Craps - FAQ

There are lots of them. Many casinos give free gambling lessons in the mornings when things are slow.

You seem to be forgetting that the 5% commission is taken off the top and the player doesn’t get it back if he wins (except some casinos give it back on a buy 4 or 10 bet). A $100 place bet on 5 will get back $100+$100*(7/5) =$240 if it wins. If you bet $100 on the buy 5 the 5% commission will reduce the bet to $95.24. If the bet wins the player will get back $95.24+$95.24*(3/2) = $238.10. The place 5 bet returns an extra $1.90.

Good question. When the house edge is quoted as 1.52% on place 6 bet, for example, it is per bet resolved. In other words it is assumed the player leaves it up there until a 6 or 7 is rolled. However if the player’s intent were to leave it up for one roll only the house edge would be 0.46%.

I don’t think the takeover had any effect on the craps at Binion’s Horseshoe in Vegas. Although they used to offer 100x odds they ended that long before the federal marshals shut them down earlier this year. The best odds in Vegas can now be found at the Casino Royale (between the Venetian and Harrah’s), which offers 100x odds.

First, it doesn’t make any difference that the shooter is making lots of money. Your odds are the same on an ice-cold table. The past does not matter. However if you are going to play then wait patiently for a come out roll. Never make a pass bet after a point has been established.

There is no particular place. You have to give the chips to the dealer and tell him to put them on the odds. For example assume you make a come bet and the next roll is a nine. The way I do it is I wait until I get the dealer’s attention, put the bet anywhere he can easily reach it, and say "odds on the nine."

You’re correct, dice alone can not determine the outcome in craps. There are various ways of using cards in place of dice and still have the odds exactly the same. One way is to use two separate decks, thus there is no effect of removal. Another way is to have a 7-card deck, featuring the numbers 1 to 6, plus a seventh "double" card. The first card drawn can never be the double card. If it is then it is put back in and the process repeats from the beginning. If the double card is drawn second then it counts as whatever the first number drawn was. Regardless of how the casino does it I have never seen hard evidence of a case where the odds were different than if two dice were used. So I think you are omitting something from the rules.

The Casino Royale, which offers 100x odds. For complete playing conditions in Vegas please see my new Vegas craps directory.

I asked the Bone Man at nextshooter.com this one. Here is what he said.

If a player other than the correct shooter picks up the dice and rolls them, it should be a no-call, no-roll and the dice should be returned to the correct shooter. Though this is indeed the proper ruling, the boxman in some instances may allow for the roll if the result is to the favor of all or most of the players. In some instances, the result of the roll may not effect any of the player(s) wagers. Also... Any player can request that the dice be sent to the next shooter to finish a hand. In such cases the same dice may be sent out or the new shooter can request new dice. Upon the completion of the roll, the SAME shooter can then shoot HIS/HER OWN HAND, thereby having more than one hand.

You’re welcome. Thanks for the kind words. In my experience, most players make proposition bets for the dealers. For example, a "two way yo" bet is split 50/50 between the player and dealers. To make this bet, a player will hand or toss the bet to one of the dealers and say "two way yo." However, all the proposition bets are sucker bets, which will cut down the value of the tip by up to 16.7%. As you said, I prefer to give the dealer the tip directly, as opposed to betting it. Before a come out roll I will try to get a dealer’s attention and then put the tip in front of him, saying "for the dealers." I don’t like making pass line tips for the dealers, because I’ve been goaded into tipping extra on the odds, which was more than I intended to offer. If you must make a bet for the dealers, I would put it on the field, saying loudly "dealers in the field."

To answer your second question, dealers are only obligated to share cash tips. Anything else they may keep for themselves. I asked about this at the Venetian and the floorman said dealers may accept personal gifts up to $100 in value. Acceptable gifts can be things with a close to cash value, including gift certificates and unresolved sports tickets. It was quietly added that if a player gave a dealer an envelope, nobody other than the player and dealer would ever have to know what was in it. Should you decide to give a specific dealer a tip I would suggest being discreet about it, putting it in an envelope, and away from the table.

I just added a section to my craps section on the Rendezvous Rules.

This sounds very promising! If this is true, there would be lots of opportunities to count cards. I don’t know if they even allow them, but I think the best opportunities would be on the proposition bets. For example, the “yo” bet, which pays 15 to 1 on an 11, would have a 9.43% house advantage off the top of the deck. However, if no 5 or 6 appears in the first two rolls, the odds swing to a player edge of 5.80%. This same principle would apply to any two-number hop bet.

I still say hop bets, like the yo-11, are the way to go. Using chips, you could keep track of how many cards of each face are left in the decks.

With 26 unseen cards, if any one face had 6 left in the deck, you would have a 43.1% advantage on a hard hop bet (two of the same face), assuming it paid 30 to 1. With only 5 left, the house would have a 4.6% advantage.

The easy hops are even more exploitable. If the two dice sides in majority have at least 10 left combined, both with a minimum of 3 left, out of 26 unseen cards, then make an easy hop bet on those two numbers. If two numbers have 5 left, you will have a 23.1% advantage. If one has 4 and one has 6, you will have an 18.2% advantage. If one has 3 and one has 7, you will have a 3.4% advantage. All this assumes easy hop bets pay 15 to 1.

None of the above takes into consideration the $1 fee. As long as you are making large bets, it won’t make much difference.

The odds change a little bit compared to craps played with dice, due to the effect of card removal. Regardless what the first card is, there is less than a 1/6 chance that the next card will be the same value. As an example of the effect, the house edge on the pass bet is 1.41% with dice, but 1.34% in this game. I indicate the house edge for all the bets in a new table at the end of my page on Card Craps, for various numbers of decks, including eight.

For points of 4 to 6: ((7-p)/(5+p))*(1/(1+o))

For points of 8 to 10: ((p-7)/(19-p))*(1/(1+o))

This question was raised and discussed in the forum of my companion site Wizard of Vegas.

For the benefit of those who don't understand the question, books, videos, and lessons allege that it’s possible to beat the odds in craps with a careful toss that favors certain outcomes, namely lowering the probability of a total of seven to less than 1 in 6. I'm firmly in the skeptics camp on this one. I have yet to see any credible evidence leading me to believe that anyone can consistently influence the dice. There is much more money to be made selling books and lessons on how to do it than actually doing it.