I Love Craps

I play craps for fun. While winning is awesome, as long as I get a good long run for my money, I consider it entertainment.

With that in mind, I devised a new (to me at least) strategy for playing my favourite game involving dice and betting and 7. At a $5 table, the most I can lose with my general strategy (pass line, full odds on a 3-4-5 table, and come bets with full odds) is $155. That would only happen if every point was rolled only once, followed by a 7.

This scales up easily. $10 = $310 loss, $15 = $465 loss, $20 = $620, etc..

So, once I show a profit of $310, I planned to up my betting to $10 + full odds. This way, a total loss would bring me back to even, and I'd drop to my $5 betting. Remember, I'm doing this for fun, and don't mind losing the house's money. The plan would then lead to a $775 profit meaning $15 bets (drop to the $10 level on a loss), $1395 profit means $20 bets, etc..

Yesterday, it didn't start so well. There were a couple tight spaces on the table to fit into, and I dropped my usual $500 on the table (I just don't think less than 10x the min bet gets you enough space to play on craps if you don't start out winning. And reaching for the wallet is a sure way to kill your mojo). This promptly started dropping as the table was a bit chilly. Not cold yet, but certainly not a winning environment. Some bad shooters, yours truly included, kept that chip stack dropping. I was soon looking down at somewhere around $200, while X had already bought in three times (having gone in for less than me to start... see what I mean?). $200 isn't nearly enough for comfort with the way I play.

But then the old guy got the dice.

I love old guys at a craps table. Especially when a wife isn't around. Craps isn't a game you pick up when you're 70, it's a game you've played for decades at that point. These guys have seen ups, downs, huge runs and terrible losses, and they keep coming back for more. I'll let some old, slow, toothless guy in a faded baseball cap roll the dice any day of the week. And I'll cheer for him twice as loudly.

This one didn't disappoint. A 4-point firebet, with 7 points hit, later, I was looking at my first profit of the game. And with me and my posse (6 of us in total) at the table, he ended up with a smile splitting his face with all the cheering and pointing and high-fiving coming his way.

From there, there was a steady climb. Up a bit, break-even, up a bit more... and I kept track of my profit rack. It passed the $310 mark and on the next roller, I upped my bets.

And didn't really go anywhere. It was a break-even roll. Then I lost some on E's roll and dropped below the threshold.

Then the mean old supervisor announced that they'd be upping the limit after 3 more shooters.

Well, damn.

X was rolling next, and I have to have faith in my friends (except Recess "The Iceman" Rampage, screw that guy at the craps table). $5 on the firebet, and the $10 bets continue, despite being below the $310 profit mark.

And X promptly got me back over that mark, but only hit a single point on the way.

Next shooter was a quick bust, and we were down to the last shooter before the table price doubled.

He did everything in his power to hold off that rate increase. 4 points hit, and loooong rolls between them, with me betting $10 the whole way. I was quickly in "cruise control" mode, where all I had to do was take the chips being offered me and watch my rack fill up. $70 on every roll came my way. When the 7 was finally rolled, and we all coloured up, I had the biggest stack going into the middle. Just under $1700 in green and reds getting turned into a nice stack of blacks. $1200 profit baby!

Which of course meant that I should have upped to $15/bet $400 earlier. Which would technically have increased my profit approximately another $200. I can live with missing out on that opportunity.

So yah... I love craps.

Slots? Still the abusive sugar-momma in my relationship with gambling. She pays me just enough to keep me coming back, but likes to remind who's boss by slapping me around when I get too cocky. $200 lost to that gaping maw. Which is actually lower than average when the wheels don't spin my way.

**Bayne pointed out a miscalculation on my part. The $5 I have on the come wins 1:1 on a 7-out. I always forget this because it's so minor compared to the loss. But it does adjust the total possible loss at $5 to $145. This makes the next level up $290 profit, then $735 profit, then $1315, etc.. Same idea applies, just my numbers were off.

WPBT Report - Day 1

It's the same every time. Days before I leave, the tune gets stuck in my head. Then it fades as I rush around to get ready. Then, as the wheels lift and the plane starts climbing, a distant singing begins in my brain. It's as if the man is standing there on the Strip belting out the tune and I can just pick it up over the Toronto skies. As we approach, it gets louder and louder.

