. It is a unique opportunity.

Can players actually throw the dice in a way that gives them a chance to overcome the house edges at the game? Almost none can – except for a few outliers who actually have developed what the Captain called the “rhythmic rolling” ability. That hard-earned skill I will get to at the end of this article.

The Captain categorized shooters based on their proper attitude towards shooting or lack thereof. True, almost all shooters had to face the random game but how they played it meant something to him. Form and style had meaning to him.

THE “I DON’T CARE” SHOOTER

I am sure all craps players have experienced this shooter and probably most of them feel as the Captain does; these “I don’t care” shooters don’t take their shooting seriously. They just whip the dice down the layout and effect an arrogant, uncaring haughtiness thereby letting everyone betting on them know that rolling is meaningless at a game such as craps.

The “I don’t care” shooters are right too. But they are wrong as well. 

Players’ money means something to those players. Certainly the game is random as life itself could be random; as the universe could be, as our individual selves could be but we give meaning to ourselves, our family, friends, jobs and our activities and all the things we think and do and one such thing many of us do is shooting the dice at craps. 

The Captain said, “I want to think the person shooting the dice whether a random shooter or not; I want to see that shooter look serious; knowing players’ money is at stake in the game. That means something to me. Style is important in all aspects of craps and of life. I take the game seriously and I expect other players to take the game seriously as well. If I have money bet on them I want them to care about that.”

The “I don’t care” shooter makes the game less important than the other players think it is. He degrades their seriousness and concern. Craps is far more fun when this person is not at the game.

[Please note: A corollary to this shooter is the same type who also criticizes other shooters for taking their shooting seriously. “Come on, shoot the stinking dice, will you?” Add such admonitions from the “I don’t care” shooter and the game loses its appeal.]

 

THE AVERAGE SHOOTER 

Most shooters care about having a good roll. Just ask them. Sure everyone knows the game is random but that doesn’t stop them from giving it the old college try. They want to do well and their faces show it. When they are having a hot roll, they look as if they are having a hot roll. You see joy written on their faces. When they quickly seven-out, they are crest fallen. You see that emotion too. 

The Captain said, “How a player looks is the key to how they feel. I want the player to want to do well. That caring? Does it translate into a good roll? No, not at all, but it does tell you that you and the shooter are in this game together. Our fates are linked.”

[Please note: Only don’t players, those darksiders, want a quick seven-out when other players shoot the dice or when they roll the dice. Still, many of these darksiders never shoot the dice or they shoot in the “I don’t care” manner showing all the other players that they want to lose. Many right-side players find such darksiders intolerable and actively root for them to lose. It is rare, however, for darksiders to cheer when a shooter sevens-out.]

THE CAREFUL SHOOTER

I am seeing more and more careful shooters in the past 20 years; that is, shooters who take care with fixing their dice on certain pips and taking great care with their rolls. You just know they want to do well and they are sincerely (somewhat) sure that if they can just get those dice to do what they want everyone at the table will make some good money. They believe that in some way their rolls will be good.

The Captain said, “When I go to a gourmet restaurant I want to dress up. I like seeing men and women looking their best. It adds to the dining experience. The shooters who fix the dice in certain ways and take some time with their throws give me a charge. I am so rooting for them to do well, not just so I can win money, but so they feel a sense of accomplishment. If you meet a shooter such as this who did have a good roll; you meet him in a restaurant or the cashier, you thank them. They feel great when you do that. They cared.”

[Please note: “Fixing the dice” is the same as “setting the dice.” It is making sure certain pips on the dice are aligned the way as you want them to be.]

THE RHYTHMIC ROLLER

The Captain of craps believed that some small segment of dice shooters actually had the skills to change the nature of the game when they rolled. These shooters went from random to controlled. They could hit certain numbers more often than the math of the game indicated or they could avoid certain numbers such as the seven. He called these shooters “rhythmic rollers.”

It wasn’t too hard for him to believe in such since he was himself a rhythmic roller. Indeed, the greatest rhythmic roller I ever saw was the woman called “the Arm” who was truly an amazing sight to behold. She was the shooting glue that held the Captain and the Crew (and me!) in her grip. I have never seen a shooter since her that can match her.

For years I taught a course in rhythmic rolling but I found that most students just couldn’t do what was necessary to achieve this ability. It was not any physical limitations, it was discipline coupled with the ability to completely change one’s perception of the game.

My estimation was that for most novice rhythmic rollers it would take at least six months of practice to become somewhat proficient. A huge segment of the students did not want to wait that long and headed right to the casinos to try out what they had just learned. That would be like taking a first week little-league ballplayer and having him play in the major leagues. Success would not happen except through luck. In short, these craps players would be random shooters who fancied themselves rhythmic rollers. Sadly some teachers would egg these poor souls on to hop to the casinos and jointly play together at the same tables.

The next problem was huge. Most of the players could not rid themselves of their poor betting choices. Even those players who actually achieved some mastery of a rhythmic roll just couldn’t stop wagering on propositions that they had no ability to beat. They made the worst bets and then bragged if luck was in their corner on any given session. This luck they mistook for skill but they paid the price for such foolishness.

Many teachers of rhythmic rolling do not have the actual skill but pretend they do. They can be dangerous individuals with which to throw one’s lot. You will learn poor betting methods and a host of supposedly legitimate throws which are not really legitimate at all. So that is one big caveat to achieving a real skill.

[Please note: Rhythmic rolling was coined by the Captain but since his time other words or phrases have also been used to describe this skill such as precision shooting, dice control, dice influence and rhythm rolling. These are all synonyms.] 

ELEMENTS OF THE RHYTHMIC ROLL 

There essentially 10 elements to the rhythmic roll. 

• Proper setting the dice in a way that encourages certain numbers to appear or in order to reduce the appearance of the seven.
• Proper gripping of the dice so there is little or no friction when released.
• Proper arc on the dice, which changes depending on the table.
• Proper bounce of the dice on the table so there is not too much friction or activity on the dice from a table’s layout or the pyramids at the back wall.
• Playing at good tables for one’s throw.
• Proper betting on oneself.
• Avoidance of all poor bets such as the hardways, the horn, the field, and all place bets except perhaps the six and the eight. 
• Extremely small bets on other players. One small Come or Pass Line bet is recommended.
• Regular at-home practice.
• Honesty about your actual skill.

SUMMARY

Listen to the Captain. His words and his ideas have revolutionized much of craps play – at least to those of us who listen to him. How you shoot the dice is a reflection of your character. Be serious about it even if you are playing the random game with your actual shot.

I have written several books about him and I have based my writing on his ideas. Following a player such as the Captain is a smart move.

The Captain has stood me in good stead for three decades.

All the best in and out of the casinos!

Roulette is a game of strategy, and it's all about the numbers; individual numbers, high numbers, low numbers, red numbers, black numbers, odd numbers, even numbers, and dozens of numbers. There are numbers and combinations of numbers that make roulette players’ hearts flutter with excitement. Will my number(s) come in? Or will my numbers disappoint me?

Maybe the biggest hoped for number answers the following question: How much money can I win? Winnings constitute numbers too. Indeed, money might be the essence of all the numbers.

Of course, most offline and online casino games rely on numbers but some are festooned with them and just such a game is roulette. Another such game is craps.

Roulette is an old game too, probably going back to the 16th century to Blaise Pascal’s attempt to create a perpetual motion machine; and perhaps this game goes back even further than that. It is said that Roman soldiers played games by spinning their shields and winning and losing on the outcomes. 

[Please note: Why are casino players so obsessed with games composed of numbers? Is it that in reality we always use numbers to figure out where and how we are walking, running, swimming, sailing, driving a car, flying a plane, throwing a baseball, passing a football, shooting a basketball, checking the price of food, entertainment and the expense of an engagement ring? We might not know these activities all boil down to the use of numbers but they certainly do. We are all mathematicians whether we know it or not.]

