Casino Questions

Despite the image portrayed by Hollywood, nowadays, if you’re caught cheating in a casino you’re unlikely to come to physical harm but, depending on what you do and where you do it, you could find yourself in serious trouble. By definition, cheating is illegal, but punishments for cheats, or suspected cheats, vary from casino to casino and from jurisdiction to jurisdiction.

If you’re caught cheating, or even just suspected of cheating, you can reasonably expect to be detained and interrogated by casino security staff. In Nevada, for example, casino staff need only identify probable cause to detain suspected cheats, as long as the conditions under, and the length of time for which, a suspect is detained are deemed ‘reasonable’. If, following interrogation, the casino finds evidence of wrongdoing, you could be charged with a felony; if convicted, you could be liable for up to six years’ imprisonment and/or a fine up to $10,000, plus restitution to the casino.

Nevada casinos can also, legally, seize your winnings if you are suspected of cheating. Furthermore, if your cheating is warranted serious enough, your name could be entered onto the Nevada Gaming Control Board (GCB) Excluded Person List, colloquially known as the ‘Black Book’. The Black Book is essentially a ‘Who’s Who’ of charlatans, crooks and rogues from the past two or three decades – including infamous cheats, such as Tommy Glenn Carmichael and Ronald Dale Harris – who are, or were, permanently excluded from every casino in Nevada as a result of their illegal activity.

In Texas hold’em poker, it is not uncommon for the dealer to accidentally expose, or ‘flash’, one or more cards, such that the rank and suit of the card(s) can be seen by one or more players. If the first or second card dealt is exposed, or more than one card is exposed, the mistake is considered serious enough to warrant a misdeal; in that case, the dealer should collect all the cards, shuffle the deck and start dealing again from scratch.

However, aside from the first or second card dealt, a single exposed card does not warrant a misdeal. In fact, the dealer should complete dealing hole cards to each player before dealing the player with the exposed card a replacement card, face down, and announcing the rank and suit of the exposed card. Play continues as normal, except that, at the end of the first round of betting – when the dealer would normally discard, or ‘burn’, the card at the top of the deck before dealing the flop – the previously exposed card becomes the first ‘burn card’ instead.

If the dealer, by the act of dealing or otherwise, causes a card to fall off the table, the card should be considered exposed, regardless of whether or not it has been seen by any of the players. In the event that one or more burn cards is exposed – at which point there will, by definition, already be bets in the pot – the dealer should return the exposed card(s) to the deck, shuffle, burn another card and continue dealing as normal; no misdeal should be called.

Of course, it is possible to win at roulette, as it is at any other casino game, in the short-term. However, even if you play the European, single-zero version of roulette – which offers a significantly lower house edge than the double-zero, or triple-zero, American versions – the game is designed to give the casino an inherent advantage, so you will always lose in the long-term. Furthermore, the longer you play roulette, the more likely it is that the percentage return for the casino, and hence the percentage loss for you, the player, will approach the house edge. Casinos lack clocks and windows and often ply players with free alcoholic drinks, so that they play, badly, for as long as possible.

Mathematically, it is impossible to win at roulette in the long-term, so the best a player can do is reduce the house edge to a minimum, focus on outside bets, which pay only even money, or 1/1, but offer a near 50% chance of winning and manage their bankroll. A European roulette wheel, with a single green zero pocket, offers a house edge of 2.6%, but an additional green double-zero pocket increases the house edge to 5.2% and an additional green triple-zero increases the house edge to 7.69%, or one of the highest that you are likely to find in the casino, outside of some ‘sucker’ bets on craps or keno. Granted that the payouts for all bets, inside or outside, are identical in single, double and triple-zero roulette, it becomes clear that players of either American version immediately place themselves at a disadvantage when compared with players of the European version.

In Texas hold’em poker, each player is dealt two cards, known as ‘hole’ cards, face down. The player immediately to the left of the dealer, known as the ‘small blind’, and the player to his left, known as the ‘big blind’, are required to make compulsory, albeit small, bets so there is something in the pot for players to win. A round of betting proceeds to the left, during which each player may call, raise or fold.

The dealer discards, or ‘burns’, the uppermost card in the deck and deals the first three ‘community’ cards, collectively known as the ‘flop’. By using the hole cards and the community cards, each player decides on the best actual, or possible, hand he can form and another round of betting follows accordingly.

The dealer burns another card and deals the fourth community card, known as the ‘turn’ card. Another round of betting follows, before the dealer burns another card and deals the fifth, and final, community card, known as the ‘river’ card. After another round of betting, the remaining players, starting with the last player to bet, or raise, reveal their hole cards and the player with the highest five-card combination wins. The highest possible hand is a royal flush or, A, K, Q, J, 10 all of the same suit, followed by a straight flush, or any sequence of five cards all of the same suit, followed by four of a kind, and so on down to a high card, which can still be a winning hand.