Taking odds at Craps

Cyrus · #1 09-09-2005, 06:04 PM

Settling this one and for all (yeah, right):

Taking odds at crap does not change the house advantage, either in percentage terms or in dollar terms.

The house edge is 1.4% on the Pass bet.

If you wanna wager $100 on the Pass bet, you will be losing an average of $1.40 per bet. If you wanna wager $10 on the Pass Bet and $90 on Odds, you will be losing 14 cents per bet on average. Some people get confused here and point out to the smaller loss in dollars, arguing that they have effectively lowered the house advantage. That is not correct. The $90 wagered on the Odds have the same Expected Value as if you had put them in your pocket instead!

Money in your pocket has an EV of zero.

Yes, the analogy is not exact because of the Variance. Well, let's say you reach in your pocket and half the time the $90 are missing, half the time you find $180 ! The EV is zero.

In sum, when you go to the Craps table and want to bet $100 on the Pass line, but then decide instead to bet $10 on Pass and take $90 Odds, you are not gonna lower the house advantage, you are just gonna lower your Pass line bet! That's all. The rest of the money you are taking essentially off the table.

flatline · #2 09-09-2005, 06:39 PM

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Some people get confused here and point out to the smaller loss in dollars, arguing that they have effectively lowered the house advantage. That is not correct. The $90 wagered on the Odds have the same Expected Value as if you had put them in your pocket instead!

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You are clearly the one who is confused about the definition of house advantage. You throw in EV here, this is your mistake. The fact that the odds bet is 0 EV does not mean you no longer consider it. Think about it like this, would the casino rather you bet $100 ($10 + $90 odds) or $100 (baccarat). The casino would rather you bet baccarat, as their house advantage on the $100 bet is greater. It is nonsense to just disgard the odds bet. No one on here has ever claimed that the odds on the pass line bet change.

Again, I link to the wizard of odds, who has this clearly explained on his site.

Cyrus · #3 09-10-2005, 02:19 AM

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The fact that the odds bet is 0 EV does not mean you no longer consider it.

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Of course, you consider it. Like I said, it is like putting it in your pocket! Money in your pocket you always consider. [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

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Think about it like this, would the casino rather you bet $100 ($10 + $90 odds) or $100 (baccarat)? The casino would rather you bet baccarat, as their house advantage on the $100 bet is greater?

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I know how a lot of idiot casino managers are "thinking" but the proper choice from the casino's point of view should always be the game that gives the house the most dollars per hour.

It is a little different than merely house advantage. [img]/images/graemlins/smirk.gif[/img]

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It is nonsense to just disgard the odds bet.

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Oh yeah, disregard it. It confuses you. It's an offer by the casino to hold on to that money for as long as you wager the rest of your money on other, non-zero-EV bets.

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Again, I link to the wizard of odds, who has this clearly explained on his site.

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Don't worry about Mr Shackleford, he is totally in agreement with what I'm saying in this thread. How could he not? Here, read this from the link, and see how he treats Odds as a separate consideration:

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Have you ever wanted a bet with no house edge? Craps offers just such a bet, as long as you bet on the pass line first. Once a point has been thrown you may bet up to some multiple, usually 2 times, your pass line bet on the 'odds.' The odds are simply an additional wager that the point will be rolled before a 7. etc

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BTW, the Wizard offers a table with the combined house edge when taking Pass + Odds --- but (pay attention, now) that's like having a table with the combined house edge when you are betting concurrently Baccarat and Roulette. The act of splitting your bets is what's confusing for many people -- and will continue to do so, from the looks of it.

flatline · #4 09-10-2005, 02:55 AM

OK, simply stated:

You have $1000. You want to make one bet (or combination of bets). You have to make a standard casino -EV bet. What is the one that will lose the least money over the long run?

You know the answer is a craps bet with max odds (I.E. a $100 bet w/ $900 odds or something similar). Why are you still arguing? (Oh yeah, you have realized you are wrong, but refuse to give up.)

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BTW, the Wizard offers a table with the combined house edge when taking Pass + Odds --- but (pay attention, now) that's like having a table with the combined house edge when you are betting concurrently Baccarat and Roulette.

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No [censored]. I said that in my last post. You keep acting like I think that the odds on the pass-line bet change, when I have never said that. I am (and always have been) talking about the game of craps as a whole, not the pass line bet by itself.

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Don't worry about Mr Shackleford, he is totally in agreement with what I'm saying in this thread.