Bright light city gonna set my soul
Gonna set my soul on fire

I watch TV, movies, read, and usually doze off for a bit. But eventually I turn my head and look out the window. Blackness for miles starts to brighten. Outlines of mountains and valleys are barely visible. Then, a road, and a speckling of lights.

Got a whole lot of money that's ready to burn,
So get those stakes up higher

The smile that's been sporadically appearing on my face for the past few days starts to grow again. It has no intentions of leaving this time.

There's a thousand pretty women waitin' out there
And they're all livin' devil may care

Finally, the lights fill the window. Desert gives way to a civilization that has no right being there. Some of those lights are higher in the sky than others. Some spell words like "Flamingo" or "MGM", and one shoots straight into space. The songs starts hitting its crescendo.

And I'm just the devil with love to spare

We touch down, with The Strip looking close enough to touch. And I hear nothing but The King's voice going through my head.

Viva Las Vegas, Viva Las Vegas

I'm back baby. As sick as I get of Vegas after a weekend, there's no other feeling quite like the joy and anticipation of landing at McCarran. It's time for my 3rd WPBT Winter Gathering.

We got in Wednesday night, a full 12 hours earlier than usual. The flights were cheaper than the extra night in the hotel, that's +EV. N picked E and I up, having arrived a few hours earlier. First stop? In-N-Out Burger. Verdict? Decent fast food burger, fresh ingredients, and the worst fries I've had in a long time. They were pretty obviously overcooked in stale oil. Shame about that.

Then it was check-in time, where I was going to put in my first bet of the trip - $20 on upgrade. The line was short, but long enough for me to pull out President Jackson, fold him up, and make a sandwich with him and my cards. I handed that meal over to the middle-aged woman behind the counter, and the bill fell out in front of her. Without missing a beat, she picked it up and put it the side with just enough body language to let me know I was a winner.

"One or two beds? Smoking or non?"

Hmmm... info that is in my reservation already. Unless she's redoing it.

"Okay. We have you in a lakeview room on the 36th floor, which is the highest floor I have to give, and they're all suites. Tune to channel 22 to listen to the music for the fountain show, and at that level you can reach out your window and touch the fountains. I'm just kidding about the last bit. You will need your room card to access the floor."

WIN!

Standing next to me was N, with a reservation in his own name. I'd mentioned a couple times that I was dropping $20 to shoot for the upgrade. But he missed the part where I actually did it. I had mentioned he was checking in with me in the hopes I could spread some of the mojo his way. He neglected to provide any green paper to the woman, and was given a parking lot view on the 25th. Lesson learned.

The room was great. Fairly standard 2 queen layout, but a HIGH ceiling, on the top floor, dead-centre of the hotel (one room north of the middle column of the Bellagio). The Eiffel Tower across the road completed the scene. I'll have some pics to get up soon. For $90/night + $20 at check-in, this couldn't be beat.

Checked in, it was time to explore. E had never been to the Rio, and had an interest in the cocktail waitresses' outfits, so despite my warnings of it being a Wednesday, we went. And were disappointed by the lack of staff. So it was time to head to the IP, for I had heard rumours that they had craps there.

Dice were rolled, money was lost. There was a cute flirty girl from Alaska having a blast at the table. She couldn't remember where she got the fat lip from the night before, but we all assumed she won the fight. She left with some drunken skeezebag who wouldn't leave her alone. No, it wasn't me. It was 6am when we called it a night. When the staff says "you guys don't know when to quit" and accusing you of spreading lies and falsehoods when you announce that "this is my LAST roll!", you get the impression that it's time to get some sleep. Besides, we had to go ziplining in a few hours.

Rolling Rolling Rolling

As I mentioned last week, I spent the bulk of yesterday at Casino Niagara putting little plastic circles in various places on green felt while I or someone else threw clear red cubes with pips all over them across a table.

And it hit me as I bellied up to the rail that I haven't played craps since August, and that was in Atlantic City and was terrible. I hadn't played craps at Niagara since last year. It was a damned shame. My brain had taken the craps reflexes and shoved them in a dark little corner. I was placing minimum odds for the first few rolls, and felt like something was askew. Then I looked at the card - 3-4-5. It was all coming back. I confirmed that I could bet 3x odds on the 4 and 10 and the craps portion of my brain came leaping into the light, crying out in joy at his freedom.

