This article is not about dice control. There are organizations that will sell you lessons that purport to teach you how to throw the dice so that sevens come out less often than their normal 1-in-6 frequency. Stanford Wong, a respected gaming writer, wrote a book on how to do this and came on Gambling with an Edge to talk about it. (Later he said he wasn’t sure if it worked or not.)
Call me a skeptic. Frank B was also on our show and he convinced me that this was likely impossible — and if not impossible, at least very difficult. Today’s article is about something else entirely.
I’m assuming you know the basics of craps before we start. If you don’t, and you want to, www.wizardofodds.com/craps provides an excellent free primer you can read.
A friend told me about a casino, not in Nevada, where if you play craps for $50,000 coin-in a month, you get very nice weekly mailers. He asked me if this was potentially beatable.
Absolutely! . . . Depending.
In simple terms, it’s beatable if the mailers and comps exceed your expected loss from playing $50,000 a month at a negative game.
The biggest factor is, “Do they count odds when they figure your average bet?”
The usual answer is no. But sometimes they do! Especially at small, out-of-the-way casinos where somebody in marketing gets a “brilliant” idea on how to attract more play.
Odds are an even money bet, meaning neither the house nor the player wins or loses on these bets in the long run. Well run casinos do not count odds bets as part of your average. Since the house doesn’t make money on these bets, they don’t reward players for making them.
But if they do . . .
For now, let’s assume they count odds bets. In this case, you want to be betting the don’t pass/don’t come side and laying odds rather than betting the pass/come side and taking odds — simply because the size of the bets you make when laying odds are larger than when you’re taking odds.
If they do not count odds in your average bet, it doesn’t matter a lot which side you take. While the ‘don’t’ side has a very slightly lower house edge against you, there are social reasons why it’s better to take the pass/come side. Namely, more than 90% of players bet the pass/come side and you blend in better when you go with the crowd.
Betting $50,000 coin-in takes a while, so let’s assume you’re going to bet $25 a roll and you’re going to do it on the pass/come side. Now what?
On every come out roll, make your bet. This will create a “point” to hit (4,5,6,8,9, or 10). Do not buy numbers. That’s more expensive.
If it’s not the come out roll and you don’t have bets on all six of the points, bet $25 on the come. This will keep the most money in action per time period.
After knowing how to play, the object becomes slowing the game down. The casino isn’t actually counting every bet you make. They use your average bet and the time you are at the table to make an estimate.
To slow the game down, it’s better to be playing at full tables, where lots of players are making hard way and other sucker bets than it is to play at a table where there are very few players. The more people who are making these bets, the longer it takes to pay them off. So you get fewer hands per hour.
When it’s your turn to throw the dice, take your time! While I believe that all the dice are the same and if you throw them and hit the foam diamonds at the end of the table the dice will be “random enough,” dice players as a group are superstitious. Many players have quirks. Be a quirky shooter!
You will be presented with a group of dice at the start of your roll and instructed to pick two of them. Take 10 seconds deciding which ones are lucky! When it’s time for you to throw the dice, take time to set them “just so” before you let them go. It won’t affect the outcome, but it will kill valuable seconds.
After all, other than the mailers you’re getting back, every roll made costs you money. The fewer rolls you can make, the less money you will lose in getting your mailers.
Approximately every 10-15 rolls, throw one or both dice off the table! Apologize profusely, of course. Then say, “Same dice, please,” as though it really matters. Well, it does matter. When the die is retrieved, the box man is going to have to examine it to make sure it’s okay, and if you have insisted on the same dice, everyone has to wait until he finishes that process. If you didn’t request the same dice, he can examine the die during the time you’re throwing.
Aim, without appearing to, for stacks of chips at the other end of the table. If you can hit one (which you won’t usually be able to do), they will need to scramble to figure out how many chips were in whose stack. This takes some time. Sometimes there is a dispute about who had which chips. Great! That takes a lot of time!
Once an hour or so, step back from the table (while you can still see your chips to make sure nobody is messing with them), and take a five-minute fake phone call. You’re still there, sort of, and your clock keeps running while you’re not losing anything!
Occasionally, ask a question. Perhaps for the best nearby Chinese restaurant — or whatever. It will take time to get the answer. Wasting your time is your friend! In his book, Comp City, Max Rubin discusses other ways to slow the game down. Well worth reading. It’s almost 30 years old, and some things have changed since then, but the general principles outlined in the book still apply.
