Good and Bad Bets in Craps

Like in roulette, the casino game of craps offers a large number of bets and players can choose which bets they want to wager on. In roulette all the bets have the same house edge and therefore it does not matter which bet is chosen by the player from the point of view of expected return. However in craps different bets have different house edges and therefore the craps player is required to know which the good bets are and which are the bad bets.

This issue becomes all the more important in craps because the bets that are simpler to understand are the ones with the higher house edges. Unfortunately because these bets simpler to understand new players tend to place wagers on these bets and in doing so make the wrong selection. One of the more common of these bets is known as Any Seven. This bet wins if in the next roll of the dice the total of the two numbers displayed is 7. In most online casinos this bet pays out at 4 to 1 giving it a house edge of 16.67%. To put things in perspective this is roughly three times the house edge of online slot games. There is a bet known as Any Craps. This bet is sometimes popular with new players because it has given the game its name. This bet wins if in the next roll of the dice the total of the two numbers displayed is 2, 3, or 11. This roll is named as craps. In most online casinos the craps bet pays out at 7 to 1, which results in a house edge of 11.1%. Though this is not as bad as the Any Seven bet it is still not worth the trouble.

The above two bets are examples of bets that are settled in a single roll of the dice. However the lure of craps is the bets that are settled over multiple rolls. The easier of these bets are the Hardways bets. When the numbers 4, 6, 8 or 10 are rolled with doubles they are said to be rolled the hard ways. The Hardways bets win if these numbers are rolled the hard ways before they are rolled any other way or before a 7 is rolled. These bets have house edges ranging from 9% to 11% and are avoidable.

A bet that new players should figure out is the Pass Line bet. Not only does it offer an attractive house edge of 1.4% but it can also be used as the basis of some more complex winning strategies. If the first roll of the dice, known as come out roll, shows 7 or 11 then the Pass Line bet automatically wins. If the come out roll shows 2, 3 or 11 then the Pass Line bet automatically loses. If any other number is shown in the come out roll then that number is established as the point. For the Pass Line bet to win the point must be rolled before a 7 is. Instead of betting for the Pass Line bet to win craps players can bet for the Pass Line bet to lose. This bet is known as Don’t Pass bet. The Don’t Pass bet also has a house edge of 1.4% and is an equally good bet.

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