PLAYING THE NUMBERS

So how should we play the numbers of roulette? First and foremost, we must remember that the game has an edge for the house. On the American double-zero wheel the edge is 5.26 percent, with two exceptions. On the European single-zero wheel, the edge is 2.7 percent, with one exception. The American wheel has 38 numbers; the European wheel has 37 numbers. The payout for a single inside number is 35-to-1 on both wheels.

[Please note: The edge is simple to determine: Divide 38 into 2 and you get .0526 which becomes a house edge of 5.26 percent in the American game. Divide 37 into 1 and you get .0270 which becomes a house edge of 2.7 percent in the European game. Why 2 and 1? Because the house keeps two units for a player win in the American game and one unit of a win in the European game.]

In the following, I will assume that we know what the edges are at both games and I will only mention those edges that differ from the norm.

INSIDE SINGLE NUMBER BETS

You place your chips directly on an individual number or numbers. The payout is 35 to one.

Pros: Because the payout is 35 to one and a win gets those juices flowing, many players prefer this style of betting. If you are lucky enough to make a hit early, the roulette wheel seems like an easy game to beat.

Cons: The pattern of wins and losses is similar to that of a slot machine, although worse, since you only have a one in 37 or a one in 38 chance to come up with a victory. You can experience long periods of losing streaks. That is not much fun. Slot machines actually hit more often even though their percentage edge is usually greater than the one at roulette.

INSIDE SPLIT BETS

You place your chip(s) on the line between two numbers. If either one hits you win 17 to one.

Pros: With one bet you can cover two numbers increasing your chances to win but not increasing or decreasing the house edge. This applies to all inside combination bets. More numbers covered by a single bet, the better a win on that spin.

Cons: The house edge does not change at all on this bet but your chances of winning do go up. Again, the player can have long losing streaks by betting on the splits. Be careful that other bettors do not accidentally push your bet onto a single number.

INSIDE WAGERS:

STREET BETS

You place your bet on the outside line of the three numbers you wish to win. The payout is 11 to one.

Pros: One bet, three numbers covered. Yes, this can reduce losing streaks.

Cons: By placing your bet on an outside line you might find that other players accidentally push your chip(s) away from this outside line. Be aware of this as it does happen at times. You might want to wait to put your bet out so other players are finished with their bets.

SQUARE BETS

This is a four-number bet. You place your bet on the middle area of four boxes so you have two boxes on top of the bet and two boxes underneath the bet. In short, the lines intersect in the middle of the bet. The payout is eight to one. 

Pros: Easy bet to notice. Losing streaks continue to be reduced.

Cons: Big problem is once again someone knocking your chip(s) off the bet since many players might want to bet any one of those numbers straight up.

THE MONSTER MASHER OR THE BEAST BET

This five-number bet is only found on the American double-zero wheel and covers the 0, 00, 1, 2 and 3 numbers. It has the highest house edge at roulette of any wager; it comes in at 7.89 percent. Absolutely a total waste of your money! Avoid it.

THE SIXER BET

This is a six-number bet that is placed on the outside line that splits three numbers from three numbers. The payout is five to one.

Pros: Again, with a single bet you can cover six inside numbers. The reduction in losing streaks is the best for this style of inside betting.

Cons: There is a tendency on the part of some players who bet the six numbers to want to cover ever more numbers on the inside and that can create a somewhat frenetic individual prone to losing streaks. 

[Please note: Some players want to cover even more inside numbers but not by making individual single bets, so they will put two or more of the above inside combination bets on the layout. You will not see this very often but it is something to be aware of as these bets can be pushed around quite a lot and players don’t want their bets pushed off that layout area.]

OUTSIDE PROPOSITION BETS

You will find all the outside proposition bets ringing the roulette numbers. All of them give you a greater chance of winning than any of the above inside bets. Some are almost 50-50, as in 18 wins and 20 losses on the double-zero wheel and 18 wins and 19 losses on the single-zero wheel. The others are up to a dozen numbers and you can, if you want, bet up to 24 numbers by betting two of these particular propositions.

THE DOZENS BETS

If you look at the layout you will note that numbers 1 through 12; 13 through 24 and 25 through 36 will each form a “boxed” set. These boxes are called the First Dozen, the Second Dozen and the Third Dozen. There is a betting area under each of these dozens for a player to place his or her wagers. The payout on the Dozens bet is two to one. The zero or zeros do not count as part of the Dozens bets.

Pros: Betting a dozen numbers with one bet usually reduces fluctuation and long losing streaks experienced with inside betting. If you bet two of the dozens you get 24 numbers out of 37 and 38 numbers on the respective games. 

Cons: Giving yourself so many numbers may at first seem great but keep in mind the more you bet the more money the house edge works on. You will win more often on these bets but you will also lose more money over time.

COLUMN BETS

There is another type of “dozen bet” that is not boxed but is in a lengthwise line on the layout. This bet is called a Column bet and goes from 1 through 34; 2 through 35 and 3 through 36. These numbers are not in numerical order.  The betting is done at the bottom of the column and the payout for a winning wager is two to one. The zero or zeros do not count as part of the Column bets.

Pros and cons for the Columns bets are the same as for the above Dozens bets. 

HIGH OR LOW BETS

You can bet High numbers which are 19 through 36 or the Low numbers which are 1 through 18. The zero or zeros do not count as either high or low. The payout is one to one. 

Pros: You have 18 chances to win and 20 chances to lose on the American double-zero wheel and 18 chances to win and 19 chances to lose on the European single-zero wheel. The pattern of play is rather close as truly long losing streaks are relatively rare.

Cons: The house edge does not change because you have so many possible winners; just the pattern of wins and losses changes.

RED OR BLACK BETS

With the exception of the green zero(s), the numbers at roulette are either red or black. You can bet on either color and the payout for a winning bet is one to one. 

The pros and cons are the same as for the High and Low bets.

 

ODD OR EVEN BETS

Again, with the exception of the green zero(s), numbers at roulette are either odd or even. You can bet either proposition. The payout is one to one.

[Please note: In roulette your initial bet is not part of payout as it is in slots. If a slot pays 10 coins on a line, one or more of those coins will be the actual bet itself. When a roulette bet wins, you keep the original bet and are paid the full amount. So a 10 to one win is actually 10 and your original bet is returned.]

SURRENDER AND EN PRISON

Some casinos around the world offer players the opportunity to reduce the house edge at roulette in half. Instead of bucking a 5.26 percent house edge against the double-zero wheel or a 2.70 percent house edge on the single-zero wheel, you face a 2.63 percent edge or a 1.35 percent edge respectively.   

In a game with surrender the live casino dealer will scoop up only half your bet when 0 or 00 hits on the High/Low, Red/Black or Odd/Even. Thus, the house edge drops to 2.63 percent on the double-zero wheels and 1.35 percent on the single-zero wheels. 

A 1.35 percent house edge is one of the lowest in the casino. 

PUT ME EN PRISON

En prison also reduces the house edge on those outside even-money bets in half. This unique roulette rule is found on some of the single-zero roulette games. It is simple; if the zero hits your bet is locked up until the next spin of the wheel. You will either win or lose that spin.

[Please note: You can bet the same amount for the same length of time on these outside bets with surrender or en prison and reduce your expected losses in half. Or, two, you can double your bet figuring that your wins will be more when you get hot. Or, three, you can employ an even-money roulette betting system, some of which I have written about in other articles. So what is the best bet to use? In my opinion, it is that first one!] 

DANGER AWAITS

One danger certainly faces players when they are playing those even-money proposition bets and that is falling into the trap of thinking that trends will dominate and be predictable. “Red has hit six times? It must be hot! No, no, it is about to get cold!”

