Progress Publishing Co.
	Dice Control for Casino Craps / Gambling Disciples of God

 

          From Chapter 2  

Craps Buy Bet

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In This Chapter

• Craps Personnel
• Flow of the Craps game
• Dice totals and their frequencies, probabilities and odds
• Craps Bets

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Buy Bets

The Buy bets are another way for a right bettor to cover the point numbers. These Craps bets can be made at any time. Buy bets can be pressed (increased), reduced or taken down (removed) at any moment prior to a roll. They work the same way the Place bets do, but the payoffs for the Buy bets are made at the correct odds. For that increase in the payoff ratio a player has to pay the house a 5% commission on the amount of his bet.

Suppose a player wants to make a $20 Buy bet on the number 6. A 5% commission, which is also called the “vig”, the “vigorish” or the “juice”, will be $20 x 5% = $1. A player places $21 on the layout and tells the dealer that he wants to buy a 6. A dealer collects $1 vig and puts $20 in an appropriately numbered box on the layout. He also puts a small “Buy” button atop the chips to distinguish them from the Come bets. If the 6 repeats before a 7 is thrown, a player is paid at correct odds of 6 to 5 – $24.

How big is the house advantage when a player makes the Buy bets? If the house did not charge a 5% commission, the Buy bets would be the even proposition bets without any advantage for the house or the player. Thus, if we’ll use our example above, all we’ll have to do to calculate the house advantage is to divide that $1 commission charge by the amount wagered, which is $21. The result is 4.76%. We can see now, that it is cheaper to buy a 4 or 10 than to place them, because the Place bets on a 4 or 10 carry a 6.67% advantage for the house. On the other hand, it is better to place a 5,6,8 or 9 than to buy them due to a smaller house edge on the Place bets for these numbers.

If you want to buy bets you have to make at least $20 bets. If your bet is only $10, than the 5% commission on that bet is equal 50 cents, but the house will charge you $1 anyway, because $1 chips are the smallest chips on the craps table. In this case, the house advantage against you will sharply increase to 9.09%.

The Buy bets are off on a come out roll, unless you instruct the dealer to make them work.

 Copyright Progress Publishing 1998

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