Page 8 - Jackpot Magazine South ~ July, 2023

PLAY TO WIN
Understanding roulette with this true-false quiz
“In Vegas, I got into a long argument with the man at the roulette wheel over what I considered to be an odd number.”
~ Comedian Steven Wright
We are going to talk about roulette, but first, a trip to the movies. If you’ve seen Casablanca, you may remember this scene: A young girl comes up to the main character, Rick, explaining to him that she and her husband need official papers to leave the country and head for America. They have no money and she may have to do something inappropriate with a government official to get what they need. Meanwhile, the husband is head down at the roulette table after losing what little money they had.
Rick tells the young man to bet on 22, and the man puts his remaining few chips on the number. Rick gives the roulette dealer, the croupier, a signal and when the wheel stops spinning, the ball is in the number 22 slot. Rick tells the man to keep his money on 22 — and once
again the man wins. The young
couple is very happy and it
seems Rick was able to fix the
outcome of the game.
Outside of a movie studio,
roulette is one casino game
that is almost impossible to
cheat. There are too many variables — the spinning of the wheel and the timing of the ball drop are just two of its random components. And while it worked in Casablanca, in reality, the dealer has no control over the outcome of the game.
Henry Tamburin, a gaming expert and author of many best-selling books on gambling, including Blackjack: Take the Money and Run, once challenged Jackpot! readers who thought they knew a lot about roulette. Maybe you do, he said in a past column, but then maybe you don’t.
He continued, “The only way to know for sure is to try my simple true-false quiz.
So go ahead and give it a try. You have nothing to lose and maybe a little knowledge to gain.”
The questions he
posed assume a standard American roulette wheel with numbers 1 through 36 and 0 and 00. Here are the six true or false questions, followed by their answers.
1. The house edge on betting on the number 7 to win is higher than betting on any even-money wager like a bet on red.
2. The chance of a red or black number hitting is 50-50.
3. If an even number hits four times in a row, an odd number is due to hit.
4. You can cash in your roulette chips at the cashier’s cage.
5. You need to wait until the dealer spins the wheel to begin betting.
6. Betting systems will allow you to overcome the house edge.
Answers
1. False. The house
edge is the same for bets straight up on a single number as it is for bets that pay even money like red or black. Here’s the tradeoff. You win more
frequently betting on even money wagers compared to betting on a single number. However, when a single number wins it gets paid a whole lot more (35 to 1) than the even money or 1 to 1 payoff on, say, red or black. When you factor in the chance of winning a bet and its payoff, you end up with all roulette bets having the same 5.26 percent house edge (except the five number bet0,00,1,2and3—thehousehasan even higher edge of 7.9 percent).
2. False. The roulette wheel has 18 red and 18 black numbers and the green 0 and 00 numbers. If the ball lands in 0 and 00 all bets on red or black lose (which is
why the green numbers are often referred to as the house numbers). Therefore, if you bet on a red number you would
lose if either any of the 18 black numbers hit or the numbers 0 and 00. Therefore the probability of winning is not 50 percent, it’s 18/38 or 47.4 percent.
3. False. The chance that an odd number will hit on the fifth spin is the same as an even number. In roulette, past wins do not affect the outcome of future spins. Each spin is an independent spin with a fixed probability.
4. False. Roulette chips have no value once you leave the table. Each player gets different color roulette chips and their value is determined at the time they are purchased. You should always cash out your colored roulette chips at the roulette table where you bought them and you will be given the equivalent amount of regular casino chips that you can bring to the cashier’s cage.
5. False. You can begin to place bets on the roulette layout immediately after the dealer removes the marker that was placed on the previous winning roulette number. Here is the sequence of events that occurs as soon as roulette ball lands in a number pocket. First, the dealer will mark the winning number, sweep off all losing bets on the layout and then pay off the winning bets (inside first then outside), and finally remove the marker. As soon as the latter occurs you can begin to place chips on the layout for the next spin.
6. False. No betting system based on past wins or loses will overcome the house edge. The only way you can gain the edge is if certain numbers or groups of numbers are hitting more frequently either due to a bias in the wheel (i.e. physical imperfection).
Do you have a question on the best way to play to win? Email jackpotmagazine@gmail.com.
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8 JACKPOT! MAGAZINE • July 2023
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