Neither is true. You can structure your betting “system” however you like but do not lull yourself into a state of belief. Land-based and online roulette are random and the results are random no matter what they seem to be in the short run.

 

All the best in and out of the casinos!

Everybody walks into a casino hoping to bring down the house and force management to its knees. However, unless you rank among the James Grosjeans or Don Johnsons of the world, there is an argument to be made that you will have to rely on good luck and every perk you can possibly extract. While luck is something you can hope for but not control, casino generosity, which comes in the forms of free stuff – such as rooms, food, cocktails, fight tickets, etc – can be engineered. If it's an online casino you will find promotions, free spins and plenty more entertaining offers as well.

Scoring a free dinner in the steakhouse won’t make you rich, bit it will make the casino experience more rewarding and take some of the sting out of your double downs and split aces that failed to deliver. “Guys come to Vegas for three days, without a host or a players card, and then they complain, ‘I lost three grand and nobody even said hello to me,’” explains superstar casino host Steve Cyr. Subject of the book Whale Hunt in the Desert, Cyr has hosted high rollers at Vegas casinos such as Hard Rock, Caesars Palace, Palms and Golden Nugget. He’s wined and dined winners and losers alike, lining them up for free rooms on the low end and $10,000 shopping sprees on the high. “The first lesson there is that you should have been rated.”

By “rated,” Cyr means that gamblers should have their gambling tracked. In order to do that, upon arriving at your gambling destination of choice, you go up to a counter, generally designated as the “players club,” and ask for a players card. It resembles a credit card and allows the casino to monitor, for example, how you play blackjack, whether you win or lose, what your games of choice are, and, most importantly, the free stuff that you will be entitled to.

 

But you do need to remember to use it every time you so much as stick a quarter into the slot machine. “I still get people telling me that they hate using the card,” admits Cyr. “I tell them, ‘If you don’t use it, don’t expect a comp.’ By getting rated, you prove your worth to the casino. Everybody says that they gamble a lot.”

So now you are gambling away and your play is being monitored by a computer. What will it take to get a free room? “You want to gamble $1,000 a day,” says Cyr, meaning that you provide the casino with likelihood of winning $1,000. “That’s what it takes to get a free room. This means that your average bet is $50 and you play for three hours a day.”

That value of that play-level can be amped up by coming in on the right day and going to the right gambling spot. “Come mid-week and I might get you a mini suite instead of a standard room,” vows Cyr. It also pays to go to a Vegas casino – which you might hit just once or twice per year – that is affiliated with a casino where you routinely gamble close to home. Companies such as MGM Resorts International (owners of Bellagio, Mirage and MGM) and Caesars Entertainment (owners of Caesars Palace, Rio and Flamingo) have gaming outposts around the world. “Smart players gamble at their little, local casinos that are affiliated with big casinos in Vegas,” says Cyr. “Then you use your clout and points” – generated by gambling close to home – “when you’re playing with the big guys.”

It’s also worth making sure that your casino host knows your value. Your host – you can get one just by calling the casino, asking to speak with a host and letting him know that you are coming to town – can never be certain that you’re willing to gamble at the level you promise. But he can have a better indication of it after you put your gambling money on deposit with the casino.  If, say, you put $5,000 on deposit - once it is logged in, you extract portions of that money at the cashier’s cage or at the table – it increases the generosity that your host is willing to extend in terms of room, food, beverage, etc.. Additionally, it means that you do not need to fly to Vegas with a ridiculous sum of cash in your pocket. 

 

 

 

Upon sitting at the table and doing your gambling, it is worth noting that all games are not created equally. Some favor the house more than others. And if your game of choice is one in which the house has a high win rate, the comps you get should reflect that. According to Cyr, the casino’s profit on blackjack tends to be 12- to 14-percent per $100,000 wagered. Craps is around 11 percent and roulette, says Cyr, “is over 20 percent.” He adds, “If it’s midnight and I have one suite left, it’s going to the guy who plays the wheel. If you play the wheel and you want a little extra, you should say something.”

Other reasons to align with hosts is because they can get you rooms when all the rooms appear to be booked. Same goes for good reservation times at popular casino restaurants. “When you call Scotch 80 [the hot, new steakhouse at Palms in Las Vegas] and they tell you that the only reservations are 6:00 and 10:00, it’s because all the good ones have been taken by hosts,” says Cyr. “If you have a host he might be able to get you in there for the 8:00 dinner you desire.”

And if you gamble high enough, you can offset your loses against rebates paid back by the casino. Known as “discounts,” this is money given back to the largest players. “If you lose $80,000, I will pick up your airfare,” says Cyr, laying out an offer that doesn’t sound so generous. “But if you drop 150-grand, you get back 10 percent. There’s one guy who gets back 20 percent per $1 million he loses.”

But you don’t have to drop that kind of money to draw the attention of a casino host and benefit from the freebies that casinos dole out to gamblers who warrant them. Look like enough of a player and you’ll get courted. “If I see a guy I don’t know and watch him gambling for an hour, I can tell if he is a real player,” says Cyr, pointing out that you draw attention by gambling at the highest limit table that your bankroll and appetite for risk can withstand. “Then, if I think he is a real player, I tell him to check out our room and send a limo to bring him over from wherever else he might be staying.”

There's a supposed Einstein quote: "The only way to make money at a roulette wheel is to steal it when the dealer isn't looking." True or not, roulette cheating has been attempted countless times throughout casino history. Some roulette cheats succeeded spectacularly; others faced arrest or worse. Modern casino security has evolved dramatically, but these four methods actually worked (at least once).

Here are some cheats that have actually been applied to roulette. I am not suggesting that you should do anything funny while at the roulette table. These are only for your information and entertainment. Casino security personnel are aware of these tricks – or they should be – and they are not very friendly to cheaters.

The 4 roulette cheat methods that have actually worked are:

1. Sleight of Hand
2. Roulette Computers
3. Biased Wheels & AP
4. Rigged Wheels, Balls & Magnets

Sleight of Hand Roulette Cheating

The pro cheaters are often posing as players in high-action roulette tables. Their techniques involve extreme misdirection and perfect sleight of hand skills, acquired after years of practice.

What if you could make a bet after the ball has landed on the wheel? Well, there are people who can do it and have done it. Welcome to the art of Past Posting.

Have you noticed that when the ball lands, the croupier puts a piece of fiberglass on top of the straight-up bets on the winning number? This little item is called "Dolly", and casinos started using it to deter cheaters from putting chips on the winning number after the ball has landed.

This should tell you how widespread the trick of late betting was and still is.
Since casinos made it almost impossible for cheaters to bet directly on the winning number for a 35 to 1 payout, the sharks focused their "skills" on the outside bets.

Here is a demonstration of how it is done: There are various methods of past posting. The undisputed master of this type of technique is the famous casino cheater Richard Marcus. In his own blog, you can read how he performed special cheating moves and tricks like The Savannah, The Roulette Mix-Up, and The Roulette Section.

If this article interests you, keep reading. Alternatively, explore other topics like roulette strategy and how to play roulette.

The Chip Cup Scam

The Chip Cup scam involves teaming up with a croupier and using a little plastic prop called Chip Cup. The croupier then gives you hundred dollar chips, instead of five dollar ones, when you exchange your money. Watch this video to see how it's performed.

Chip Theft

Using distraction techniques and fast, perfectly coordinated moves, tricksters, often working in teams, can steal colored chips from other players' stacks or the bets on the table or even from the dealer.

Roulette Computers: The High-Tech Roulette Cheat

No article about roulette cheats would be complete without exploring the use of roulette computers. They are a huge issue in roulette. There are opposite views about them.

Some say they don't work in real casino conditions, and the people who sell roulette computers to wannabe cheaters are scammers themselves. Others claim that they are the only way to make a scientific prediction and win.

