Less come bets, higher odds?

Hey all,

I'm a longtime wizard fan who just joined the forum. I'm a craps player for a few years now. (Blackjack is just too tedious). I have studied the game, understand the statistics, don't believe in magic or strategies. I only play pass/don't pass with odds. What I am still refining is how many come bets to place based on my bankroll.

My baseline betting pattern is 1 pass and 2 comes with full odds (3/4/5) a bankroll that is 100x the pass line bet. I replace them when they pay out. I let them ride until 7 out and start over. I have a high tolerance for volatility, and I like action so I will press to 3 come bets or even load the bases if I am playing with their money. I am still practicing reducing my exposure when I am down. I have been experimenting with dialing back after 2 payouts. So far it's proven smart. Discipline makes a winner and that is where I focus my practice. I'm holding my own so far :).

MY QUESTION:
I want to reduce my risk and volatility exposure but not reduce opportunity. If I'm at a $10 table with 3/4/5 odds, Am I better off betting a pass line bet/full odds and one come bet/full odds (two bets/full) or a pass line and two come bets with 3x odds on each. Each maxes out at $120 on the table. Two bets do reduce exposure on points 4,5,9,10. Does it reduce potential as well?

Which is the better choice?

Quote: Itumac

MY QUESTION:
I want to reduce my risk and volatility exposure but not reduce opportunity. If I'm at a $10 table with 3/4/5 odds, Am I better off betting a pass line bet/full odds and one come bet/full odds (two bets/full) or a pass line and two come bets with 3x odds on each. Each maxes out at $120 on the table. Two bets do reduce exposure on points 4,5,9,10. Does it reduce potential as well?

Which is the better choice?

Given that only the Pass Line bets and the Come Bets have a House Edge working against you, the, 'Better choice,' is to make as few of those as possible. In terms of the House Edge relative to the total $$$ exposed, then again, you're better off to make as few Pass Line and Come Bets as possible.

I don't understand what you mean by, "Opportunity." Barring some kind of angle, there is a House Edge working against you in Craps, so the only side of the table with, 'Opportunity,' is the side that has the chair in the middle and a dealer on either side. There's a reason why those stacks of chips on the table add up to a lot more than the stack in your rack.

Try to get a handle on your "total action" and put as much as you can of that on free odds. With 2 come bets, seems to me you are increasing your total action per hour [edit: ok you have a plan to control that] and decreasing the amount of it that is free odds betting [this is the bad part].

As for opportunity, yeah, you might want to explain that.

Quote: Itumac

I want to reduce my risk and volatility exposure but not reduce opportunity.

By opportunity, I meant a greater chance of a payout with 3 numbers vs. 2... perhaps due to the mix of different probabilities. But as you explained it, each pass or come bet adds to the house edge. This makes perfect sense. But to make sure I understand, if I was at a table with 10x odds with the same bankroll and amount willing to wager, the best approach would be to place one bet with 10x odds each round vs. two or three bets with less odds. I recognize my fear of "reducing opportunity" is actually a fear of missing out on action, which is dangerous.

Thank you (both so far) for your answers.

compare this,

2 hours at a 3x4x5x, $5 table with an average bet of about $40, and 50 bets per hour, which often is my session. You would have then $4000 in total action

Let's say instead you were at a $10, 10x table and found your average bet was about $90 [I don't want to figure out what it might be exactly, let's just say $90]. If you only made 44 bets and stopped, your total action would be about the same, but the proportion that went to free odds would be much higher.

Your variance would also be much higher, but in fact there is no dispute this is smarter betting if you can handle the variance. Your needed bankroll, about the same. Smarter betting but note it requires walking away from the table before maybe you got your fix as far as time you meant to spend in this form of entertainment. The desire for that time gambling is what makes most of us want the dumber betting, if you want to put it that way.

Quote: odiousgambit

Your variance would also be much higher, but in fact there is no dispute this is smarter betting if you can handle the variance. Your needed bankroll, about the same. Smarter betting but note it requires walking away from the table before maybe you got your fix as far as time you meant to spend in this form of entertainment. The desire for that time gambling is what makes most of us want the dumber betting, if you want to put it that way.

