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) After the ball has started spinning, the dealer will wave his hands across the
table and say 'no more bets'. 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. 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. Fiver number bet - there
is only one five number bet available. The outside bets on a roulette board are
simply the bets that reside 'outside' of the main playing area of 38 numbers. When you place an outside
bet your bet must meet the table minimum. 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.
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. We've added blue circled letters to the diagram to point out
how to make the not-so-obvious bets (the sets of 2-6 numbers) When the ball is getting
ready to drop, the dealer will wave his hand over the table, which means "No
more bets". Then he'll scoop up all the losing bets towards the dealer area. Don't reach for your winnings until the dealer
removes the marker, or the dealer will scold you. 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. 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. There's no advantage to
limiting yourself to inside or outside. Roulette games have minimum bets, which will be posted on a
placard at the table. 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. 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) if you win, the
casino doesn't pay you 37 to 1, they pay you less - 35 to 1. 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. In effect, this variation has the ability to turn a loss into a tie.