Then there are those who would never use an illegal device in a casino and end up in jail or beaten up by casino security. And some others go to great lengths to find casinos in faraway countries where the use of computers inside is not strictly prohibited.

How do Roulette Computers Work?

Every roulette computer setup is different, and that's why it gets hard to understand how they work. They are usually a group of various small devices that do different things:

1. The tracker – A device that records the data of the wheel, either by human input or laser scanning. The tracker device registers the speed of the wheel track and of the roulette ball, and their relative position.
2. The calculator – A program that is on a stand-alone device or embedded in a smartphone. It takes the data from the tracker and, by doing complex calculations, tries to almost instantly predict where the ball will land.
3. The earpiece – The prediction by the calculator is then transmitted by audio to the player via an earpiece.

In theory, this concept might work. Take measurements, using physics equations calculate where on the wheel the ball will land, and transmit this info to the player to make the correct bet. There are also some cases that prove that the idea of roulette computers can work in practice.

Historical Examples

The Eudaemons, a group of four UCSC students, had moderate success in Las Vegas casinos in the '70s using some sort of roulette computer, which they hid in their shoes. They made in excess of $10,000, but an incident in which the insulation failed and the solenoid burned one of the players brought the project to a screeching halt.

Before them, in 1961, Edward Thorp, the mathematician who wrote the first book on how to count cards in blackjack, Beat the Dealer, and the father of electronic communications and information theory, Claude Shannon, had created their own roulette computer. This was actually the first wearable computer ever made.

In lab conditions, it worked brilliantly, but real life posed some unique challenges that the professors had a hard time overcoming.

In 2004, two Serbian men and a Hungarian woman won over £1.2million in two visits to the Ritz casino in London. After the casino reviewed their game, as recorded by the security cameras, they concluded that the players used a laser scanner and roulette computer to beat the wheel.

Subsequently, they were arrested and their funds were frozen. However, the players were ultimately allowed to keep their winnings because no hard evidence has been found of any wrongdoing.

Why Roulette Computers Aren't Viable

I don't consider roulette computers viable. Here's why:

1. Illegal – Criminal charges in most jurisdictions.
2. Detection – Casinos use device detectors at entrances.
3. Heightened awareness – Post-2004 Ritz incident, casinos actively hunt for users.
4. Impractical – Exact measurements under pressure are nearly impossible with limited betting time.
5. Unreliable – Most sold devices make wrong predictions.
6. Seller profits – If they worked, sellers would use them, not sell them.

Roulette computers are an unfavorable bet. You'll more likely lose money buying one than get rich using it.

Now, how about if you could make all the calculations of a computer in your head? Wouldn't that be great? Check out this video.

Biased Wheels and Advantage Play

Advantage Play means taking advantage of inefficiencies in the way the game is performed. One such "inefficiency" is the bias the roulette wheel can show in favoring specific numbers.

Despite the expertise and high quality control of roulette manufacturers, a wheel can never be 100% perfect; there will always be imperfections that will slightly favor a sector. This little bias can get worse if you add the wear and tear of old wheels, especially if they are not often tested and serviced. The advantage player spots and exploits these biased roulette wheels.

García Pelayo: The Master of Biased Roulette Wheels

The most famous bias player is García Pelayo from Spain. In the 1990s, he collected data on thousands of roulette spins of various roulette wheels at Casino Gran Madrid. Then he analyzed the data with a computer program and identified a strong bias in some of the wheels.

Pelayo, together with his family, went on and did the same bias attack in various casinos all over the world. His story became a documentary and a movie.

Rigged Wheels: Casino Roulette Cheats

There have been rare reports of cheaters rigging roulette wheels or putting an extremely small undetected magnet onto the ball in order to control it remotely. This is done when the casino is closed to the public and sometimes with the cooperation of corrupt casino staff.

In the 1800s, Pierre Dugal, when the casino closed its doors, hid in the toilet and when all the staff went away, he rigged the roulette wheel to hit specific numbers more often.

In 1973, Monique Laurent became known as the Frenchwoman with the cigarette pack. With the cooperation of her brother, who worked as a croupier, she rigged the roulette ball with a miniature radio receiver and then controlled it with a transmitter hidden in a supposed cigarette pack. Over a period of time, the team "won" over $1 million until they were busted.

Roulette Cheats: Frequently Asked Questions

Can you cheat at roulette?

Historically yes, but modern casino security makes it extremely risky. CCTV cameras, RFID chips, and trained staff catch most attempts today.

Is roulette cheating illegal?

Most methods are illegal. Advantage play like tracking biased wheels is a grey area. It’s not criminal, but casinos will ban you.

Do roulette computers work?

Theoretically possible, practically impractical. They're illegal in most jurisdictions and casinos use electronic device detectors.

Can you cheat at online roulette?

No. Online roulette uses certified random number generators. Live roulette games have multi-angle cameras and monitoring systems that flag anomalies immediately.

What's the most successful roulette cheat?

García Pelayo's biased wheel exploitation won millions legally. For illegal methods, the 2004 Ritz Casino laser team took £1.2m before arrest.
 

It is a “battle to the finish” between the casinos’ two most popular table games, blackjack and craps. Which is the better game? 

There are many ways to look at the contest. Of course, you can state house edges but these are often obscured or enhanced by the number of decisions players make at each game. A fast game with a low edge can be just as dangerous as or even more dangerous than a slow game with a bigger edge.

For example, how many hands of blackjack does a player actually play at a full table of seven? Of six? What about that player going head-to-head against the dealer; how many hands does such a player play and what’s the long-term edge in such games? How much is this player expected to lose per hour?

At craps there are so many various bets, some good, some bad, some awful. A player can be playing a strong game against the house or find himself in the equivalent of a burning building. Which bets and what edges are players willing to face? Is it best to play alone at a table or with one or two others or with a whole crowd? 

There are so many scenarios when playing either table game that it can make a player dizzy. What bets does a player make at craps and how many of them? What strategies does a player use at blackjack? How many decks does the player go up against?

[Please note: I will assume all blackjack players are playing basic strategy. There are different basic strategies for the various numbers of decks. These strategies have been created by computers and they explain how to play every hand a player gets versus the dealer’s up card. While there are many different basic strategies, they are not all that different from each other. We’ll assume all blackjack players are playing the correct strategy.]

I will also give you some comments from blackjack and craps players about why and how they play the game they like.

A REASONABLE BLACKJACK GAME

Most players play a multiple-deck blackjack game, composed of either six or eight decks. Six decks will be our reasonable game. In the good old days of Las Vegas blackjack players could challenge single-deck games with outstanding blackjack rules; you’ll be hard-pressed to find such games today.

Most players play a multiple-deck blackjack game, composed of either six or eight decks. Six decks will be our reasonable game. In the good old days of Las Vegas blackjack players could challenge single-deck games with outstanding rules; you’ll be hard-pressed to find such games today.

A general rule of thumb is to speculate that blackjack games come in with about a half-percent edge against the player, which translates into a loss of 50 cents per $100 wagered. Therefore I will use one-half percent as our median edge; above that is a game that is poorer or getting poorer. Below that is a game that is getting better and better. 

Many games will mix up the rules, some good, some bad; but our chart is not going to do such mixing. I am also only using rules and situations that are most often found in casinos. So obscure rules found in individual casinos but not throughout the world will be ignored. 

The number of decisions per hour combined with the house edge will create an edge that can be viciously sharp or somewhat blunt. We can see why certain situations add to the speed of the game and other situations reduce the speed of the game. While a game’s edge on individual wagers technically remains the same, the speed of the game gives that edge more money to work on and thus more money that the player can lose over time.

