by Henry Tamburin
- Best Craps Strategy and How to Win At Craps It’s no hidden secret that the house always wins in casino games. This is the only way the casino can make enough money to pay their costs including staff, operations and maintenance etc. But in Craps in particular.
- Real money online craps at Planet 7 is a fantastic way to experience all of the thrills, fun and excitement of a classic craps game from the comfort of your own home or office. You can even play real money craps on the go, on your tablet, iPad, iPhone, Android or Windows powered device anytime, anywhere. Best Way to Practice.
- 'THE' Best Craps Method to Make Money Betting On Both Numbers and 7-Outs Alike, by Employing a Very Clever Hedge! Learn how robert reno bets on BOTH numbers and don't pass bets together and STILL profits overall. Something that's unheard of in the gambling world! Different from See Saw!
This is a controversial article because it is going to present a different view on how to determine what are the best bets on the crap layout. For example, if someone were to ask you to selectwhich of the four bets is the best bet, which one would you, pick?
Craps offers a special proposition called“odds,” which is a bet that doesn’t feature a house edge. Instead, this wager pays at your true odds of winning. This differs from every other the craps bet, because the rest offer payouts that are lower than your chances of winning.
- $5 bet on the pass line.
- $1 bet on the Field
- $6 Place bet on the 6
- $1 bet on Any Craps
Most players would pick bet number 1, the $5 pass line bet because “it has the lowest casino edge” compared to making bet 2, 3, or 4. Before we go on with our analyses let’s make sure youunderstand what the casino's edge is really all about and why it has its shortcomings.
We all know that casinos can’t depend upon luck to generate the income they need to pay their expenses and have a few bucks left over as profit in profit for their shareholders. To ensurethemselves a steady income they must have a mathematical advantage over every crap-shooter at all times. How do they create their advantage in the game of craps? They do it in two different ways but with the same result.
Take a bet on the pass line for example. Based on the rules for winning a pass line bet, for every 1,000 bets a player makes, he will win 493 on average and lose 507. In other words the rulesfavor the casino winning more bets than the player. How much more? If you bet a buck every time you would win $493 and lose $507 for a net loss of $14. Thus for every $1,000 worth of bets youmake on the pass line the casino stands to win $14 or 1.4% simply because the rules favor the casino winning more times than the player.
The casino creates its advantage on other crap bets a little differently. Take the bet on any seven whihc is a one-roll bet that the dice will show a 7. If you win that bet the casino will payyou $4 in winnings (4 to 1 payoff). That’s very nice that they give you $4 for only a dollar bet, but unfortunately it isn’t quite enough. You see the number 7 can be rolled in 6 different dicecombinations out of a possible 36 combinations. You can only roll the number 7 with a pair of dice when the following numbers show: 1,6; 2,5; 3,4; and the opposites 6,1; 5,2 and 4,3. Any otherdice combination – like 3,6 or 2,1 – will yield a non-7 number. There are in fact 30 combinations that yield a non-7 therefore the odds that a 7 will appear are 30 to 6 or by rounding 5 to 1.That is the true mathematical odds against rolling the dice and having a 7 show.
If the casino were to pay players at the same odds, namely 5 to 1, they wouldn’t make a penny profit on this bet. But being the smart business people that they are, they pay off a winning betnot at 5 to 1 odds but rather at 4 to 1 odds. By simply short changing the player one chip when he wins, the casinos have discretely created their edge on this bet. Frank Scoblete says it best:“when you lose a bet it’s lost; but when you win a bet you have a silent partner – the casino – who keeps a part of your winnings.”
Let’s be sure you also understand what the casino’s edge means in dollars and cents. The casino’s edge or advantage is usually written as a percentage. In the above example the casino’s edge onthe any seven bet is 16.7% which means a player can expect to lose 16.7% of all the money bet on any seven. It doesn’t matter whether your bets win or lose in the calculation of how much thecasino’s expect to win from you. All that’s required is that you bet and what the casino will earn day in and day out is 16.7% of what you bet. If you make a total of 25 one dollar bets on anyseven during the course of play the casino will expect to win from you about $4 for your action (16.7% times $25). Now most likely you will win or maybe lose a lot more than $4 but the moremoney you bet the closer your losses will come to the statistical 16.7% loss rate. The casinos bank on this fact day in and day out.