The crew at Niagara was awesome as usual. Of course, it helps that when my group walks in, we turn a quiet, boring table into the most fun place in the house. Even on the cold streaks we're cheering and hollerin', joking with the crew, and showing the rest of the table what tipping is. They love us there.

And for the next 4.5 hours, we cheered ourselves hoarse and clapped our hands sore. And we didn't even win that much.

N drove E and myself there, and we started off warm, but things quickly cooled off. My $500 initial rack started to dwindle, climb back up, and dwindle again. It got to the point where I had around $28 left in front of me and N about to roll. I pulled out another $500, saying that I had faith in my buddy. Darryl, one of the top-notch crew (and who has been there EVERY time we've gone), pointed out that if I had faith, I wouldn't be reloading. I pointed out I needed the chips to bet on him.

I never touched that second rack. N went on a heater. Hitting 4 points for the fire bet and $125 to me ($5 fire bet on my friends). Breaking even was suddenly a possibility. M and his brother showed up around this time and brought new energy to the table, and the hot streak continued. By the time the dice went through the 5 of us, I was looking at a nice profit. The opposite end of the table had slowly warmed up to our revelry, but seemed afraid to roll... and they kinda sucked at it anyway. Except one older Asian guy who had high-fived N during his roll. That move alone had us up the volume when he got the dice. He was shocked, confused, and happy as a pig in shit when we started cheering him. The guy probably lost a few hundred bucks yesterday, but undoubtedly had more fun then he's ever had at a craps table.

The dice got back to N, and my profit was gone again. He went on another sweet roll, hitting 3 points and a lot of numbers in between, and our side once again turned it around. It went back and forth like this a few times, with us winning, and the other side of the table taking it away. We'd sucked in a random player to our side who was fist-bumping us whenever a point was hit. He was loving it too. The ups and downs continued, until the dice got to E for the last time. A conservative player who has no faith in his rolling, E always enjoys hitting the tables. He started his roll. 8......8. 5.....5. 8.....8. 9....9. 10.

The man was on the verge of our second fire bet hit for the day. The table was going nuts. He was having a blast. And he'd been hitting numbers between points like mad too. The 10 roll took a while, but with the bases loaded for me and my friends, we just kept raking it in regardless. Then.... HARD TEN! The table exploded! And he kept rolling! 4! C'MON 4!!!

But... 7 out. I looked down at my nearly $400 profit and we kept going. The next guy lost me around $100 and we called it a day, all of us happy with the results. -$475 to +$285 isn't a bad swing on a $5 table. Plus, we were starving.

We cashed out, and I couldn't resist the Blazing 7's, where I promptly lost $105.

Dinner - steak for the winners! Tanqueray No. 10 martini for yours truly. And it was decided we were going back!

Dinner wrapped up, M & his bro went home, well those of us who intend to have FUN in Vegas returned to the casino. The table was STILL $5 (unheard of for us - it's usually upped to $10 around 5 or 6 pm, and it was now 9), but our crew was gone, and we love our crew.

So I returned to the slots. Burger Girl! Where I went on a huge side game run and turned $20 into $90 on a quarter machine. I took that winning ticket and returned to the Blazing 7's that had taken my money earlier. In went the ticket, and out came $200 a few minutes later. BOOYA!

Off to Let it Ride! Oh how cold that was. Lucky for me, I had a 3-card wheel as I was getting ready to leave the table and $5 on the bonus. My loss had become tiny and I opted to up and leave the table.

To WAR! Easily the game that requires the least skill in the casino. It was mindless fun. Our first dealer was a bit of a downer, but he was soon replaced with Greg, who we engaged in banter immediately. He made what could be a boring game fun. I had been timing my bets horribly, increasing and losing, decreasing and winning. I was halfway through my stack and opted to finish off my reds and call it a night. Then the tied War happened, then another War was won. Suddenly I was even again, and it seemed like a good time to take off.

Up $335 on the day, which may not be a huge hourly rate, but it's tough to find another way to get paid for having fun. Vegas is right around the corner, and now I'm more psyched for it than before.