So let me take a look at a few of the above rules and situations:

Blackjack at a full table will see a player play about 60 hands an hour. Blackjack with the player going head-to-head against the dealer will see a player playing around 100 hands per hour. The more decisions the faster that long-run kicks in. So playing at a full table is a good thing, a very good thing.

The auto-shuffler will increase the number of decisions per hour by about 20 percent. Best to play at games where the dealer shuffles as these are far slower.

A talkative dealer will tend to slow down a game, meaning fewer decisions. A silent dealer will tend to speed up a game, meaning more decisions. 

Deep cuts of the cards are good for card counters but they are not good for basic strategy players. Shallow cuts are the best for basic strategy players as the dealer will need to shuffle more frequently.

You can see that the good rules give you a chance to get more money into action when the game is more favorable for you or to reduce your losses. Casinos that limit your ability to utilize these options are restricting your chances to have success at any given session.

WHAT PLAYERS SAY ABOUT THE GAME

RONALD: “Blackjack can go back and forth between the player and the casino. At rare times a dealer gets hot and the players lose consistently or the player goes on a rather big winning streak but usually the house wins slowly. Since blackjack players basically face that one-half percent house edge, many sessions are winners for them. This keeps most of them coming back for more. It keeps me coming back that’s for sure.”

MARTA: “I am a social person and at many blackjack tables I get into good conversations with the other players and even the friendly-type dealers. I find the game is somewhat relaxing and I win many sessions that I play. I do not like to play against the dealer alone because the game goes too fast.”

JIMMY: “I go to the casino with the best rules. That makes sense to me. You want to play the games that give you the best chance to win.”

FRANCES: “I am not a card counter or anything but I have read a lot about the game. I play at full tables at games with the best rules that I can find. I like cuts that are not deep. I think overall I am a good player and I certainly do enjoy the game.”

BLACKJACK VOLATILITY

While blackjack is a back-and-forth game, there are times when it can jump in the favor of the players or jump in the favor of the casino. When a player has some double downs, splits and doubles after splits, a winning streak at these times can be a strong positive enhancement to his or her bankroll. However, if the player loses on these options a severe slide can happen.

 

CRAPS THOUGHTS 

Craps is probably the most exciting and frustrating game played in the casinos. It is a communal game where players shoot the dice and feel they have some control of what is otherwise a random game. In short, craps players feel they take the game into their own hands. Except for true dice controllers such a feeling of control is an illusion. Still there are better and worse ways to play the game and these ways determine how much of a monetary edge the casinos have over the players.

Most craps games across the world are usually similar with one glaring exception, the number of Odds that players can take on the Pass Line, Come wagers, Don’t Pass, and Don’t Come wagers. The more a player can place in Odds, a bet with no house edge, and the less a player bets on the above mentioned good bets, the better he will fare over time.

Let me give you a short list of the good bets, the medium bets and the bad bets at the game of craps. Here they are with their house edges:

[Please note: Sometimes it is good to translate the house edges into money. That is easy to do. Any Seven comes in with an edge of 16.67 percent and that means the house will win $16.67 on $100 wagered over time. For a $10 wager the loss is $1.67. A good bet on blackjack will lose 50 cents per $100 wagered, while a bet on the Pass Line will lose $1.41 per $100. The faster the game, the more likely such a monetary edge reveals itself.]

Quickly: All bets in the first two columns are a waste of time and money. The higher the edge, the worse the bet; it is really as simple as that. Since most craps players are rightside bettors let me stick with those as our example. If you bet the bad and medium numbers then you might like the game of craps but it will not be economically rewarding for you.

Most craps players have it in their heads (as I used to) that betting three numbers is the way to go. Of course, some other players prefer to bet a slew of numbers. I once saw a high roller lose 1.4 million dollars in one hour betting almost every number and proposition. Yikes! What happened to him in Vegas stayed in Vegas.

If you bet three Pass Line and/or Come bets then you triple the money that goes against the 1.41 percent house edge. That’s tripling your expected loss.

ONE BET ON ONE NUMBER 

Now my idea that craps players should only bet one number at the game is radical (I will cover this fully in my article “A Game of Numbers”) and most craps players will think I am out of my mind. However, a single bet on a single number puts the game in league with blackjack in terms of hourly losses for the same amount of a player’s wager.

With 36 possible combinations on the dice, most rolls will have no effect on the player; only the player’s number and the 7 matter. When numbers other than the mentioned two are rolled, that is dead time. Dead time can’t hurt you.

CRAPS VOLATILITY

Craps might be slightly more volatile than blackjack but it is not so volatile that it can crush you in the one-bet one-number strategy.

WHAT PLAYERS SAY ABOUT THE GAME

THOMAS: “Craps gets my juices flowing. No other game does that for me.”

WEYWARD: “When you are winning several bets in a row and the shooter is having a decent roll, nothing matches that!”

MARCUS: “Craps is the game. Once you get into it all other games seem relatively calm.”

So, folks, what is the best game? I have no idea. I guess it all comes down to a matter of taste.

All the best in and out of the casinos!

Multi-Strike Poker has been with us since the early 2000s – multiple lifetimes as electronic casino games go. That it’s held onto a niche in casinos and is also available on online casino after all this time speaks to the quality the concept. 

It’s an intriguing game that can create some huge wins, but getting the most out of Multi-Strike requires some changes from normal video poker strategy.

THE BASICS OF MULTI-STRIKE POKER

Multi-Strike, which was created by Leading Edge Design and is distributed by International Game Technology, is available in many of IGT’s video poker game families. You can play Multi-Strike versions of games including Jacks or Better, Bonus Poker, Double Bonus Poker, Double Double Bonus Poker, Bonus Poker Deluxe and Deuces Wild.

• You have the opportunity to play four hands per play, but that is not guaranteed. 
• Accordingly, the maximum bet usually is 20 credits – four times the usual five-credit max.
• That buys you a chance to advance through hands that pay one, two, four and eight times normal payoffs.
• You advance by either winning or getting a randomly dealt free pass. 
• Lose at the 1x level, and you’re done. You’ve lost 20 coins for one hand. That’s the downside. The upside is that if you win at video poker or get a free pass at the 1x level, you’re dealt a 2x hand. Win or get a free pass there, and you get to play a 4x hand, and a win or free pass there brings you the 8x hand.
• There’s potential gold in that hill. At the 8x level, a royal flush isn’t worth just 4,000 coins, or $1,000 on a 25-cent machine. It’s worth 32,000 coins, an $8,000 bonanza for a 25-cent player, plus any winnings at the lower levels.
• Even smaller pays become nice bankroll padders as you move up the latter. If at each level you just got a pair of Jacks – normally a five-credit pay for a five-coin bet --- you’d get five credits at the 1x hand, 10 at 2x, 20 at 4x and 40 at 8x for a total of 75 credits. That’ll keep you going for a few hands.

MULTI-STRIKE POKER ODDS

If winning hands were the only way to advance, Multi-Strike would be a much tougher game. To use 9-6 Jacks or Better as an example, about 45.4 percent of hands are winners given optimal strategy.

To make Multi-Strike an attractive game for players, Leading Edge added free passes to move you up a level. They occur often enough that you’ll advance from each level about 50 percent of the time.

That means you have a 1 in 2 chance of reaching the 2x hand, a 1 in 4 chance of reaching the 4x hand and a 1 in 8 chance of reaching the 8x hand.

Payoffs at higher levels raise the overall payback percentages of the games, if only slightly. Instead of the usual 99.5 percent with expert play, 9-6 Jacks or Better pays 99.8 percent on Multi-Strike. Percentages on 8-5 Bonus Poker rise from 99.2 percent to 99.4 percent, and 9-6 Double Double Bonus Poker rises from 99 percent to 99.2 percent.

STRATEGY ADAPTATIONS 

The big potential paybacks mean players need to prioritize advancing at early levels.