Table 1 ranks all the crap bets according to the casino’s edge. The pass/come/don’t pass/don’t come bets with odds clearly have the lowest casino’s edge compared to the other bets.
Table 1 - Ranking of Crap Bets by Casino’s Edge
| Bet | Casino’s Edge (%) |
|---|---|
| pass/come/don’t pass/don’t come with 100-times odds | 0.02 |
| pass/come/don’t pass/don’t come with 20-times odds | 0.10 |
| pass/come/don’t pass/don’t come with 10-times odds | 0.18 |
| pass/come/don’t pass/don’t come with 5-times odds | 0.33 |
| pass/come/don’t pass/don’t come with triple odds | 0.47 |
| pass/come/don’t pass/don’t come with double odds | 0.61 |
| pass/come/don’t pass/don’t come with single odds | 0.85 |
| pass/come/don’t pass/don’t come | 1.41 |
| place 6 and 8 | 1.52 |
| lay 4 and 10 | 2.44 |
| field (paying 2x on 2 and 3x on 12) | 2.78 |
| lay 5 and 9 | 3.23 |
| lay 6 and 8 | 4.00 |
| place 5 and 9 | 4.00 |
| buy 4 and 10 | 4.76 |
| field (paying 2x on 2 and 12) | 5.55 |
| place 4 and 10 | 6.67 |
| hard 6 and 8 | 9.09 |
| big 6 and 8 | 9.09 |
| hard 4 and 10 | 11.11 |
| 3,11 | 11.11 |
| any craps | 11.11 |
| 2,12 | 13.89 |
| any 7 | 16.67 |
But does comparing the worth of one bet to another solely based on the casino’s edge tell the whole story? Not really, because the number of times a bet wins or loses per unit of time has notbeen factored into the equation.
Think about it for a minute. Is the number of times you win or lose a pass line bet per hour the same or different then say a field bet? How about a bet on any craps or the place bet on the 6?In fact they are not the same. Which is why a meaningful comparison of the worth of different craps bets should be based on their “cost per hour” and not solely on their “casino’s edge”.
The cost per hour is just what its name implies. It’s what the casinos expect to earn or what it costs you per hour to make a bet. The equation to calculate the cost per hour is simply theamount of the bet times casino’s edge times number of decisions per hour.
Most casual players will typically bet $5 on the pass line. You can expect in most well run games the dice will roll about 100 times per hour. The number of pass line decisions that occur inthose 100 rolls is 30. Therefore the cost per hour is simply
$5 times 1.41% times 30 decisions per hour = $2 (rounded)
By doing similar calculations for every bet you can compute each bet cost per hour and then rank them (Table 2).
Table 2 - Ranking of Crap Bets by Cost per Hour (rounded)
(assumes 100 rolls per hour)
| Bet | $ Wagered | # Decisions/hr | Cost/hr |
|---|---|---|---|
| pass/come/don’t pass/don’t come | $5 | 30 | $2 |
| place 6 and 8 | $6 | 30 | $2.70 |
| hardway 6 and 8 | $1 | 30 | $2.70 |
| big 6 and 8 | $1 | 30 | $2.70 |
| field (3x 12) | $1 | 100 | $2.80 |
| hardway 4 and 10 | $1 | 25 | $2.80 |
| field (2x 12) | $1 | 100 | $5.50 |
| place 5 and 9 | $5 | 28 | $5.60 |
| 3 and 11 | $1 | 100 | $6.70 |
| 2 and 12 | $1 | 100 | $6.70 |
| place 4 and 10 | $5 | 25 | $8.30 |
| any craps | $1 | 100 | $11.10 |
| any 7 | $1 | 100 | $16.70 |
| buy 4 and 10 | $21 | 25 | $25 |
| lay 4 and 10 | $41 | 25 | $25 |
| buy 5 and 9 | $21 | 28 | $28 |
| buy 6 and 8 | $21 | 30 | $30 |
| lay 5 and 9 | $41 | 30 | $30 |
| lay 6 and 8 | $25 | 30 | $30 |
What’s surprising when you scan the ranking of the bets in Table 2 is that several “bad bets” all of a sudden become better bets because they have a relatively lower cost per hour. Such isthe case with the hardway bet on the 6 and 8. Even though the bet is ranked low in Table 1 because of its high casino edge, it suddenly becomes a better bet when you look at its cost per hourranking in Table 2. Why is this? Simply because it’s possible to bet low amounts ($1) and the number of decisions per hour (30) is relatively low. Remember it’s the combination of casino’sedge and number of decisions per hour, which determines the ranking in Table 2.