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Taking odds at crap does not change the house advantage, either in percentage terms or in dollar terms.

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He would not agree with this statement, because it is false.

Cyrus · #5 09-10-2005, 10:01 AM

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You have $1000. You want to make one bet (or [one] combination of bets). You have to make a standard casino -EV bet. What is the one that will lose the least money over the long run? You know the answer is a craps bet with max odds (I.E. a $100 bet w/ $900 odds or something similar)

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I do not think you misunderstand the game's math, at all, actually. What I think is happening is the common mistake (and this is the reason I started the thread) whereby gamblers are induced into thinking they can somehow change the house advantage by placing an additional bet somewhere else! And taking the Odds is as irrelevant as combining a bet on Keno with a bet on Roulette in order to lower the house's "combined expectation".

In your example, and in general, the correct answer is the one you gave. (Key text I've put in bold.)

But here's where the fault lies -- and it is a question of very clever semantics on the part of the casino (eg "Smart gamblers also take odds" -- did you catch the key word?). When the Craps gambler is gambling in the casino, he is never thinking along the lines of your theoretical proposition. He is betting on the right side of the Craps shooter and then he is placing an additional wager on the Odds. That's what happens almost all the time.

The gambler thinks he somehow lowered the house expectation on his original bet. It's as if the Keno bettor lowered the house advantage on Keno by also betting on Roulette.

Try getting that past Shackleford.

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You have realized you are wrong, but refuse to give up.

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[img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

SheetWise · #6 09-10-2005, 10:44 AM

You continue to view HA as a dollar figure rather than as a percentage of the handle. I'll take one last stab at it. You are arguing that the player cannot change the HA by buying odds.

Here are two wagers. I can bet $1 on the Big 6, wagering a 6 before a 7 for even money. I can place $1 on the 6, and I am allowed to wager 5 additional dollars at 6:5 making a composite wager of $6 paying 7:6. No one is disagreeing that the expected earnings for the house is different between the two wagers. Neither wager is a contract bet.

By your analysis, the HA on the Big 6 is the same as on the Place 6 -- since the only difference is that on the Place 6 you buy odds.

SheetWise · #7 09-09-2005, 07:15 PM

The pass/come wager has two lives. If you lose the first life, it is now a contract bet. Nothing can change the expected return of the contract bet, but taking full odds will increase the expectation of the resulting wager. If I wager $10 and a 4 is rolled, the even money $10 - 4 is a contract -- my current choice, given that I lost the come out, is to wager $10 pays $10 or $30 pays $50 on the 4 -- either way, I am currently playing the 4. If you want to argue that this doesn't change my expectation -- you must have an interesting definition. Somehow you've managed to define it as a percentage that's independent of the amount wagered.

cardcounter0 · #8 09-09-2005, 08:05 PM

It doesn't change the percentage. If I bet the pass line, and if the point rolled is a 4, I run over to the roulette table and bet on black, how have I changed the HA on craps?

The pass bet and the odds bet are two seperate bets. Making the odds bet does not change the HA on the pass line bet, or change the percentage either. Neither will pulling the handle on the slot machine, or betting the Patriots will win the Superbowl ... The HA and percentage on the pass line bet is the same. Odds, no Odds, 10x Odds, or buy a lottery ticket. They are seperate events on independent events.

flatline · #9 09-09-2005, 08:22 PM

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Making the odds bet does not change the HA on the pass line bet, or change the percentage either.

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No one in this discussion has ever claimed that it does.

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If I bet the pass line, and if the point rolled is a 4, I run over to the roulette table and bet on black, how have I changed the HA on craps?

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You haven't. But if you made a $10 pass-line bet, and then made a $10 roulette bet, your combined HA would be (1.4%+5.26%/2)=3.33%. It would be ridiculous to say that you can't average these two bets for the "pass-line and run to the roulette table" game.

SheetWise · #10 09-09-2005, 09:22 PM

I think you're missing some connecting link in the process of "gambling". I hope we can all agree that if a player must invest $X in a craps game, optimally they should put the entire $X on a single trial and then, win or lose, walk away. This isn't what "gamblers" do. They find a level of "action" they like, and they let the game grind away at them. Realize that gamblers are looking for continued action at an arbitrary level of play. I know playing -EV games is contrary to what most card players believe -- but then, most card players don't play craps. Indulge me. Consider a player who likes to randomly have $15-$50 per roll in action and likes to play a couple hours a night ... what is the optimal strategy, and how would you calculate the expectation?