Instead of the best play being the one that will bring the highest average return, that has to be tempered with plays that bring more frequent wins.

One feature of regular video poker strategy is that the play that wins most often doesn’t necessarily win the most money. 

Let’s use 9-6 Jacks or Better as an example. Holding low pairs from 2s through 10s win less often than holding one or more unpaired high cards. But the low pairs bring a higher average return, so they rank higher than unpaired Jacks or higher on strategy charts.

In Multi-Strike, the need to advance is so strong that if you have two or more unpaired high cards at the 1x level, you’ll want to hold them instead of a low pair.

The strategy switches change at each level. The higher you get, the fewer changes are called for until at the 8x level, Multi-Strike strategy is the same as single-hand strategy.

Specifics change depending on game, but a grounding in 9-6 Jacks or Better strategy is a good place to start. Check out a sampling of how Multi-Strike strategy changes from level to level in that game.

1X LEVEL

Four parts of a straight flush: In regular 9-6 Jacks or Better, you’d hold a hand such as 8-9-10-Jack of another suit even if the fifth card was another Jack. In Multi-Strike, it’s better to hold a high pair to guarantee advancing a level.

There is an exception. If your four parts of a straight flush are 10-Jack-Queen-King, then you have a chance with a royal with an Ace as well as a straight flush with a 9. In that case, you’d still hold all four instead of a high pair.

Low pair: Here’s where the most frequent strategy differences come. In normal Jacks or Better strategy, hands that rank higher than low pairs are any paying hand; four parts of a royal or straight flush; three parts of a royal; four parts of a flush; and 10-Jack-Queen-King of mixed suits.

But in Multi-Strike, high cards have extra value because of the advancement factor. Adapted strategy doesn’t call for you to hold single high cards instead of low pairs, but it does call for discarding low pairs to hold any two high cards.

Given a hand such as 8 of spades, 8 of diamonds, 3 of clubs, Jack of hearts and Ace of spades, you’d hold 8-8 in regular Jacks or Better. In Multi-Strike, you hold Ace-Jack instead to maximize chances of getting to the 2x level.

High cards of the same suit are more valuable than high cards of different suits because they leave open royal flush and straight flush possibilities. But regardless of whether the suits are mixed, holding two or more high cards instead of a low pair is a play to make at the 1X Multi-Strike level.

A note on multiple high cards: Unless they’re the same suit, leaving royal flush possibilities, 

Four parts of a straight: Except in rare instances, Multi-Strike players don’t hold four parts of a straight.

The most valuable four-card straight with no straight flush possibilities is 10-Jack-Queen-King of mixed suits. That’s not as good a hold as four-card flushes or three parts of a royal, but it’s better than low pairs, two or more high cards of mixed suits or two high cards of the same suit.

On other four-card straights including high cards, the high cards are more valuable at this level than the straight potential. For example, a chart at wizardofodds.com lists the expected value of 8-9-10-J as 1.68 coins, but lists the Jack by itself at 1.79.

Even the four-card straight Ace-King-Queen-Jack misses the strategy list at this level. It’s better to play King-Queen-Jack.

With no high cards, discard four-card straights at this level.

2X LEVEL 

At this level, you’re still holding high pairs instead of four-card straight flushes except for 10-Jack-Queen-King, and you’re still holding two or more high cards instead of low pairs.

The main difference comes on straights. Four-card open-ended straights with no high cards, such as 4-5-6-7, don’t rank high on the strategy table, but they’re not throwaway hands. If the hand also includes a high card or a pair, hold that while breaking up the straight. If not, go for the straight.

4X LEVEL

With four times pay and only one more level to advance, strategy starts to become more like regular Jacks or Better. 

Four-card straight flushes: Revert to holding a four-card, open-ended straight flush such as 7-8-9-10 of the same suit instead of a high pair.

However, continue to hold a high pair if you have an inside draw to a four-card straight flush, such as 7-8-10-Jack suited and a Jack of another suit.

Low pairs: At earlier levels, low pairs were pushed behind multiple high cards regardless of whether they were suited or of mixed suits. 

At 4x level, three-card royals remain ahead of low pairs. So does the four-card open-ended straight 10-Jack-Queen-King of mixed suits.

However, low pairs move ahead of two high cards, suited or unsuited, and three or four unsuited high cards.

Four parts of a straight: Ace-King-Queen-Jack of mixed suits returns to the strategy list. At 4x level, it’s a better play than King-Queen-Jack.

Also, 8-9-10-Jack of mixed suits is a better play than holding the Jack by itself. However, with multiple high cards such as 9-10-Jack-Queen, it remains better to hold the high cards and skip the straight draw.

8X LEVEL

Advancing ceases to be factor when there are no more levels to advance. At the top tier, your best play is to follow regular optimal strategy for 9-6 Jacks or Better.

Specific plays and adjustments will differ for other games. Every video poker game has its own quirks. But basics from Multi-Strike Jacks or Better – especially downplaying low pair and straight draws at early levels – will help you get the most out of any Multi-Strike game.

Figure out how to legally beat a casino game – whether it’s through the rather benign act of card counting or by pulling off a play as audacious as Kelly Sun’s multi-million-dollar edge sorting move – and you’ll discover that getting asked to leave casinos is an occupational hazard.

Advantage players recognize the back-offs and 86s as an expected consequence of brutally bringing down the house. As I was once told by world-class horse handicapper Bill Benter, “If they’re not kicking you out, you’re doing something wrong.”

But landing in the so-called Black Book, a roster of people who are legally prohibited from entering the premises of any gambling enterprise in the state of Nevada, well, that is something else altogether. For starters, placement in the Book frequently involves a felonious act.

According to Anthony Curtis, publisher of Las Vegas Advisor and a former advantage player himself, it’s a special circle of casino hell. “It takes undesirables to the Nth level,” says Curtis. “There are different degrees of being backed off. This is the ultimate. You are not being backed off from a casino. You are being backed off from an industry.“    

Officially known as the Nevada Gaming Control Board Excluded Person List, the Black Book was launched in 1960. Once an actual book bound in black covers – though, over the years, there have been other colors – the Black Book is a list of criminals, casino cheaters, con artists and various unsavory types who, it is believed, do damage to casinos just by being there. Mobster Sam Giancana – who supposedly had ties to the CIA, gained control of casinos such as Sands and Desert Inn, and showed himself to be a prolific skimmer of profits – ranked among the first gangsters entered into the Book.

History has it that the Black Book was created as a means for the gambling industry to convince the American Congress that it could capably police itself and keep criminal elements off of gaming floors. 

A copy of an early Black Book, which debuted with a list of just 11 undesirables, open to the page of diminutive but ultra-violent mobster Tony “The Ant” Spilotro, is on display at the Mob Museum in Las Vegas. The most recent additions to the Book, which now has 35 entrants, are Anthony Grant Granito and James Russell Cooper. Both convicted of scamming the Bellagio out of some $1.2 million, they made it last November.

Working in cahoots with a croupier, the two men posted their bets after the dice landed. Of course that turns craps into an easy game to beat. So easy, in fact, that they overcame an estimated 452-billion to 1 odds in odder to reap their seven-figure rewards. A grand jury found them guilty of theft and cheating and the two men were sentenced to at least four years of prison. But the Nevada Gaming Control Board took things further by placing them in the Black Book, which currently exists as an online listing with photos, last known residences and, of course, the misdeeds.

 

For some cheaters, getting in the Black Book is enough of an onus that they’d rather go to jail if it helps them to beat the Book. One gaming insider remembers a recent scam artist who was famous for marking cards at the blackjack table. “He was arrested at home and the guy had a mini-factory for creating daubs (the dye used for marking cards), cheating equipment and disguises,” says the insider. “He made his living by robbing casinos and did not want to be banned from entering them.”

