Craps is a casino classic because it might be the most social of all the table games regularly available. The game is highly interactive for multiple players simultaneously, enhancing the excitement.
That entertainment is just as interactive when playing online casino games as it is at any brick-and-mortar casino. The beauty of playing craps at BetMGM Casino is that you can have that experience anytime, in any of the four states where BetMGM Casino is active: Michigan, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia.
That experience can take a number of shapes as each game is full of possibilities. You will become familiar with all the ins and outs of the game as you play, and a good grasp of a broad overview of the game will help you start playing.
Basics of Craps
If you’ve never played craps before, all the commotion from a crowd at the table along with all the chips and the pace of the game can make it look intimidating. However, the game mechanics themselves are quite simple.
With craps, what you’re essentially doing is trying to predict the result of a dice throw or the outcomes of multiple rolls in some cases. You win by betting on the right number(s) corresponding to what the dice show.
Craps does have some unique lingo that players use and a variety of betting possibilities. Millions of people have learned the jargon and become familiar with the wagering options, so you shouldn’t feel that you can’t pick these things up, too.
How To Play Craps
Craps asks players to do two things; place their wagers on the result of a roll or rolls of the dice and take their turns as the shooter, or the person who throws the dice. Most of the time, you will not begin a game as the shooter unless you are among the first people to start a game.
Before the dice are rolled, you have an opportunity to place a number of bets. For example, if you want to place a Pass or Don’t Pass bet, this is the time to do so.
Once all the bets are in, the shooter will roll what is known as the Come Out roll. If the player wins, they continue as the shooter. If they lose, the round ends.
With each round’s end, the dice pass to the next player who becomes the new shooter. This creates another opportunity to place bets. While there are other ways to bet on craps that arise in certain situations, this is the basic flow of the game.
BetMGM is a great place to gain some experience playing craps as you can play at your own pace and learn from your mistakes as you go.
BetMGM Craps
BetMGM is a fun way to play craps, regardless of your bankroll size or experience level. With BetMGM Casino, you’ll find traditional craps games, exciting variants, and all the action that craps lovers demand.
BetMGM offers craps players exclusive promotions, the utmost of which is an industry-best casino welcome bonus for new players. Players who register for BetMGM can take advantage of perks like bonus funds and deposit matches.
Online Craps
Craps is among the most popular games at physical casinos, and the same goes for online casinos. If you’re curious about what might change when you play the game online instead of in-person, the social dynamic is about all that you’ll miss out on playing online versions.
Craps online at BetMGM otherwise offers you the same fast-paced gameplay and all the betting options of a traditional game. While some players might miss the camaraderie, playing online is a fantastic way to get more comfortable with the game’s numerous wager types and all the vernacular.
It also gives you a way to take your time and formulate your craps strategy.
Best Craps Strategy
Probably the best of all the tips for beginner craps players is to realize that no strategy is sufficient to beat the house advantage in the game. While that can be relatively small depending on your bet, like 1.36% for a Don’t Pass bet, craps is a game of chance and once you’ve made your wager, there is nothing you can do to influence the odds.
Your best strategy, therefore, is to manage your bankroll in a way that allows you to control your risk as the game unfolds. That way you can mostly place wagers with smaller house edges but still have the room in your budget to make a riskier play when the time is right.
To do this, you should assess your budget and determine how long you want to play before you begin. Another way to approach this consideration is setting a loss or win limit for yourself.
After you’ve established those boundaries, you can decide exactly how much you want to risk on each bet and what type of wager you want to make in each situation. With a plan like this in place, you’ll avoid chasing losses or becoming victim to common mistakes.
Best Craps Bet
A broadly applicable rule of thumb when you gamble is that the lower a house edge on a bet, the less lucrative the payout will be if that wager hits. This principle is true in craps.
For example, in a standard game of craps, the Pass bet is among those with the lowest house edge at 1.41%. For that low house edge, you sacrifice your potential return as most games will pay out even money (1 to 1) if you win with this wager.
If the best bet to you means the bet with the biggest potential return, then you might consider other wagers like a One Roll bet. When you place such a bet, you’ll see a potential return of as much as 30 to 1 but you’re also facing a significantly higher house edge at 13.9% at those odds.
Managing reward and risk as you play is a crucial part of goals and strategies for novice craps players.
Best Bets in Craps Strategy
As you master craps odds and strategies, you’ll learn that the best bet for you at a given point in the game is a matter of adjusting to the rolls and timing. That’s why having a command of the various bet options is important as that allows you to assess the situation and put yourself in the best position if luck is on your side.
As an example, if you have seen several rolls in a row crap out (result in a two, three, or 12 on the come out roll), you might be tempted to place a pass bet on the next roll, assuming that there’s no way that streak can continue. However, this could be an instance of falling victim to the classic gambler’s fallacy.
Each roll in craps is independent, and the odds of every possible result reset each time. Any given throw can result in any possible combination of the dice.
You’re best off in terms of the odds in playing the percentages on each throw regardless of what has led up to that point. Come bets are a perfect illustration of this point.
