You trade in your checks (which most people think of as regular casino chips, but they're actually called checks) for roulette chips when a new session starts, and the dealer assigns you a number and denomination. When the new session starts you can put your chips down where you want to bet, and you don't really have to be in a hurry. 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. After the ball has started spinning, the dealer will wave his hands across the table and say 'no more bets'. Just sit back and let the ball fall where it may. Straight-up bet - this is the classic roulette bet. Choose any one of the 38 numbers and put your chips down on that number for the chance to win back at 35 to 1. Split bet - you can place a single bet on two individual numbers if those numbers are beside each other on the table layout. The outside bets on a roulette board are simply the bets that reside 'outside' of the main playing area of 38 numbers. 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.

Roulette is the game where you guess where the little marble is going to drop on the spinning wheel. You should always calculate your expected loss and how long you can play on a given bankroll before playing any game, but with roulette it's especially important. Making a bet is easy - you just place your chip(s) on the number(s), color, or sets you want to bet on. The house edge is the same whether you make one bet per spin or several. When the ball is getting ready to drop, the dealer will wave his hand over the table, which means "No more bets". When the ball falls into a slot, the dealer will announce the number and the color, and place a marker on the layout where the winning number is. Sometimes the dealer will ask you "Inside or Outside? When you buy in, tell the dealer what denomination you want. For outside bets, any bet you make has to be the table minimum. 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. Here's another example: Since there are 38 slots on the wheel, we expect any given number to hit 1 out of 38 spins on average. The wheel has no memory. You can certainly switch to another number if you want, but that won't improve or worsen your chances. if you win, the casino doesn't pay you 37 to 1, they pay you less - 35 to 1. The difference between the true odds and what they actually pay you is 2/38, or 5.26%. 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.