Roullete, the casino game of chance, has offered glamour, mystery and excitement to gamblers since its inception in the 17th Century. Its rules are simple enough for novice players to grasp, yet the game provides a surprising level of depth for serious betters. The aim of the game is to correctly guess where the ball will land when the wheel comes to a stop. Players place their chips on a betting mat, the precise location of the chips indicating the bet being made. Winners are paid out and the losing bets cleared from the table before play continues.
The roulette wheel consists of a solid wooden disk slightly convex in shape, with 36 compartments numbered non-consecutively from 1 to 36 and alternately red and black. There is also a green section labelled 0 on European wheels, and a second green section marked 00 on American roulette wheels. There are also some specialised bets called ‘Dozens’ and ‘Columns’ which are placed on groups of numbers and pay out at higher odds.
A small ball is rolled around the circumference of the wheel and into one of the pockets. If the player has bet on that number, or a grouping of numbers, or the color red or black, or whether it is odd or even, or within one of the two value ranges (high or low), they win. The player can also make a straight-up bet on an individual number, and a split bet between two numbers. There is also a corner bet where the player chooses four adjacent numbers in a square on the betting mat.
Many gamblers believe that there are ways to improve their chances of winning at roulette by following a strategy. These systems often involve keeping a record of the results of previous spins and observing patterns. For example, if a particular number hasn’t appeared in a while it is assumed that it must appear soon. This sort of reasoning is flawed because it ignores the fact that “the long run” starts before you ever start recording the numbers – and extends infinitely in the past and into the future.
The house edge in roulette is 1.35% and can be significantly reduced by playing the game in a live casino where the games are handled in real-time by a professional dealer. However, even when playing against a human dealer the house edge is not as low as some people would like to think.