Each roulette table moves in
sessions, each session is associated with a spin of the wheel and that spin's
result. 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. All of your chips of the same
color are worth the same amount. 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. Split bet - you
can place a single bet on two individual numbers if those numbers are beside
each other on the table layout. Corner bet -
lets you bet on four adjoining numbers. Placing your chips at the point where
four numbers meet will indicate you want a corner bet. Red or Black - you can choose to bet on
the outcome either being a red number, or a black number.
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 will likely lose money faster the more
bets you make, because you're betting more. Don't reach for your winnings until the dealer
removes the marker, or the dealer will scold you. There's no advantage to
limiting yourself to inside or outside. When you buy in, tell the dealer what denomination you want. Minimum bets work differently for inside and outside bets. Remember that
you can bet inside or outside if you like; there's no requirement to bet both on
a given spin. In this way, Roulette is more like slots - one single bet can
win a lot. Here's a
handy way to remember the payouts when you're betting on a set of numbers: Take
36 divided by the quantity of numbers you're betting on, and subtract 1. 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! There's an old saying,
"The wheel has no memory. 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. Your odds of winning a
one-number bet are 37 to 1 (37 ways to lose, 1 way to win) 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. On even money bets when 0 comes up, instead of losing right
away, your bet is "imprisoned" and rides again for the next spin. In effect, this variation has the ability to turn a loss into a tie.