Month: March 2020

The simple answer is very favourably, indeed. Single-zero roulette, also known as ‘French’ or ‘European’ roulette, is the standard, traditional form of the game outside the United States. As the name suggests, single-zero roulette is played with a wheel consisting of 37 numbered pockets, including a single green zero. The true mathematical odds against, say, a single-number bet are 36/1, but the payout is just 35/1, which creates a house edge of 2.7%. Of course, the same house edge applies to so-called ‘outside’ bets on combinations of numbers, including red/black, odd/even and so on.

By contrast, double-zero roulette, often known as ‘American’ roulette because of its prevalence in the United States, is played on a wheel with 38 numbered pockets, including a green single-zero and a green double-zero. The addition of the extra pocket increases the mathematical odds against a single-number bet to 37/1, but the payout is still only 35/1, which increases the house edge to 5.26%. This long-term advantage over players is not only 2.56% higher than single-zero roulette, but also higher than most other casino table games.

Worse still, triple-zero roulette, which was introduced, as ‘Sand Roulette’, at The Venetian on the Las Vegas Strip in October, 2016, is played on a wheel with 39 numbered pockets, including a green single-zero, a green double-zero and a green triple-zero. Payouts, though, remain identical to those for single-zero roulette, increasing the house edge to an eye-watering 7.69%, with no advantage to players other than, possibly, a lower table minimum stake.

Blackjack is a gambling card game, played with one or more 52-card decks of cards, in which players try to beat the dealer by acquiring cards with a face value higher than the dealer, but totalling 21 and no more or, in the event that the dealer draws additional cards, such that their face value exceeds 21 – in other words, the dealer ‘busts’ – simply with a face value totalling 21 and no more. Aces count as 1 or 11 points, tens and court cards count as 10 points and all other cards count as face value. An ace and a ten or court card constitutes ‘blackjack’, the highest possible hand, which pays odds of 3/2, or 6/5, provided the dealer does not also have blackjack, in which case the result is a tie, or ‘push’.

Each player places a bet and the dealer deals two cards, face down, to each player and two to himself, the first of which, known as the ‘hole’ card, is dealt face down and the second of which, known as the ‘upcard’, is dealt face up. If the upcard is an ace, the dealer offers an optional side bet, known as ‘insurance’, whereby players can bet, at odds of 2/1, for not more than half their original bet, that the hold card is a ten or a court card. If the upcard is a ten, a court card or an ace, the dealer checks the hole card to see if he has blackjack and, if so, turns over the hole card immediately. If the dealer has blackjack, all bets, except insurance, are lost, unless a player also has blackjack.

Thereafter, each player, starting with the player immediately to the left of the dealer, may choose to stand (pat), hit, double, split or, if allowed, surrender. To hit means to draw one, or more, cards, to double, or double down, means to double an original bet in return for a single card, while to split means to split a pair, or two 10-point cards, to form two individual hands. Surrender, where offered, means to forfeit half the original bet and take no further part in the hand.

After each player has concluded his turn, the dealer reveals the hold card. He will hit on 16 or less and stand on 17 or more, with the possible except of a ‘soft’ 17, made up of an ace and a six, or a combination of cards totalling six. If the dealer hits and exceeds 21, all players with hands totalling 21 or less win, otherwise any players outscoring the dealer wins.

Craps, of course, involves rolling two dice, each of which can land on one of six possible numbers, which makes a total of 36 possible number combinations. The odds against throwing a seven or, indeed, any other specific total, in craps is determined by the number of ways to throw that total. Seven can be thrown in six different ways – the highest number of possible combinations for any two-dice total – and, unsurprisingly, is the most frequently rolled number. The probability of rolling a seven is 6/36 or, reduced to the lowest common denominator, 1/6, so mathematically, a player can expect to see a seven once in every six rolls. In other words, the odds of throwing a seven on any roll of two dice, randomly, are 5/1.

Of course, in craps, if you are betting ‘pass’ and you roll a seven on your first, or ‘come-out’, roll you win; if you roll a seven once a point has been established you lose. The pass bet is the fundamental bet in craps, paying even money, with a house edge of 1.41%. Players can also bet on the single-roll ‘Any Seven’ or ‘Big Red’, which wins if the next number thrown is a seven; the winning odds, though, are just 4/1, or a full point lower than the true odds, which equates to a house edge of 16.67%. So, despite the mathematical expectancy of seven occurring more often than any other number, Any Seven is the definitive ‘sucker’ bet in craps.