Can Craps Be Beaten
And even better, you Can Craps Be Beaten get to play them at the best online Can Craps Be Beaten casinos around. Browse through our website to find the juiciest. A player should understand that craps is a casino gambling game. That means it has a built-in house advantage that guarantees the online casino will win in the long run. This does not mean that the game cannot be beaten. In fact, craps is the second most favorable online casino game for the player. Live casino games offer a real casino experience similar to Can Craps Be Beaten what you will find at Las Vegas casinos. The games are Can Craps Be Beaten streamed, and there is a live dealer. Furthermore, you can see and hear everything happening at the table as well as enjoy the bonuses like you would if you were sitting in the casino. With the exception of the games listed above you simply cannot beat casino games in the long term. This is especially true with craps but no different for slot machines or the roulette wheel. There’s not a strategy or system that can overcome the house edge. Although no wagering system can consistently beat casino games based on independent trials such as craps, that does not stop gamblers from believing in them. One of the best known systems is the Martingale System.
Testing the notion that “precision shooters” can gain an edge at the craps tables
By Frank Scoblete
So is there a way to truly test whether someone has the ability to throw the dice in a way that changes the odds of a craps game to give them the edge? The simple answer is “yes.”
The concept of dice control at the craps tables—also known as precision shooting or rhythmic rolling—is perhaps the game’s most controversial topic. Can a shooter actually change the odds of a craps game with his throwing technique?
This practice was introduced to the modern casino world by the late, legendary Captain from Atlantic City, who believed that certain shooters, the special few he called “rhythmic rollers,” could change the nature of the game from random to controlled. When I met him in the late 1980s, he had developed a complete concept of a controlled shot’s nature.
The controlled shooters he was interested in set the dice a certain way (please note: simply setting the dice is not dice control), gripped the dice a certain way, and threw the dice in a soft arc with backspin. He felt these shooters changed the odds of the game to favor the players on certain bets. This would classify them as “advantage players”—similar to card counters at the blackjack tables—because they possess an advantage over the house.
While the Captain was a superb shooter, perhaps the greatest controlled shooter I ever saw was a woman known as “The Arm.” I was fortunate to play alongside both of them for over a decade.
Still, many traditional gambling writers, players and casino executives claim there is no such thing as a controlled shooter. Indeed, when Golden Touch shooters (www.goldentouchcraps.com) come to a table, some box personnel and/or floor people will make it a point to tell such shooters, “You know, that thing (or dice control) doesn’t work. You can’t win that way.”
This is in itself a strange statement, since you will never hear casino personnel say such things to random rollers; those who throw, wing, loft, fling, heave or bounce the dice down the table. Obviously, random rollers have no edge over the house—so why don’t the casino folks tell these shooters that what they are doing will not work?
So is there a way to truly test whether someone has the ability to throw the dice in a way that changes the odds of a craps game to give them the edge? The simple answer is “yes.”
Every single player who has read one of my books on dice control and/or taken one of the Golden Touch dice control classes knows that incontrovertible proof for dice control exists.
There are two methods by which dice controllers (or would-be dice controllers) can prove whether they have an actual edge over the house. The first method is to keep a record of one’s SRR, which is the shooter’s seven-to-rolls ratio. In a random game of craps the SRR is 1:6; that is, over many decisions, the seven will come up once every six rolls on average.
Over many rolls, if the shooter has an SRR over 1:6, he or she can be confident that they have control. The better the SRR, the more control. Shooters will throw 10 to 20 thousand rolls before they can say with confidence that they are indeed changing the nature of the game. Some of these elite shooters actually have regulation craps tables in their homes, which they practice on.
So what kind of SRR would a student need, as a minimum, to have an edge? If you have an SRR of 1:6.3, you can overcome the house edge on certain bets. Shooters without axis-control must use the Hardways set, where the dice show hardways all around – 2:2, 3:3, 4:4 and 5:5, with the 1 and 6 being on the left and right sides, respectively.
The second method for proving you have dice control skill is to pass the SmartCraps tests. SmartCraps is a software program that analyzes throws to determine if the shooter has axis control. The SRR does not in and of itself measure axis control; in short, you do not need axis control to have an edge at the game. When you use the Hardways set, if the 1 or 6 spot shows, that is an off-axis result for that die—but one such result cannot end in a seven out.
With axis control you are shooting for certain specific numbers. For example, the use of the 3V dice set looks to hit sixes and eights. A shooter could have an SRR of 1:6, but if this shooter is hitting an inordinate percentage of sixes and/or eights despite such a low SRR, he indeed has control. My new book Cutting Edge Craps: Advanced Strategies for Serious Players explores axis control in depth—who has it, and what to do when you do have it.