Take a look at the hourly cost of some of the proposition bets in Table 2. If you are prone to making prop bets, you should confine your betting to the hardway 6 and 8 compared to say anycraps, any seven, or a bet on the 2/12 and 3/11 because the hourly costs are lower. If you like to bet the field, please do so in a casino which pays double on the 2 and triple on the 12. Yourhourly costs will decrease from $5.50 to $2.80. Also note how the place bet on the 6 and 8 ranks high in both tables. If you like betting on the numbers you better pay close attention to Table2. The numbers clearly show how much more it will cost you to buy a number vs. placing it.
Keep in mind that the cost per hour calculations and rankings in Table 2 is based on a specific bet size. If you bet only $1 on the pass line, for example, your cost per hour would be one fifththe figure in the Table 2 (40 cents vs. $2). Likewise if you decide to bet $5 in the field instead of $1 your hourly costs would jump from $2.80 to $14.00.
You must also keep the cost per hour rankings in perspective. Obviously one way to keep your hourly costs to as low as possible is to bet the smallest amount ($1) on a bet which doesn’t havemany decisions per hour. But that leads to a lot of rolls of the dice in which you would not be participating much and it won’t be fun playing.
So what about the odds bet which is noticeably missing from Table 2? Shouldn’t it reduce the cost per hour for the pass/come/don’t pass/ don’t come wagers because it lowers the casino’s edgefor these bets (see table 1)? Well let’s see.
Table 2 tells us that the $5 pass line bettor’s hourly cost is $2. Suppose the player wagers doubles odds. The casino’s edge for the combined pass line plus double odds is reduced from 1.41% to0.61% and the number of decisions per hour stays the same. But, and it’s a big but, instead of making only $5 bets on the pass line the player betting double shells out another $10 on the oddsevery time a point number is thrown (about two thirds of the time). His average bet is about $11.67 per decision. If you multiply $11.67 times the 0.061% casino edge times the 30 decisions perhour, you arrive at an hourly cost of $2 - the same as the pass line player that doesn’t make the odds bet. Putting it another way, the casino’s edge on the odds bet is 0 so the hourly costsfor the pass line bet is the same as a pass line bet with odds assuming the same amount of money is riding on the pass line bet. Therefore whether you bet pass line or pass line with single,double, triple, even 100-times odds, your hourly cost for the basic $5 pass line bet is always $2.
Review the numbers in Table 2 before you hit the crap tables to determine what it is really costing you to play. And remember when it comes to playing craps, time is really money.
With its origins going back over 500 years, craps is a popular dice game in North America. Based on a game called hazard that is referenced in books dating back to the 14th century, craps was brought to New Orleans in the early 1800s. The game found a foothold with fieldhands and deckhands of the time, allowing its popularity to spread up the Mississippi River.
The word “craps” is actually a mispronunciation of the word “crabs”, which were the numbers 2 and 3 in the game hazard (which were the numbers that were automatic losers).
The Basics of Craps
At its core, craps is a dice shooting game. The goal is to match or avoid certain numbers. Boiled down to the essentials, the rules of the game are:
- In the first roll of the dice, if you shoot a 7 or 11, you automatically win.
- In the first roll of the dice, if you shoot a 2, 3 or 12, you automatically lose.