The Curse of Good Pillows

A weekend without an adequate amount of sleep, but a surplus of fun means that when your 4th alarm goes off on Monday morning, you have no desire to rise up from the übercomfortable pillows.

Friday - Year end at work! Our fiscal year just ended, and there was much rejoicing. Why? Because everything starts at zero now. It's been an interesting October to say the least. So what better way to end off than going to a Halloween party? I dressed as myself from 10 years ago, which entailed buying a Jesus wig (which was just about a perfect match to my long hair of yore), tossing on my Engineering coveralls and F!rosh shirt, and a pair of sneakers. I walked in the door and was greeted with "AWESOME!" from all who have known me for the past decade or so. A good time was had by all, and I was home and asleep around... 5:30am.

Saturday - Alarm goes off at 11am, because I have a chair arriving somewhere between noon and 3. The condo doesn't like deliveries on Saturdays, but fuck 'em, it's just a chair. Up, ready, and the phone rings. Chair arrives at 1, and all is well. I throw together a hearty breakfast (bacon/tomato/pepper hash, scrambled eggs loaded with yellow pepper and extra EXTRA old white cheddar and a couple spices, a toasted sesame bagel with cream cheese, and a pot of berry tea with honey), and pass out on the couch for an hour. Up, tidy, and phone rings. 'Tis Kat informing me I have 20 minutes to get to the subway station for Keith to pick me up. I throw myself together and head out the door, only 10 minutes late, costume in tow (same Jesus wig + psychotic clown mask). Off to Tuckfardia for low-stakes poker! The tourney went less stellarly than expected, getting taken out when I pushed with K7s into a BB who announced that his call was, in fact, a donk call before flipping up K9o. Dammit.

But I stacked him in the cash game later on when my AQo beat his 56d in one of the two memorable hands of the night. Live straddles can mean... straddles all the way to the button (me). I obviously had to put 7x the BB down to complete the circle. The SB looks at his cards and declares all-in immediately. A good move on his part. Everyone folds to me, I look down at AQo and call. 5 and A on the flop and that's it.

The game was a riot. Nutzfirth was in fine form on my right. Strangely, he was unable to get me to respond to be called "douchebag". Hand of the night for me was when we were heads-up, and I had flopped a pair of aces with a J kicker. I bet $1, it folds around to him, and he shows me his 9Th that hasn't hit a thing on the board. "If I promise to put $1 in the pot, can I see the turn first?" No, if you put $1, THEN you can see the turn. Back and forth it went, "Can I have 4 if I call you?" No, if you push all-in, you can have whatever card you want. Finally, he calls, checks the brick turn, I check behind. River pairs the board and he flips over his cards for all to see and then bets 35 cents (yes, very high stakes here) with nothing. I raise to $2, and he tanks. He gets convinced that 55AK with his T playing MIGHT be good and he calls. I win. Laughs all around. Home late, in bed around 5am, and that's AFTER the time change. Thanks for hosting Carson, and happy birthday again.

Sunday - Up at 10:15 for a trip to Niagara for craps. Amazingly, we were actually on time this time. Perhaps we should stop that as everyone lost everything they were willing to lose. I'm still up in the 3 trips this group has made, and will view this as getting the losses out of the way so Vegas is pure profit. We decided to go for steak dinners anyway because SOMETHING had to be done right. Steaks were delicious and I was home at a reasonable hour (9pm). Odd occurence on the way home though. We dropped off one of our group at the carpool lot and hit the Tim Horton's across the road for some hot chocolate. "Sorry, we're cleaning the machine, no hot chocolate." Damn... we drive off and find another Tim's - "Sorry, we're cleaning the machine." WTF?? Luckily, I knew of another one down the road from there and we head off. It's DARK. We drive around back and there's a giant Tim Horton's tractor trailer there... and a makeshift drive-thru? They were running the shop out of the truck! We pull up, ask about hot chocolate and... they have it! Amazed, we pay, crack a joke about it to the drive-thru guy, who totally doesn't care, and head off.

Of course, I then stayed up until 2 because End of Days was on, and I couldn't turn away from this generic actioner about Satan coming to New York. The Hellboy animated movie that was also on was better.