The passing of either or both of these tests is flat-out verification that the shooter does have the ability to change the game. You can’t fool yourself into thinking you control the dice when your SRR shows you aren’t, or when your SmartCraps tests show you don’t have enough axis control to use sets other than the Hardway set, even if your SRR is decent.
Our Golden Touch students can test themselves. Again, you can’t con the SRR or the SmartCraps tests. Dice control is firmly proven by the players who are passing these criteria. There’s no nonsense here. You think you can control the dice? Great—test yourself and see if it’s true.
The SRR and SmartCraps tests are the be-all and end-all of proof. As for the critics, let them carp and moan and try to sell their ideas to the public. The casinos realize that this works. That’s why they tell you it doesn’t work. Thankfully, so many dice setters (as opposed to controlled shooters) exist that the casinos find it hard to see who does and who doesn’t actually have the skill to beat them.
Can dice control be proven? Certainly. In the next issue of Casino Player, I’ll discuss the real nature of the back wall pyramids and how dice really react when they bounce on the table.
Frank Scoblete’s newest books are Slots Conquest: How to Beat the Slot Machines, whichfeatures advantage-play slots; Casino Craps: Shoot to Win, which comes with a DVD showing controlled throws. Cutting Edge Craps: Advanced Strategies for Serious Players and Beat Blackjack Now are available from Amazon.com, at your favorite bookstore, or by mail order by calling 1-866-SET-DICE. You can also call that number for a free brochure.
Testing the notion that “precision shooters” can gain an edge at the craps tables.
I recently wrote a couple of blog posts about how to become a professional gambler. In those 2 posts, I listed several gambling activities where you could get a theoretical long-term mathematical edge. That’s what you’d need to be able to play those games for a living.
Those activities include blackjack, horse betting, poker, progressive slots, sports betting, and video poker. (And progressive slots are debatable—a serious professional gambler would probably avoid most of those games because of the high chance of never hitting the progressive at all.)
Most casino games, though, are completely impossible to beat in the long run. This post explains why in general in the section about probability and the house edge. I look at specific games and why they have an edge in separate sections devoted to each game.
To understand how the casino makes money, you need at least a rudimentary understanding of probability. Luckily, probability is pretty easy to understand. It’s just a mathematical way of expressing how likely an event is to occur.
The probability of something is just a number between 0 and 1. Something that’s impossible has a probability of 0. Something that’s a sure thing has a probability of 1. Anything else has a probability of between 0 and 1.
This number can be expressed as a fraction, as odds, a decimal, or as a percentage. To calculate the probability of something, divide the number of successful outcomes by the number of total possible outcomes. It’s that simple.
Here’s an example using a coin toss. You guess heads, and you want to know the probability of achieving that result. There’s one way to get heads when tossing a normal coin. But there are 2 possible outcomes, both of which are equally likely—heads or tails. This means the probability is 1 out of 2, or 1/2. You can also express that as 50%, or as 1 to 1 in odds format. Or you could even say that the probability is 0.5. They all mean the same thing.
Let’s take another example—you’re rolling a 6-sided die and want to know the probability of rolling a 1. There are 6 possible outcomes, and only 1 of them constitutes a success. That’s a probability of 1/6, or 16.67%, or 0.167, or 5 to 1.
The house edge comes in when you compare the payoff for a winning bet to the probability of winning. Many casino game bets, like a bet on red or black in roulette, are even-money propositions. This means the payoff odds are 1 to 1. You risk a unit, and if you win, you win a single unit.
If the probability of winning were 50%, you’d have a theoretically break even game in the long run. You wouldn’t win, and neither would the casino.
But the probability of winning that bet on an American roulette wheel is only 47.37%, which means you’ll win a single unit 47.37% of the time, and the casino will win a single unit 52.63% of the time. The difference between the 2 is the house edge: 52.63% – 47.37% = 5.26%
Other games have different payoffs, but those payoffs are always lower than the odds of winning. For example, in craps, if you bet that the next roll of the dice will result in a 7, you have a 5 to 1 probability of winning. But that bet only pays off at 4 to 1 odds.
Of course, in the short run, you’ll rarely see results that mirror your long-term expectation. But in the long run, your results will get closer to the expectation. This is called the Law of Large Numbers.
Now let’s look at betting systems, then I’ll follow that up with a discussion of some specific casino games.
Why Betting Systems Can’t Overcome the House Edge in the Long Run
Lots of people think you can beat a game with a house edge by using betting systems. In this context, a betting system is just a way of raising and lowering your bets based on what happened on the previous bet or bets. Depending on the system, you might raise the size of your bets when you’re winning. Or you might raise the size of your bets when you’re losing. It depends on the system.