- If you roll a 4, 5, 6, 8, 9, or 10, you roll again, this number becomes the “point”.
- You will then keep rolling and each time the point is hit, you win. The game continues until the player retires or a 7 is rolled ending the game
The hard part of the game is understanding the table and the betting. But if you understand the essentials, the betting becomes easier to understand.
The 5 Smartest Craps Bets
The Pass Line
The most common and popular bet at the craps table is the pass line bet. This bet the bet that backs the shooter. A bet of this type means that you are betting on the shooter to roll a 7 or 11. If he does so, you win instantly.
If he rolls a 2, 3, or 12, you automatically lose.
If he rolls anything else, he must roll again and this number becomes the point. Each time he rolls the point, you win. If he rolls a 7, you lose.
Most of the bets on a craps table will be pass line bets. There are a few reasons for this. First, it is an easy bet to understand. Second, there are chances for multiple wins without having to bet over and over again. Third, it is an even bet. And fourth, the house edge is only 1.41% which is not only one of the lowest on the table, it is one of the lowest in the whole casino.
The Don’t Pass Line
Another smart bet in craps is the don’t pass line. In this bet, you are betting against the shooter. In this scenario, you are betting that the shooter rolls a 2, 3, or 12 for an automatic win. If he rolls a 7 or 11, you lose.
Much like the pass line, if he rolls a 4, 5, 6, 8, 9 or 10, he rolls again to try and hit point. If he hits point, you lose, if he rolls a 7, you win.
The house edge on this bet differs slightly from the pass line and is 1.36%.
There is a pitfall to this bet. Because craps is a communal game, you are betting with other people on the results of the roll. This can cause issues with people around you if you are continually betting don’t pass line and they are betting pass line and you win. It might be a bit intimidating and can even cause friction with other bettors. So if you do choose this bet and are doing so regularly, you might want to limit your celebrations as it may draw the ire of your fellow gamblers.
Odds Bets
If you bet the pass line, don’t pass line, a come bet or a don’t come bet (which I will cover later) you can place an odds bet. Because of the way the bet is placed, it makes it a pretty integral part of the game.
A good way to think of an odds bet is like raising in a card game. An odds bet is simply adding a wager to the bet you made when the shooter started (assuming he didn’t crap out with a 2, 3, or 12.
Each casino has different rules about odds bets. Some will only let you match the original bet. Some will let you bet several times more than the original, so you’ll need to know the casino’s rules before entering into this type of bet.
On an odds bet, you’ll win the even-money payout on the original bet. For example, Lets’s say the point is 10. If you bet $100 on the pass line, you’ll win $100 each time he hits point before he rolls a 7. In this case, you win 2 to 1 odds on the odds bet. Therefore if you added $200 to the bet, you’ll win another $400.
An odds bet is one of the only neutral house advantage bets in the casino with a house edge of exactly 0%.
The odds vary based on the point and whether you are betting pass line or don’t pass line. The odds for pass line bets are:
- Point of 4 or 10 – 2 to 1 odds
- Point of 5 or 9 – 3 to 2 odds
- Point of 6 or 8 – 6 to 5 odds
For don’t pass lines, they are the opposite:
- Point of 4 or 10 – 1 to 2 odds
- Point of 5 or 9 – 2 to 3 odds
- Point of 6 or 8 – 5 to 6 odds
One of the wonderful things about odds bets is that you can decide on each roll whether you want to continue. So you can do it for one roll, skip a roll and start again while the same shooter is playing the same point.
Odds bets are a real money maker for players when played correctly especially considering that there is zero house edge.
Betting on 6 or 8
While 7 is theoretically the most common roll in craps, the second most common roll is a 6 or an 8. And the great thing about craps is you can bet on the shooter rolling it.
With a house edge of only 1.5% and the odds of rolling a 6 or 8 being 13.89% (second only to the probability of a 7 which is 16.67%), you can make a decent amount of money betting the 6 or 8
After the shooter makes the point, you can simply tell the dealer how much you want to bet on either 6 or 8 or both. (If you bet on both, you’ve just doubled the probability of winning.)