Oh, and squeezed some poker in Sunday night too. Actually walked away from a ring game with more cash than I sat down with, and cashed in an 18-man $2 SnG. Amazing.

And that leads to this morning... damn am I tired.

Rollin'

We made it to Casino Niagara yesterday for some craps. It was fun.

Departure was a few minutes early, with a stop for our 3rd pickup (E - LJ and Fuel saw/met him last Dec in the Caesar's poker room). Our traditional stop at the food court complex in Grimsby was made, where inferior pizza was "enjoyed".

Arrive at the casino at 1:30 would lead to 5 hours of dice rolling action. It was a pretty standard run of ups and downs, with all 3 of us coming close to bust a couple times before HUGE rebounds (usually on our own solid rolls). VinNay showed up after getting stuck in traffic and rain for an interminable length of time (Canada obviously hates the guy), but didn't catch one of the really hot streaks. He ventured to Blackjack for a bit, hit the video poker, and called it a day after a few hours... a shame, because if he'd stayed at the table, he'd have done alright.

A couple times, we were the only guys playing, but we kept it loud and spirited the whole time, drawing some railbirds who eventually put their money down. TWO firebets were hit (for 4 points), one by N, and one by another guy. I was one point away from hitting one myself. Of course, when N hit the firebet, I only had $1 down, not my customary $5 for friends. Someone had stepped to the table ahead of him, and I assumed the new guy was getting the dice... nope! Dammit. $25 instead of $125 for that roll.

In the end, we left a crew that liked us (being the only ones tipping or talking), and a table that missed us, with a nice solid profit in pocket. I more than doubled ($650 profit, and probably another $50 or so given away in tips), E also more than doubled (but started with far less), and N did pretty well himself.

Oh, and I played max odds the whole way.

Of course, I couldn't leave without hitting the slots. Two spins, up $200 at Blazing 7's... I played down another $50 for $150 profit total. I dropped $40 on my burger girl slots (which SUCKED), and we called it a day. Steak dinner for us winners, Tanquery Ten martini for me, and home for a rest.

Now there's talk of Atlantic City in the future... hmmmm...

More Craps

When playing craps, the advice always given is "play what you're comfortable risking." Nobody denies craps favours the house. The lure is that when it runs hot, you can make a killing. Also, it's LOADS of fun.

So most beginners will put the minimum odds behind their pass line bet. They won't put odds on come bets. My friends refuse to put odds on 4 and 10 come bets. They also still put small odds behind their pass line bets.

But here's some basic math.

The odds of rolling a 4 before a 7 is 2:1 (6 ways to roll a 7, 3 ways to roll a 4 - 6:3 = 2:1). Odds are the only bet in the casino that pays true odds, every other bet in the house carries a casino edge (think of it as implied rake).

So, every 3 times a 4 is a point, you should statistically hit it once and lose twice.

Let's pretend there's a $1 table for ease of math.

No odds, and you only bet $1:

You will lose $2 and win $1 every 3 rolls. So you risk $3 and end up with $2. 33% lost.

Minimum odds - $1 place, $1 odds:

You will lose $4 and win $3 (odds bet pays 2:1 remember). You've risked $6 and end up with $5. 16.67% lost, or half your losses from no odds.

2x odds - $1 place, $2 odds (what Seneca offers):

You will lose $6 and win $5. You've risked $9 and end up with $8. 11.1% lost, or a third of your losses from no odds.

3x odds - $1 place, $3 odds (the standard max odds for a 4 or 10 at most casinos):

You will lose $8 and win $7. You've risked $12 and end up with $11. 8.33% lost.

100x odds - $1 place, $100 odds:

You will lose $202 and win $201. You've risked $303 and end up with $302. 0.33% lost.

That's just for 4 or 10. 5 or 9 pay 3:2 and work similarly.

No odds - lose 20% every 5 rolls. 1x odds - 10%, 2x odds - 6.67%, 4x odds - 4%, 100x odds - 0.2%

6 or 8 pays 6:5.