He reportedly rallied to serve jail time but be kept out of the Black Book. “He would have much preferred that,” says the source. “But the guy did not get it and now he can’t go into a Nevada casino.” He pleaded guilty to a count of felony burglary and received probation – plus his spot in the Book.

While it’s hard to get into the Black Book – entering the rogue’s gallery involves doing something that truly offends powers that be at the Nevada Gaming Control Board – it is even harder to get out. Most of those who escape the Book manage to do it by dying. Even giving up on gambling will not help. According to “Las Vegas Review Journal”, the last of the Black Book’s surviving OGs was Los Angeles-based mob boss Louis Thomas Dragna. He died in 2012, at age 92, and broke free of the Book with his passing.

But what is it like to actually be in the Black Book? Surprisingly, it seems that most members of the devious sect – save for the cheater described above – don’t mind being there all that much.

For starters, by the time you do something notorious enough to enter the Book, you’re probably persona non grata in most casinos anyway. In some quarters, in fact, placement in the Black Book is essentially an advertisement for one’s underhanded skills. Being in the Book, says expert card-marker William Gene Land, “was a badge of honor. I held my mug and it opened up a lot of opportunities for me – if you know what I mean.”

What he means is that he was able to work with highly profitable card-marking teams that operated beyond the Book’s range of influence. Now claiming to be out of the cheating business – “I’m retired; I stay home and play with my grandchildren” – Land earned millions by spearheading plays despite his notoriety. “I couldn’t go into a Nevada casino,” he admits. “But there were plenty of games outside of the United States.”

Another inductee to the Black Book, a cheater who famously  rigged slot machines and asked that his name not be used, shrugs it all off as well.  “It doesn’t really affect me,” he says. “[Being put in the Book] felt more like a publicity stunt than anything else. The irony is that I live in Las Vegas (where bars and even supermarkets typically have slot machines) and I can walk into any bar to play slots.”

He considers this for a minute, laughs and concludes, “So how much sense did it really make?” 

 

*Credits for main photo in this article belongs to Eran Alergant

• The basics of money management boil down to protecting your money, limiting your losses, making sure you keep some winnings, and limiting the number of chances the house edge has to work against you.
• When you do that, you won't change the house edge or create extra winning spins, but you will make sure your bankroll stays a little fatter and isn't stretched beyond your limits.

Money management is not a magic spell that can turn you into a big winner on the slots. 

It can do nothing to change the odds of the games. You'll win sometimes and lose more often no matter how well you manage your money.

But sound money management techniques can help you to limit the losses in the bad times and to keep more of your winnings when the reels and bonuses are kind to you. 

That makes learning to manage your money an important skill for anyone who plays slot machines.

The techniques described here are not difficult. Many of them are merely common sense. But they can make a difference in the size of your bankroll.

TIP #1: SET YOUR BANKROLL BEFORE YOU PLAY

Regardless of whether you're playing offline or online casino, give due thought to your stakes for the day.

If you take stock and decide you can afford to risk $100 for the day, then limit your online buy-in to no more than $100, or take no more than $100 in gambling money to a brick-and-mortar casino.

Once you've set your bankroll for the day, don't exceed it. If you've bet your bankroll at $100 and you lose it all, that's it. Don't tap on other funds. Walk away from the games for the day.

If you win or never reach the bottom of your bankroll and can extend your play, terrific. But part of smart money management is to never bet money you can't afford to lose. You want your gambling money to come from an entertainment budget, not from money needed to pay the rent, mortgage, grocery bills or any of the other necessities of life.

TIP #2: KEEP YOUR SLOT MONEY AND MONEY FOR OTHER EXPENSES SEPARATE

That could mean keeping money to play with and money for going out to lunch in separate compartments in your wallet, or it could mean gambling money in your left pocket and other money in your right.

Regardless of how you decide to separate your funds, don't let them mix. You've already set your playing bankroll, and your lunch money is not part of it. When it's time to go to lunch, you want your lunch money to be there.

TIP #3: DO NOT BORROW MONEY TO GAMBLE

That goes double for credit-card advances. Borrowed money is expensive money.

Most offline casinos have machines where you can use your credit cart to initiate a cash advance. You then go to the cashier's cage to sign paperwork and collect your money.

There is a transaction fee that depends on the amount you want to borrow. If, for example, the fee for a $100 advance is $10, it's like adding 10 percent to the house edge. To break even for the day, you'd have take that $100 to the slots and cash out $110.

That doesn't include the monthly interest your credit card company charges on cash advances. Those can exceed 20 percent, and can recur month after month unless you pay your bill in full.

Paying the fees and interest, then playing games on which the house has an edge, makes it all too likely that not only will you lose money, but you'll wind up farther behind than you intended when you set your bankroll.

 

 

TIP #4: TRY A SYSTEM OF FLOATING WIN GOALS AND LOSS LIMITS

Win goals and loss limits have been part of the slot player's toolkit for decades.

In their strictest form, the limits have you set both a floor and a ceiling. If you've set your bankroll for the day at $100, then that is your loss limit. If you lose $100 you stop and don't draw on other funds.

At the same time, you set a win goal. If you decide that for your $100 bankroll, you'd consider it a great day if you could walk out ahead by half that amount, then your win goal would be $50.

Any time you reach either your win goal or loss limit, you call it a day. In this example, if your gambling bankroll reaches $150, meaning you're ahead by $50, you stop there and lock up your winnings. If the bankroll reaches zero, of course, you've hit your loss limit and are done for the day.

Most players find a fixed win goal too limiting. 

What if you have a $50 winner on your first play? That's easy enough to do with four of a kind on many 25-cent video poker machines, a big bonus round or a mid-level progressive jackpot on a low-limit video slot or a combination such as three triple bars or three 7s on a three-reel slot.

You're probably not going to want to leave after making one bet. You've logged onto the online casino or walked into an offline casino to have a good time, and you want to make it last.

 

One way stay in action while still using solid money management is to let the win goals and loss limits float, with adjustments in both your floor and ceiling every time you reach a win goal.

With floating goals and limits, it's best to narrow your win goal to 20 percent of your loss limit instead of putting that 50 percent gain in your sights right away.

Let's say you have a $100 loss limit and set your win goal for $20. If you win $20 to bring your bankroll to $120, you've reached your win goal.

At that point, adjust both your win goal and loss limit by that $20 win. You raise the win goal to $40, but you also link it to your loss limit. The loss limit remains at $100, but it's $100 from a bankroll that now stands at $120.

That means you're locking up $20, there for you to take home even if your luck turns sour and you lose $100 from that point.

By doing that, you assure yourself of walking away with at least part of your budget amount without hindering your flexibility to keep playing.

You do the same thing every time you reach a new win goal. In our example, you've won $20, and the new win goal is $40. If you reach $40 in winnings, then you raise the win goal to $60 and you also raise your floor. If you lose $100 from your new total of $140, then you walk away with $40 in your pocket.

The idea is that any time you have a nice winning streak, you make sure you walk away with a little more of your money and don't give it all back to the casino. 

The precise amounts of your starting bankroll and the percentage you set as win goals are up to you. There are players who are more comfortable with 10 percent as a win goal; others like 25 or 30 percent.

The small amounts you lock up after reaching each win goal may not seem like much, but coming home with $20 more than you'd budgeted as your floor on multiple casino trips adds up fast. It certainly beats losing early winnings back to the casino time after time.

TIP #5: PUT AWAY AT LEAST HALF OF ANY REALLY BIG WIN

Think of good-sized jackpots as something separate from win goals and loss limits. You want to make sure you bring a large share of the money home.

Don't repeat the sad tale of a video poker player who wrote that she draw a royal flush good for $1,000 on a 25-cent machine. She decided to move up to a dollar machine to see if she could win really big. Instead, she lost it all and went home empty handed.