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A bet on a 6 and/or 8 pays 7 to 6.
You can bet on other point numbers but the probability of landing on these are lower and the house edge increases. On 4 0r 10, the probability is only 8.33% and the house edge is 6.7%. On a 5 or 9, the probability is 11.11% and the house edge is 4%, so the 6 and/or 8 is the best bet.
Come Bet
The come bet is playing an on-demand pass line bet, the same way a place bet work. At any point after the come out roll, you can place a come bet which essentially creates your own personal pass line bet.
In a come bet, after the shooter has rolled the come out roll and established a point number – any point number – you can then place a come bet. Then, on the next roll, you’re playing out your own pass line bet separate from everyone else at the table.
So, if the next roll is a 7 or 11, you win even money on your come bet. But, if the next roll is a 2, 3, or 12, your bet is lost to the house. And any other number (4, 5, 6, 8, 9, or 10) will establish the new point number going forward, but one that only you care about.
With this bet, you are really playing 2 games at once. Which can make it a bit harder to keep track of, but the house edge is the same as a pass line bet at 1.41%
The 5 Dumbest Craps Bets
To me, dumb bets are long shots where the odds are not in your favor. Is it possible to win? Yes. Is it likely that you’ll win? Not very. Craps have a few bets that are long shots just like they have bets that are really good to make.
Betting on 4 or 10
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One of the worst bets to make is on the 4 or 10 (especially individually). I discussed earlier that the odds of rolling a 4 or 10 are the least like point rolls in the game with a probability of 8.33% on either. But placing a bet on these also have a house edge of 6.7% making it one of the tougher bets, not only in craps but of most bets you can place in table games in the casino. A win on this bet does pay 9 to 5, but you can make better bets that will yield you a better return with less risk.
Betting on 5 or 9
Another dumb bet in craps would be betting on the 5 or 9. The probability of a roll of a 5 or 9 is 11.11%, which is higher than the 4 or 10, but not enough to make it a good bet. Also, the house edge is 4%, which is still more than twice that of a 6 or 8 bet. The payout on this bet is 7 to 5.
Field Bet
A field bet is when you place a bet on the shooter rolling a 2, 3, 4, 9, 10, 11, or 12.
I like to think of this bet similar to endcaps at a grocery or department store. The items they display on the endcap may be on sale, but if you look in the right section, there are much better deals elsewhere. Much like an endcap, this bet looks attractive because it has a wide field of possible results, but they have some of the lowest probabilities of actually being rolled. In the chart below, you can see the probability of each total:
- 2 – 2.78%
- 3 – 5.56%
- 4 – 8.33%
- 5 – 11.11%
- 6 – 13.89%
- 7 – 16.67%
- 8 – 13.89%
- 9 – 11.11%
- 10 – 8.33%
- 11 – 5.56%
- 12 – 2.78%
The house edge on this bet is 2.78%. The payout on this bet is 3 to 1 on a roll of 12, 2 to 1 on a roll of 2 and even money on all others.
Betting on 2 or 12
We can see from the chart that a 2 or 12 (also known as “snake eyes” or a “boxcar”, respectively has only a 2.78% probability. So this is a sucker bet. It will pay 30 to 1 if you win. The house edge on this is 13.89%. Just remember, the higher the payout, the lower the chances of it happening.
Betting on 3 or 11
While the odds of hitting these numbers versus a 2 or 12 is double, it is still highly unlikely and that makes if also a dumb bet. This bet has a house edge of 11.11% and pays out 15 to 1.
Conclusion
For the new or casual gambler, safe is always the way to go. Betting online bets are going to be the best chance of winning.
The great part about this game is that you don’t have to shoot, you can bet on the abilities of others, so if you find someone that is “hot”, you can keep betting on him and keep winning.
But if you do shoot, remember the pitfalls of the 7 on the point. And don’t be afraid to invest in yourself by betting odds or come bets.
I recommend that you try to learn a bit before going to the casino by checking out some videos on YouTube or another video site. This way you’ll be prepped when you get there and you can focus on having fun and winning.
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