You invest travel time and costs, nuisance of airport rigamarole, you watch your chips but you also slurp free booze. A mathematician will say put it all on one roll so that the house edge applies just once. No one really wants to do that though particularly if a wife/girlfriend is along on the trip.

Cheaper to just stay home and visit an online casino? Maybe.

There is absolutely no obligation to make an odds bet. It does erode (or add to) your bankroll more rapidly though.
Is it like getting shot at with small caliber bullets than large caliber bullets? Not really. If you can't tolerate a 1.414 per cent house edge, don't gamble at all. If you truly enjoy a 0.06 percent house edge, go for 100x odds. Math carried out to four decimal places discomforts my brain, after awhile so does the free booze,. I'm going to walk away from the table eventually but "time at table" is an important metric. Eroding "time at table" to cut a few more slices off house edge might not be worth it to me.

If Lady Luck is smiling at you, make an odds bet but remember she is famously fickle.

The house edge is only for the pass/come bets, all the free odds are free. So, the more pass/come bets you make, the more the house will take.

But, if you only play 1 pass bet, you never have the odds on your side, and so, playing multiple numbers makes it so, albeit with more exposure. If you look it up in any craps book, you find the least aggressive strategies (as far as the number of pass/come bets made) are the ones that best reduce loss.

Playing don't allows you to always have an advantage on every roll, so imho, playing only 1 don't pass with max lay is the best overall bet, other than just not playing. Better yet would be getting on the other side of the table by being the house! In that case, you'd be unstoppable... Vegas was not built upon winners, and the game of craps cannot be beaten over the long term.

(later edit) Yea, like Mission said!

Thanks. I play online at virgin casino. Their don't pass/come odds are all 6x vs 3,4,5 for pass/come

Instead of 3 instances of 1 unit pass w max odds.
Max total possible bets of 17 units pass:odds: 3:14
With no less than three rolls to get there...
I'll play 3 unit don't with 6x odds.
Max total bets of 21 units dont pass:dont odds: 3:18
One roll to get there.

Or conservatively play 2 unit don't with 6x odds.
Max total bets of 14 units dont pass:dont odds: 2:12
One roll to get there.

One thing doesn't make sense to my (knowingly fallacious) rationale. 1. That partial payout is possible on three come bets reducing loss to 5, 6 or 7 units on a single win, or 5 unit win on 2 payouts. (Excluding continuous replacement). Vs the all or nothing of a single pass.

Needless to say I'll be playing don't all the time online.

Thanks for the great insight.

There is only one play to play craps if you want the best deal.

Don't pass line with max odds. No come bets no don't-come bets.

The next best way is the pass line with max odds (but only after a point is set).

Both of these ways "work the odds" at every opportunity automatically by waiting for the comeout roll before betting the pass or don't pass.

Come bets have odds turned off for 30% of the rolls reducing the effect of odds considerably. This reason alone is enough to tell newbs not to make come bets.

As soon as you make a come bet that can win when your pass line loses, you are working against yourself just like the person who bets both RED and BLACK on roulette.

If you remove opportunity for losing, you often remove the opportunity for winning as well.

Every true gamble is taking a chance that you may lose.

When executed properly, the pass line doesn't matter as much, only the odds bet matters (because you have 345x odds or more). You expect that the opportunity to win or lose on the single pass line or single don't pass line bet is diminished to near zero.

Bold play is the other part. Just straight laying against the 12 on crapless is a legit play that I have never seen anyone take a big swing at (just for cultural reasons, IMO). IE: most people play the way the casino wants them to play (to lose).

Taking a swing takes a minute, not a day or a week.

Figure out what probability you want to win, take your swing, then fly back home.

If you want the absolute best craps game in the world, go to New Mexico.

$5 pass, double odds. Triple, triple field for zero HE. Free buy 4&10. I just play a single $5 pass and chuck the max bets on 4/10. Then I play field now and then.

They also comped me free rooms and food.

A few years ago, I wrote a review of the casino. Haven’t been back for like three years, but I hear they’re still running, although they capped the zero HE bets at $100 each.