Come Bets in Craps
When playing craps, you could be presented with an opportunity to place a Come bet. You can place this bet on any roll in the game.
To win, you need the shooter to roll a seven or an 11 on the Come Out roll. If the shooter rolls a two, three, or a 12 on the Come Out roll, you lose.
Any other number creates the point, which moves your Come bet to that number. The shooter will roll again. If the shooter rolls the point before rolling a seven, you win.
Should the shooter roll a seven before the point, however, you lose. You can also place a Don’t Come bet on any roll.
This is essentially the opposite wager to a Come bet. You would win if the Come Out roll results in a two or a three but lose on a seven or 11. A 12 on the Come Out roll is a push.
The point is your nemesis with a Don’t Come bet. If the shooter rolls that number before rolling a seven, you lose. A seven prior to the point, however, results in a win for you.
Before you can hope for the best on a Come bet, you need to know how to place such a wager.
The Come Line in Craps
The Come Line in craps is a spot on the table where you can place your chips before a roll if you want to place a Come bet. For that reason, some players will simply use the term in reference to a Come bet.
In the same way, there are Pass lines, Don’t Pass lines, and Don’t Come lines on the table. Their purpose is to denote your wager before the next roll occurs.
Advanced Craps Strategy
Once you’ve become familiar with managing your bankroll in craps and the basic terminology, you could be ready to learn about advanced strategy in the game. This includes topics like hedging your bets in craps and placing riskier wagers.
The best way to grasp these strategies is simply with experience and trying them out as you play. Suppose you get on a bit of a lucky streak and you currently have some winnings on top of the bankroll you began with.
That could be the moment to place a riskier wager, knowing that you even if you lose, you’ll still have broken even for the larger playing session. In this instance, you could place an Any Craps bet, which pays out if the next roll is a two, three, or 12.
The standard payout on such bets is 7 to 1, which is a better return than a Come Bet would have given you in the same situation. If your luck holds out, you will quickly add to the value of your winnings.
Reacting to how you fare in the game like this can elevate the excitement and help you stay in the game longer. Even the best laid plans can go awry if the dice aren’t kind, though.
Dice Sets in Craps
In craps, a dice set refers to how you set the dice in your hand before you roll. While dice are balanced in weight, many players include dice settings as part of their strategies.
Another similar term is dice control, which is the physical motion the shooter uses to roll the dice. Again, some players will practice certain gestures so they can repeat the movement easily.
It’s important to note that there is little evidence that either dice control or dice setting produces a significant advantage for a shooter. The weight of the dice tends to counteract these attempts.
Regardless, there are some popular methods that are common to see players using.
Best Craps Dice Set
Examples of the most popular dice sets include the Hardways set, which many players will use when they want to avoid rolling a seven. Traditionally, this dice setting involves placing the numbers four, six, eight, and 10 facing up.
On the contrary, players looking for a seven might arrange the dice so the configurations adding up to seven are showing on as many sides as possible. That includes two and five, three and four, and one and six.
Again, the actual affects of dice settings have proven to be minimal if they exist at all. If it were truly possible to give yourself a significant edge with any dice setting, casinos would ban the practice and enforce rules along those lines tightly.
Rather than trying to manipulate the dice, you’re better off spending your energy and time learning about the probabilities for those dice.
True Odds in Craps
When it comes to odds in craps, there are the payout odds that a casino sets for a wager, and then there are the true odds of a bet winning. Sometimes those are identical but not always.
With true odds, you’re only concerned with how many possible combinations would give you a win compared to the number of losing combinationsl. Put another way, it’s the number of losing rolls you should expect for every winning roll.
As an example, suppose you want to place a Come Bet after a point of 10 has been established on a Come Out roll. With that bet and point, there are twice as many ways to lose as there are to win.
Therefore, your true odds are 2 to 1 in this situation. Be careful not to think that means you have a one in three or 33% chance of winning. This merely means that for every winning roll in this circumstance, you can expect to lose twice.
Craps Odds Calculator
One of the best parts of playing craps online is that you don’t have to do the work of memorizing payout odds in BetMGM craps games. The game will tell you exactly how much you stand to win if luck is on your side with each potential wager.
When it comes to figuring out true odds, you can do it the manual way, mapping out every possible combination of the dice and then identifying the winning combinations versus the losing combos. There are easier ways, however.
There are multiple online craps odds resources online which pinpoint the odds of any possible bet you can place in standard versions of the game. They can be invaluable resources when you’re playing online as you can refer to them often.
What is the Riskiest Bet in Craps?
It’s important to acknowledge that some craps variants will feature wrinkles that can increase the stakes compared to traditional games. In standard versions, though, there is one bet that is the undisputed longest shot.
That wager is the 2 Craps or 12 Craps One Roll bet. Just as the name suggests, you need the shooter to crap out with a two or a 12 to win.
The true odds on this wager are 35 to 1. Just as this bet is the statistical extreme on one end, there is another side to that range.
What is the Safest Bet in Craps?
