A Better Way to Play Crapless Craps

If you are like most gamblers, you expect to lose while playing craps. The occasional wins you capture give you great joy and excitement, but in the long run you expect you will lose. You chalk up your loses as the cost of entertainment in the pursuit of those exciting wins. If you can just play for four hours, or six or even eight hours a day and only lose what you feel is a reasonable amount, you are happy.

As stated in my last installment, the house edge for a pass line bet in crapless craps is almost four times that of the standard craps game (5.38% versus 1.41%). To put it another way, the fun you have at the tables you will last only 25 percent as long at a crapless craps table if you only bet pass line bets.

Compared to pass line bets, the additional place bets on a crapless craps layout are even more heavily tilted to the house. Placing the 3 or 11 carries a house edge between 6.25 percent and 10 percent depending on the casino. The 2 or 12 place bets make between 7.14 percent and a whopping 14.29 percent for the house.

Based on this information, common sense dictates you should play the standard game. But what if the regular tables are full or your spots are taken? What if crapless craps is the only game open? Or, what about other bets not already discussed?

A pass or come bet with double odds in standard craps has a 0.61 percent house edge. The same bet with double odds in crapless craps has a 2.02 percent edge making it a much less desirable bet. It makes placing the 6 and/or 8 a less costly option as that bet carries a house edge of only 1.52 percent, and has a hit frequency second only to the 7.

Placing the 6 and 8 are preferred for their low house edge of about 1.5 percent. Depending on your bet size, buying the 4 and/or 10 (with the vig paid only on a win) is also a reasonable bet at a little over 1 percent house edge.

But what about those extra place bets available in a crapless game? What about betting on the 2/12 or the 3/11?

As you might expect, the house edge on a place bet for these numbers is high, between 8.5 and 14 percent depending on the casino. By contrast, placing the 4/10 has a house edge of 6.7 percent.

The message is clear and simple - avoid place bets on the outside numbers, especially the very outside numbers. However, buying these numbers can minimize the tax on your wins by the casino and make for a pretty good game.

Some Las Vegas and Tunica casinos allow buying the 3/11 for $25 with a $1 vig for a house edge of a mere 1 percent. If this isn't enough to get excited about, consider buying the 2/12. In casinos where you can buy the 2/12 for $25, and pay only a $1 on a win, the house edge is a mere 0.57 percent - almost the same as a blackjack game that has decent rules and played using perfect basic strategy.

Now that is something to get excited about. On top of that, hitting the 2 or 12 with a $25 buy bet pays $149 - almost as much fun as hitting a Hardway bet.

So, the next time the only open table is a crapless game, you don't need to walk past it. In fact you may want to seek it out. You just need to be selective with the numbers you bet on and the type of bets you make. As an added bonus, hitting the extreme outside numbers can quickly add to your bankroll.