Either way, it doesn’t matter. Every bet you place on a casino game is a separate event, independent of the previous bet. If the individual bet has you at a mathematical disadvantage, the sum of all those bets will also have a mathematical disadvantage. Think of it as adding up a series of negative numbers. No matter how you do it, if those numbers are all negative, the sum of those numbers will also be negative.
Here’s an example: You’re using a betting system where you raise the size of your bets when you’re losing. Your goal is to recover your losses from the previous bets. (The Martingale System is a good example of this kind of system.)
The problem is that no matter what kind of casino game you’re playing, you’re eventually going to hit a big losing streak. That’s the nature of random chance. The longer you play, the likelier it is that you’ll hit that losing streak, too. When you do, it will wipe out any small winnings you gained from your betting system.
If you really were able to beat a casino game with one of these betting systems, the casinos would go out of business. None of these systems are complicated. The Martingale System just involves doubling the size of your bet after each loss. That’s not hard to figure out. If it worked, everyone would know, everyone would do it, and the casinos would have to shut down after losing all their money.
But no matter what anyone says, no one is winning at any of these negative expectation games using a betting system. There are no professional baccarat players, no professional craps players, and no professional roulette players.
You might find some people who claim to be able to affect the odds of a craps roll with controlled throwing, but I’m skeptical of that. And sure, you might be able to find a biased roulette wheel, but that’s unlikely and impractical. Neither of those techniques uses a betting system, either.
You should still understand how such negative expectation games work, though. For one thing, you might want to play them recreationally. If so, you should learn to minimize your losses. Also, sometimes casinos put together promotions where they give the player the best of it. You can’t recognize such opportunities unless you understand the math behind the games to begin with.
You can find some good bets at the craps table, as long as you define “good” as meaning bets with a house edge lower than average. If you define “good” as meaning you have an edge over the house, you won’t find any bets at the craps table that qualify.
You can also find a whole lot of bad bets at the craps table. These are bets where the house edge is so much higher than average that it’s scary. No matter which category of bet you choose at the craps table, you’ll eventually lose all your money if you keep playing.
A mathematical edge of 13.89% is way higher than you’ll see at most casino games, or, in fact, most bets at the craps table. If you’re the kind of person who makes a bet when the house edge is that high, you’re probably never going to be a professional gambler.
What about an actual hardway bet? A hardway bet is one in which you get an even total by rolling doubles. For example, you can bet on “10 the hard way” or on a “hard 10.” This is a bet that a roll will come up with a 5 on each die, for a total of 10.
This is a multi-roll bet. It stays in action until you either win, or until the shooter rolls a 7, or until the shooter rolls a 10 the easy way–in either of the latter 2 cases, you lose. The payoff for this bet is 7 to 1. The odds of winning this bet are 8 to 1, though.
It’s easy to calculate the edge here, too. You’ll lose an average of $100 over the course of 9 bets, for an average loss of 11.11% per bet. That’s still a huge house edge. But even the best bets at the craps table have a house edge of over 1%. The pass line bet is the most basic bet at the craps table, and it has a house edge of 1.41%. The come bet also has that same edge.
Can Craps Be Rigged
One bet at the craps table has a house edge of 0%–the free odds bet. It’s not even labeled on the table, but it pays off at true odds. The problem is that you must make a pass or don’t pass bet before being allowed to place an odds bet. (You can also take or lay odds on a come or don’t come bet.)
Some people contend that you can get an edge at craps by influencing how the dice land through controlled shooting. I’m skeptical of this in the extreme. But I’ve seen better-known and better-respected gambling writers than myself who believe that it’s possible.
The idea is that the house edge in craps is low enough that you don’t need to be super-accurate with your controlled shooting to flip that edge. You only need to be able to change the odds enough to overcome the house edge and get the odds into your favor.
You can find any number of videos and books explaining how to set the dice. I can’t guarantee that you’ll succeed, but if you’re going to try it, prepare to spend a LOT of time practicing.
The house has an edge over the player in roulette because of the green 0 and the green 00 on the wheel. You might find a tournament or a promotion that will help tilt the odds in your favor, though.
Here’s why the zeroes make such a big difference:
It’s not because you always lose when the ball lands on a 0 or 00. It’s because those 0s increase the number of possible outcomes from 36 to 38. All the payouts at the roulette table would be break-even payouts if there were 36 numbers on the wheel.
For example, a single number bet has a payoff of 35 to 1. If you had a 35 to 1 probability of hitting a single number, that would be a break-even (or “fair”) bet. But the actual probability of hitting that single number is 37 to 1. If you bet on 2 numbers (a 2-number bet), the payoff is 17 to 1, but the probability of hitting one of those 2 numbers is 18 to 1.
