| Winning at
Roulette, by Jacob Kanzen
There are more systems devised to beat
the roulette wheel than any other game.
A system may give you an edge, but
don't expect to systematically play your way to riches off the casinos.
For one thing, everything considered, it is a very difficult task. For
another thing, it's unlikely that the casinos will sit back and do
nothing about it.
Simply aiming to win to stay ahead at
all times as a primary objective, even by a small margin, is a more
realistic goal and a great achievement.
In a game of chance using a system is
no guarantee of winning, but a well devised roulette system can
streamline your losses, control your winnings and have a strategy that
will give you an opportunity to be a winner.
Roulette systems that have a strategy
to win most of the time but lose out overall, are not winning systems. A
winning system is one with a strategy to make you win overall and keep
you ahead at all times.
It has been shown time and again that
roulette systems that rely on sequential or conditional probability have
failed to produce consistent successful results. That is because
practically roulette is not a game of probability.
At roulette, each spin is a new spin
and the outcome is never determined by prior spins. Therefore, the
probability for a possible outcome is the same for each spin and a
probability advantage cannot be generated.
For example:
Which outcome has a higher probability after eight successive Blacks,
Black again or Red?
The probable answer is Red.
Wrong! After eight successive Blacks,
a Black is as likely to come as a Red. The wheel has no memory and it
does not keep record of previous results. This is what many gamblers
find hard to believe. This misconception has been around for many years
and will probably be around for as many more years. It is known as the
gambler's fallacy.
In theory, roulette may be looked at
as a game of probability and that the casino advantage of 5.26% with a
double zero wheel (2.7% with a single zero wheel) makes the player a
definite loser. In practice, as far as the player is concerned, roulette
is a game of luck and the player has a chance to win.
If you were to bet $5 on Black for 38
spins on a double zero wheel, in theory you would win and lose every
other spin and after 38 spins (which is about an hour of play at a busy
table) you would lose $10 for twice the zero outcome.
In practice, during an hour of play,
at some stage, if you were lucky you would be up and if you were unlucky
you would be down by more than $10, and deciding when to quit will
determine the amount of your winnings or losses.
Consider this:
If there was no casino advantage and you were paid 37 to 1 (36 to 1 for
a single zero wheel) instead of 35 to 1 on numbers and didn't lose on
the outside bets when the outcome was zero, during the past several
times that you have played the roulette, would you now be even with your
money? Chances are it would not make much difference. You would still be
either winning or losing and by much more than 5.26%.
The reason is that at roulette by far
the two major factors that determine how much you win or lose are:
- Your luck on the day and
- Deciding when is the best time to quit.
Therefore, for a roulette system to
have a degree of success it has to be linked to luck and tell you
exactly when to quit. Additionally, a good system has to take into
account other obscured but important advantages for both, the casino and
the player. These are:
To the casino:
- The player's natural greed for money
- The player's lack of self-discipline and
- Time (the longer you play the higher the chances that you hit a
streak of bad luck and run out of money).
To the player:
- You can choose when and where to bet
- You can choose and vary the amount of your bet and
- You decide when to quit.
Now, if you agree to all that has been
said so far and give it some thought, you could well apply a roulette
strategy yourself that is linked to luck. Additionally, if you are able
to weaken the above said 3 casino advantages (not easy) and make good
use of the player's 3 advantages, chances are in the long run you will
come out an overall winner.
If you try to beat the roulette wheel mathematically, it's unlikely
that you will get anywhere even with no casino advantage (no 0-00).
Mathematics and gambling don't mix. In mathematics you know exactly what
is going to happen. Gambling is the exact opposite; you never know what
is going to happen - otherwise it wouldn't be gambling. |