Sticking to the rules of a standard craps game, there is no one wager that has shorter true odds than every other bet in every circumstance. The answer here depends on the situation.
For example, suppose a Come Out roll establishes the point as four. In that instance, a Don’t Come Bet would have true odds of 1 to 2, as you should expect to lose that bet once for every two times you win.
However, if the Come Out roll is a five, your true odds for a Don’t Come bet drop to 2 to 3. In that situation, you’d statistically be better off placing a Come bet, as your true odds for that wager would be the adverse at 3 to 2.
With experience, you’ll become more familiar with the best craps odds in each scenario. Unlike true odds, which are simply a mathematical equation, payouts in craps are somewhat discretionary.
Craps Payouts
When you’re playing craps, it’s important to remember that casinos don’t always pay out true odds if you win. In many instances, there is a house edge built into wagers.
Any legitimate casino will make the payout odds for every possible bet in craps available. When you’re playing with BetMGM, the app will show you how much you stand to win before you make a potential wager.
Your payout will vary greatly on what bet you want to place and the circumstances of the moment. Obviously, your payout also fluctuates with the size of your stake.
How To Win at Craps with a Small Bankroll
While the phrase nothing ventured, nothing gained is true when it comes to playing craps to an extent, that doesn’t mean it isn’t possible to win at craps with a small bankroll. That’s because your odds are the same regardless of how much you are betting when you play craps.
Another thing to keep in mind is that winning a bet and making a profit aren’t necessarily the same thing. It’s possible for you to string some wins together and still be down compared to where your bankroll began.
Your best path to winning with a small bankroll is to place relatively safe bets and slowly build your bankroll over time if you are lucky enough. That is a good time to become familiar with all the slang that craps players use during the game.
Craps Lingo
While you might find some regional variances, a lot of the craps terminology you need to know is pretty standard. Some examples include calling the dice or table “cold” when several consecutive shooters have missed their points and seven out referring to when a shooter rolls a seven before the point.
Crapping out is a term that means when a player loses and the dice pass to the next shooter because they rolled craps. In some variants of the game, though, that isn’t a concern.
Crapless Craps vs Craps
What is craps without the craps? Well, still craps, just craps-less. In this variant, rolling a two, three, or a 12 is not rolling craps.
Because there are no craps, you can’t lose on the Come Out roll. Rather, a two, three, or a 12 simply becomes the point.
Another variation is that the 11 is no longer an automatic win on the Come Out, either. In crapsless craps, only a seven produces that result on the Come Out.
Playing crapless craps can be a fun way to change things up if playing the standard game has gotten a little boring.
Can I Play Crapless Craps Online?
The simple answer to whether you can play crapless craps online is yes, many online casinos offer this variant. It’s been around for a while, so it’s quite common.
Before you play, though, be sure to familiarize yourself with the new probabilities and payouts as they will be significantly different from those in traditional craps. Other games available on BetMGM Casino will have extremely different statistics as well.
Baccarat vs Craps
When it comes to whether you should play baccarat or craps, there really is no wrong answer. Also, your answer can change over time.
When you’re looking for a game that has a faster pace or a ton of betting options with a wide range of stakes, craps is ready for that moment. If you’re in the mood for a more methodical game that gradually builds to a few chances at a big payout, baccarat might suit your mood.
Regardless of which game you want to play, you don’t have to sacrifice the experience of playing in a brick-and-mortar casino if you choose to play online.
Can I Play Live Craps Online?
With BetMGM, you absolutely have the option to play live dealer craps online. First Person Craps is a stellar choice for this experience.
First Person Craps pairs an outstanding RTP of 98.63% with immersive features, making you feel like you are in the room with other players. Evolution, the game’s creator, has even built an easy mode into the game for beginners.
Veteran players will still find all the challenge they could ever want with First Person Craps, though. It’s truly the closest thing to being at the casino you can experience from your couch at home and could help you become a renowned player.
Who is the Best Professional Craps Player?
While luck can strike for any craps players, there are a few players who have had games so memorable that their names are forever connected to craps. One of the best craps players ever is William Bergstrom.
Bergstrom made a name for himself over 40 years ago, winning six figures playing craps in Las Vegas. Another craps legend is Patricia Demauro, who went on a four-hour hot streak that consisted of 154 consecutive rolls without hitting a seven.
Although history does not record exactly how much she won, she was undoubtedly one of the luckiest craps players ever. The game’s history probably consists of other such stories lost to time, though.
History of Craps
It’s hard to pin down exactly who created the game that is now known as craps or when that occurred. Pieces of evidence point all the way back to ancient Rome or the Crusades in the Middle East.
What seems to be a consensus is that by the 18th century, the history of craps can be traced to a game that was played in France. The game radiated throughout the rest of Europe then Africa, Asia, and the Americas from there.
In the early 20th century, John H. Winn published what many believe to be the first standardized set of rules for the game under the name craps. Just a few decades later, it became a fixture in land-based casinos and the rest was history.
Whether you will become the next chapter in the story of craps remains to be seen, but BetMGM is a fantastic place to start that journey.