Of course, a roulette wheel with a 0 and a 00 is only one kind of roulette wheel—an American roulette wheel. You can also find roulette wheels that have only a single zero. These are called European roulette wheels. This reduces the house edge from 5.26% to 2.70%. That’s a big difference, but it’s still a bet that the house will win on in the long run.
One way to think about such a game is that it has only half a zero instead of one or 2 zeroes. You still can’t win such a game in the long run, though. Your money should just last longer.
But let’s say you find a casino that offers you $100 in free chips just for showing up, but you can only bet those free chips on even-money bets. Let’s say that once you’ve wagered those chips, they’re taken away by the casino.
If you gambled those chips on an even-money bet in roulette, you’d have a positive expectation, because the $100 in free chips didn’t cost you anything. You should, on a standard roulette wheel, win an even-money bet 47.37% of the time, so the expected value of that promotion is positive: $47.37.
Or suppose you find a casino that’s holding a promotion where they’re paying 39 to 1 for single number bets on the roulette wheel between the hours of 7pm and 9pm. Since the probability of winning is 37 to 1, you now have a positive expectation situation.
Theoretically, there’s one other way to beat roulette—find a wheel that isn’t working entirely right. This is called a “biased wheel.” The idea is that a mechanical imperfection in the roulette wheel causes it to land on some numbers more often than others.
If a wheel is so biased that some numbers come up 1/34 of the time, for example, and you knew which numbers they were, you’d have an edge over the casino as long as you stuck with those numbers. You’d have an edge, because now you’d win $3500 once while losing $3300, for a net win of $200 over 35 spins. That’s an average win of $5.71 per spin, meaning YOU’D have an edge of 5.71%.
To succeed at this, you’d need to record how often each number comes up over a huge number of spins. You’d need a huge sample size, though, because with a small sample size, some numbers are naturally going to come up more often than others.
On top of that difficulty, not all wheels have a bias. You could spend hours clocking a wheel’s results only to find that it’s perfectly accurate or so close to accurate that you can’t get an edge.
Finally, modern casinos spend money on good equipment. When you read about roulette legends who won loads of money by finding biased wheels, you’re reading about players who played at older casinos in a time gone by. Even if you could find such a wheel, the casinos pay close attention now, too. They’re likely to move or replace the wheel once they realize that you’re taking advantage of its bias.
How To Win At Craps Every Time
This makes finding a biased roulette wheel as an advantage play impractical, to say the least. I’m not even going to get into the idea of using a laser pointer and a computer to predict where the ball is going to fall. This would be illegal anyway, but I mention it for the sake of completeness. Anyway, that’s why you can’t beat roulette.
How To Beat Craps
Baccarat is fun, but it’s also absurd. You go through a lot of rigmarole for what is basically a coin toss with no skill involved. It’s a card game where you compare your score with the banker’s. You can bet on the banker or the player, but either way, the house has an edge of at least 1%. Card counting is of no help in baccarat, either.
Other casino card games, like Casino Holdem, Let It Ride, and Three Card Poker sometimes involve a skill element and sometimes don’t. Either way, it doesn’t matter—you can’t get an edge at those games under normal conditions. If there’s a progressive jackpot attached to the game, it could theoretically get high enough to change your expectation, but it would have to be high indeed.
Electronic Craps Table
Keno is still popular, but not only is it impossible to beat, the house edge is crazy high. On average, the house edge in keno is 30% or so. It’s basically a casino-run lottery game. I’m not a fan of lotteries because the payback percentage is always too low.
Pai gow poker is worth playing, but it can’t really be beaten. You’ll have so many hands that push that it turns out to be a much slower game than most other casino games. With proper strategy, the house edge is lower than average, too, so you’ll lose less money gambling recreationally at pai gow poker than you would at most other casino card games.
Most slot machines are unbeatable. The only slot machines where you can sometimes get an edge are the ones with progressive jackpots and the ones that “bank” money as you play. The trouble is that you’re never sure about the odds involved. It’s impossible to know when the game switches from negative to positive expectation. And with slots that don’t have progressive jackpots or banking functionality, forget about it. They just have a high house edge, and that’s it.
Most casino games are impossible to beat regardless of your skill level. That doesn’t mean you should avoid playing them. If you enjoy shooting craps or betting on the roulette wheel, feel free to indulge. Just don’t convince yourself that you can ever beat these games in the long run.
Sometimes you’ll see an otherwise successful poker player or sports bettor waste a lot of money playing games where they can never get an edge. If you’re going to play these games that can’t be beaten, do so for fun, and don’t risk amounts of money that have any consequence.