"I've won a lot of money playing craps," a friend was telling me as he set off for Hollywood Casino in Aurora, Illinois. "Lost a lot, too." That's normal, I told him. If the shooter makes a lot of points in a row, most of the table is likely to win big. If he doesn't, well, the money goes faster at the craps table than anywhere else in the house.
My friend likes to play craps and, like most craps players, has his own way of doing things. He plays pass line with the odds, but throws in a few place numbers and a hard-way or two. This time, he stopped by to ask about house rules that allow the pass-line bettor to back his wager with odds three times his flat bet if the point number is 4 or 10, four times on 5 or 9 and five times on 6 or 8.
What followed was a little bull session on craps:
Q. Those 5x odds scare me. I bet $25 on the line, so if I take full odds on the 6 or 8, I have to bet another $125. What do you recommend?
A. Take your original pass wager down to a level where you're comfortable with the combination of pass plus full odds. If you're comfortable with about $75 total, take your pass bet down to $15. That'll leave you with $45 for an odds wager on the 4 or 10, $60 on the 5 or 9 and $75 on the 6 or 8.
Q. But the extra odds are just even, right? It's not worth betting more for the extra odds.
A. The odds wager is even. There's no house edge, and that's the best deal you'll get in most casinos. But you should never bet more than your bankroll can handle. If losing a few $25 pass bets backed with $125 in odds is going to put you out of action, you can't afford to bet at that level. Make smaller wagers rather than risk quick ruin.
Q. Is lowering the pass line bet better than taking less odds?
A. Yes. The more of your total wager you can shift into the odds bet, the better. The house percentage on the pass line is 1.41 percent -- on average, for every $100 you bet, the house keeps $1.41. But the odds wager is paid off at true odds: 6-5 on the 6 and 8, 3-2 on 5 and 9 and 2-1 on 4 and 10. You're better off bucking the 1.41 percent house edge on just $15 while taking full odds than giving the 1.41 percent edge on $25 while limiting the more favorable odds wager.
Q. Pass with odds -- is that the best way to bet?
A. Pass and come with odds, don't pass and don't come while laying the odds -- those are the best percentage bets in most casinos.
In the Chicago area, there used to be an exception. Harrah's in Joliet for a time paid 3-1 on both 2 and 12 on the field bet. That leaves no house edge -- it's a dead-even bet. That's even better than the pass-odds combination because you don't have to spot the house the 1.41 percent pass line edge on any portion of your bet.
Q. I always thought the field was a sucker bet.
A. Most of the time, it is. On the most common craps layouts, 2 and 12 pay 2-1 on the field, and the house has a 5.5 percent edge. Some casinos up the field payout to 3-1 when a 12 is rolled. That cuts the house edge to 2.7 percent.
But when both 2 and 12 pay 3-1, all edge is eliminated. In that rare case, the best percentage play in craps is to play the field and ignore everything else.
Q. I see players taking odds on numbers other than the point. How can they do that?
A. They're playing the come. A come bet is exactly the same as a pass bet, except that it's not made on the come-out roll. After a point has been established, a player may make a come bet. If the next roll is 7 or 11, the come bet wins; if it's 2, 3 or 12, the come bet loses; if it's any other number, that becomes the point on the come bet. The player then may back that come point with odds, just as with the point on the pass bet.
Q. If the point isn't 6 or 8, I'll place those numbers. Is it worthwhile to cover the other numbers?
A. The house edge of 4 percent on 5 and 9 and 6.67 percent on 4 and 10 makes it too big a risk to make place bets. Placing the 6 and 8 at 1.52 percent is OK, but it takes only an average about two rolls to settle a place bet, while it takes about three rolls to settle a pass bet. That means you lose your money faster on the place bets even though the house edge isn't that much higher than on line bets.
Q. I like to play the hard 6 and hard 8, depending on how the 6 or 8 were rolled last. Am I correct that if they came up another way, it's more likely they'll come hard next?
A. No. The last roll has no effect on the next one. The dice have no memory - they don't know whether the last 6 was rolled as two 3s, or 1 and 5, or 2 and 4. Over millions of rolls, the percentages will hold up. But from one roll to the next, it's a crap shoot.
