Even as we speak, I'm at Binion's watching their double-ball roulette. It's more action packed (two balls, two winning numbers) and interactive (player pushes the mechanism to launch both balls). I imagine this will appeal to Millennials, even though payouts are less. Traditional one-ball/double-zero roulette house advantage is about 5.25% on all bets, right? What's the house advantage on double-ball, and are there any better or worse strategies?
Double Ball Roulette debuted at the Tropicana in early 2015, followed by Binion’s downtown. As the name and the question state, it uses two balls, launched through a tube by a player pressing the button; compressed air shoots the balls onto the wheel, one after the other, so they’re never in danger of colliding.
The layout is essentially the same as traditional roulette, with a jackpot side bet on both balls landing in the same selected number that pays 1,200-1. With two balls in play, there are, obviously, two separate results from each launch-spin.
To win an outside bet (red or black, odd or even, 1-18 or 19-36, etc.), both balls have to win (in other words, both have to land in red or black, odd or even, etc.); a winning bet pays 3-1. A split bet that one ball lands on red and the other on black pays 1-1. A dozens bet (first 12, second 12, third 12) pays 8-1 if both land in the selected dozen.
For the inside bets (hitting on or around a single number), players have two chances to win. The inside bets pay from 34-1 on one number to 2-1 on six numbers.
As always, we turned to Michael Shackleford, the Wizard of Odds, for the math on the game.
He analyzed the expected return on all the bets, which you can see at wizardofodds.com, but the lowest house advantage came in at 5.33% on a single number, so there's your best strategy. The two-number bet is 5.54% and the three-number is 5.89%.
As you say, the payouts are slightly worse than single-ball roulette at 5.26%.
 |
Dave in Seattle.
Nov-15-2017
|