When you win a jackpot like that, it's OK to try higher denomination games to see if lightning can strike twice for an even bigger jackpot. But it's also important to set limits.

With a $1,000 jackpot, immediately put at least $500 of it away, not to be touched for the rest of your casino outing. 

It's your call as to what to do with the other $500. If you want to try a more expensive game, good luck to you. If you want to set a higher loss limit while playing the same games, that works too. If you want to put an even bigger portion of it away, take your partner or friends out to a nice dinner, go to a play, add it to your children's' or grandchildren's' education fund or just put it in savings. more power to you.

With a really enormous, lifestyle-changing jackpot such as the multi-million-dollar payouts on Megabucks, give yourself a cooling-off period. If you want to gamble with an extra few thousand dollars, that's only natural. But leave almost the entire jackpot intact until you've had time to let the initial rush of excitement pass, talk things over with your family or financial adviser, and decide what you really want to do with the money.

The jackpot doesn't have to be anywhere near that large for taxes to come into play, and that brings special needs.

In the United States, for example, the Internal Revenue Service requires casinos to have players sign tax forms before the casino can pay any jackpot of $1,200 or more. The casino usually does not withhold tax money -- it's up to you as a player to pay. Make sure you hold onto enough money to pay the taxes in addition to money you're keeping to bring home.

TIP #6: ON MULTI-DAY TRIPS, DIVIDE YOUR MONEY INTO SESSION BANKROLLS

There are few worse feelings than running out of money on the first day of a casino trip -- and it's a feeling millions of players have had over the decades.

You don't want to pay credit card fees, and you don't want to just avoid the gaming floor either.

One way to make sure you're in action until the end is to divide your bankroll by the number of days for the trip.

 

If you bring $1,500 to Las Vegas for a three-day trip, budget yourself at $500 per day. 

Don't carry the money earmarked for the other two days. Put it in the room safe or some other safe place. Then if you hit your loss limit for Day One, you still have money for Days Two and Three separated.

TIP #7: SLOW DOWN

The faster you play, the more chances the house edge has to work against you.

Don't be in a rush. Take time to walk around the casino and explore what it has to offer. On winning spins, take a few seconds to look at the winning paylines. Order bottles of water or other beverages -- it's good to stay hydrated -- and chat with the waitress. Take frequent breaks.

You don't have to just hit the button as soon as the reels stop over and over and over again. Take your time.

The most popular slots in land-based casinos are video slots, yet the games that hold their places on casino floors longest are three-reel games.

Not only that. Slot games in an online casino, which essentially are video slots in an Internet environment, earn their keep longer than video slots offline.

If there seems to be a contradiction in all that, with the games in the least popular format holding their popularity the longest, there’s really not. There are reasons the most popular three-reel titles such as Double Diamond hold their own for decades and hot new video slots titles can be on and off casino floors in a matter of months.

In any format, slot games must earn their keep. They must pay for their own purchase or lease, and they must earn enough above and beyond that to justify retaining them instead of turning the floor space over to a new game.

Let’s take a look at some of the issues surrounding popularity and endurance in each format.

THREE-REEL SLOTS

Slots with physical reels and stepper motors driving the spins were the most popular machine games until the video slot revolution began in the late 1990s.

They differ from video slots in one very important way: To varying degrees, video slots emphasize an entertainment factor with their graphics, animation, interactive bonus play and sound effects. Three-reel slots emphasize gambling.

Some modern three-reel slots add bonus events. There are prize wheels on Wheel of Fortune slots with three-reel base games, and some games have additional video screens for bonus events.

But basically, the attraction of three-reel games is in the potential for big wins. 

The most common format for three-reel games uses a single payline. Nearly every winning spin will pay several times the size of your bet. That’s different from video slots, where there it’s common for games to have 30, 40 or 50 paylines and where many winning spins pay less than your total bet.

Slot manufacturers differentiate their games through the pay structure. Double Diamond multiplies winnings through its diamond symbols – diamonds in winning combinations double the wins. Blazing 7s, which has faded in recent years after a 40-year run of popularity, built its following thrown rapid-hit progressive jackpots that started at $1,000 on a $1 machine.

But by placing the main emphasis on your shot to win at slots, three-reel slots essentially occupy a similar position as blackjack, craps or roulette. They are classic gambling games where everyone know the rules and conditions. They don’t have as large a following as video slots, but they players who love them are loyal and keep coming back to the same games, just as blackjack or craps players keep coming back for more. 

Popular three-reel slots drive a steady level of business from customers who might not play at the same level if only video slots were offered.

 

 

VIDEO SLOTS

Video slot players like to win money, too, but they like some entertainment with their gambling.

With ever-increasing capability of offering high-definition images, animation and video clips, video slots are an entertainment experience.

Over the years, we’ve seen Star Wars slots and Men in Black slots with clips from the movies, Top Gun slots with not only movie clips but special effects motion chairs to make you feel like you’re in the cockpit of a fighter jet, Elvis, Michael Jackson and Dolly Parton slots that put you in the groove with their music, and Hollywood Squares slots with their brand of celebrity tic-tac-toe.

With or without pop culture tie-ins, video slots come with a mix-and-match blend of pick-a-prize bonuses, wheel spins and free spins, as well as special attractions such as expanding wilds that can fill an entire column or stacked symbols that can fill an entire screen with the same symbol.

It’s all designed to keep you intrigued and entertained. Even a session with a small loss can be a good time if you’ve had fun playing all the extra features.

However, there comes a time in nearly every video slot’s lifetime in which most players have seen and played all the bonus rounds, and the entertainment factor loses some of its initial excitement.

Some games, such as Jackpot Party, develop a loyal enough following to keep some floor space for years on end. But for the most part, even the hottest video slots pass peak popularity within three or four months. They may hold on with fewer machines per casino for longer periods, but when revenues drop, they must make way for newer games.

Every game must earn enough revenue to justify its spot on the floor. When that revenue drops below house average, casinos turn to newer games that bring a whole new entertainment and excitement factor.

Casino manufacturers play a continuous game of “Can you top this?” They create new bonus events, use new video and animation, and hope to capture players’ imaginations for the next several months.

That leads to a shorter lifespan for individual slots than on the three-reel format, but with higher peak performances and a higher revenue total for the entire category of video slots.

ONLINE SLOTS

Like video slots, online slots have a huge entertainment factor with bonus events of all kinds.

Unlike offline video slots, online slots have less pressure to measure up against house average revenue to maintain a spot on the host site.

Online slots must earn their keep, but the needs are different than offline. Online slots must pay for their purchase or lease, and they must earn a profit. The bar is higher with slots developed by outside companies than with proprietary games developed in-house. Paying ongoing licensing fees means a slot must continue attracting players to maintain its space.

However, online casinos don’t face the same need to move old games out to add new games as offline casinos have. Offline, each game takes up physical space. If an offline casino that has had six OMG! Kittens machines on the floor decides business now requires only two such machines, then the space for the other four is given over to new games.

Online, OMG! Kittens need be displayed only once in the slot listings, and that can accommodate as many players as wish to play it.

Because the games take no physical space, online casinos can leave them up and running as long as they’re making a profit, even if they fall below house average. The games are not taking space away from other, potentially more profitable games.

Those conditions lead us to see games such as Zeus, Invaders of the Planet Moolah or Gold Fish online even when their numbers offline decrease. Their presence doesn’t impede online casinos for adding new games such as Jumanji, Elephant King or Monopoly Epic II.

So it’s not at all contradictory that individual three-reel slots hold popularity longer than video slots even tough video slots are more popular overall, and that online slots last longer than offline video slots. The differences grow naturally out of what the games offer and the needs of the host casinos and sites.