The first thing you should know before you learn anything about the bets you
can make, is when and how you can make those bets. A session ends when the ball lands where it may, and the dealers clear
the board of losing bets (and pay winning ones of course) At this point the
dealer will say 'place your bets' and everyone at the table will start throwing
chips down like crazy. If you have a player you
likes to put down twenty different bets each time they play, the sessions are
going to move a little slower. The
inside bets are made up of specific numbers or combinations of numbers within
the number layout, or along the border of it. On inside bets, the total of all
of your bets must add up to at least the table minimum. Split bet - you
can place a single bet on two individual numbers if those numbers are beside
each other on the table layout. This is different than inside bets,
where the total of all of your inside bets must meet the table minimum. Red or Black - you can choose to bet on
the outcome either being a red number, or a black number. Dozens - a bet very similar to
the columns bet, dozens lets you place a bet on either the first dozen numbers
(1-12), the second dozen (13-24), or the third dozen (25-36)
Roulette is the game where you guess where the little marble is going to drop
on the spinning wheel. Roulette would be a great game were it not for the high
house edge - usually 5.26%, sometimes as low as 2.63%, which is still higher
than blackjack, craps, or baccarat. For most bets it's fairly obvious - you can't miss the
Red diamond for Red bets, and things like Even, 1-18, and 1st 12 are written out
in plain English. You don't have to make just one kind of bet for
each spin, you can make several, and you win if the ball lands on any of your
numbers. you will likely lose money faster the more
bets you make, because you're betting more. New players often have to be
told this repeatedly the first time they play because they kept forgetting and
because they're excited about collecting their winnings. Sometimes the dealer
will ask you "Inside or Outside? There's no advantage to
limiting yourself to inside or outside. In other games the color of the chip
denotes the denomination, but in Roulette the color denotes only which player
the chip belongs to. Roulette chips can in fact be any denomination - $1, $5,
$25, etc. Roulette games have minimum bets, which will be posted on a
placard at the table. All the bets on the layout carry the same house edge, with the exception
of 5-number Line Bet (0, 00, 1, 2, 3), which carries a whopping 7.29% edge! Now let's say
you've been playing Roulette for a few hours, betting on Red every time, and
you've been keeping track of what numbers have hit. It's more important to know what the house edge is, than how to calculate
it, but here's a quick analysis in case you're interested. Atlantic City has a special rule which
reduces the house edge to 2.7% on even money bets (Red/Black, Odd/Even,
1-18/19-36): If 0 or 00 comes up on on even money bet, you lose only half your
bet. European games have an option called en prison which reduces the house edge
to 1.35%, but it's generally not available in the U.S., even in casinos that use
the European wheel. If
you win the second spin, your bet is "released from prison" and you
get it back.