No odds - 9% lost on 11 rolls. 1x odds - 4.5%, 2x - 3%, 5x - 1.5%, 100x - 0.09%

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Something to bear in mind here of course - the house is still always statistically winning. It's just a question of how much. By the way, those percentages all equal one place bet, so there's no change in absolute value of your statisical loss, just what the house edge is.

Does this means craps is a losing venture? Of course it does... statistically speaking. You play because it's gambling. You play because you want the hot streak. You play because you get to cheer on your friends and the rest of the table and toss dice in the air hoping that they land with the right pips facing up. You play because it's fun.

Because sometimes, you win 2/3 times instead of losing 2/3 times. And in that case, those max odds pay off huge. That 4? One more win in those 3 rolls instead of a loss means you make 83% profit instead of losing 8.33%. Win all 3 rolls? 175%. No odds? You make 33% profit on 2 wins, and 100% profit on 3. On a $5 table, that's a $90 difference between no odds vs full odds. No wonder we keep coming back.

Now I Remember Why I Love Craps

Had a decent weekend. Condowarming BBQ on Friday night with some good friends, Saturday was spent mostly in the kitchen, followed by some bad beats online knocking me out of the 50-50, $4k PLO, and Midnight Madness (but cashed in a some $22 turbos), and Sunday was a trip to Niagara.

My friends and I were looking for $5 tables, a rarity in these parts. Calls were made - Fallsview? Nope. Niagara? Maybe. Rama? Yup. We opted to go for the maybe, since there was also Seneca across the border (more on that later). Niagara was running $5 at their only open table and we joined in.

2 hours later they upped it to $10 despite our protests and we left, having all more than doubled or rolls. Myself - up $600. All of the winnings came from my 4 buddies (who are all joining me in Vegas in December) going on a solid series of rolls. Fire bets were almost hit twice (enough points, just not enough individual ones), and I was double-betting their rolls because that's what friends do. The crew was tipped generously and they even tried to talk the floor into keeping the $5 to no avail. So the 5 of us left, taking the majority of the chips off the table, all the talk and fun, the tips, and half the players. We wandered by 20 minutes later and the crew was excited until we just waved and walked on.

Naturally, I hit my blazing 7's. After hitting the 777 for $300, I walked away from that, now up $780 on the day.

One friend decided to visit some family in the area and the rest of us opted to visit Seneca on the US side. We found it, coughed our way through the dense smoke and terrible ventilation, and found the craps tables. $10. But that's not the worst of it.

$10, heavy smoke, and only DOUBLE ODDS? Plus, no firebet, which is a sucker bet, but one I love playing when my friends are rolling or the table is hot. Pathetic. Seneca for craps? Not gonna happen. Actually, despite the aggressive expansion and promotion of the Seneca casino, it offers absolutely nothing of value as far as I'm concerned. It's mostly slots, it's confusingly laid out, doesn't cycle air well, and just feels... dirty. Methinks I'll stay on the good side unless maybe VinNay (have fun in Ireland) or Iakaris (have fun in India) refuse to cross to my side for a game.

I played some slots and lost $140 ($20 of which to demonstrate why I don't play video slots). Up $640 on the day. We did take a look at the poker room, which was running a deepstack tourney, decided it was alright, but not spectacular, and continued on our way.

We then ended up in the Tonawandas on our search for a gas station and cheap US gas. Man, does the Buffalo area still suck.

Back across the border and off to Copacabana for Brazilian BBQ. By now, people should be familiar with the endless stream of meat that come with this dining option. Stuffed, bloated, and done, we decided it was time to head out.

A call was made to the absent friend, who was "almost done". So we went to Fallsview (where we were parked) to play slots for the free parking and wait for him to show up so rides home could be better arranged.

Slots - up $60 (so now up $700 on the day) after a bad burger-girl machine, a good burger-girl machine, and a generous Monte Carlo machine. No friend call, so we leave. He finally calls us once we're in St. Catherines, hitting a traffic jam. He's waaaay behind, so we say goodnight.

The jam isn't too long and we get through... and hit another in Oakville that looks brutal. A pulloff, sideroads taken, and we're back on a clear highway and on our way. People dropped off and I'm home 2 hours later than planned. Sigh.

But the trek was good, and the first winning craps session I've seen in a while, and should have primed the one wavering gambler in the group for Vegas (winning craps sessions can do that).