If you haven't read up on the rest of the site I'll quickly go over the different colors of chips and how they relate to the rest of the roulette rules. 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. Now lets take a look at each of the individual bets you can make. 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. 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. The outside bets on a roulette board are simply the bets that reside 'outside' of the main playing area of 38 numbers. There are no winning outside bets for 0 or 00 results. Red or Black - you can choose to bet on the outcome either being a red number, or a black number. Odd or Even - similar to the red black bet, this even money bet is based on whether the resulting number will be odd or even. 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 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. 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. 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. Here are the different bets you can make. In most games players can continue making bets even while the ball is still spinning. When the ball is getting ready to drop, the dealer will wave his hand over the table, which means "No more bets". 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. " when you're buying chips, to find out whether you're making inside bets (the ones listed in purple in the table, on specific numbers) or outside bets (the ones listed in yellow, on kinds of numbers) That's because if you're betting only inside and someone else is betting only outside, he can give you both the same color chips and there won't be any confusion. Roulette games have minimum bets, which will be posted on a placard at the table. Remember that you can bet inside or outside if you like; there's no requirement to bet both on a given spin. 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. The difference between the true odds and what they actually pay you is 2/38, or 5.26%. The European wheel has a lower house edge (2.63%) because it has only 37 slots instead of 38 (no 00) 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.