This last Vegas trip wasn’t so nice with the dice. No 6 or 8 got pressed up over 60. Considering the pattern is 12, 18, 30, 42, 60 – that means it wasn’t rolled by anyone more than 5 times. 4 and 10 maybe got up to 100 a couple of times (10, 25, 50, 100…got tired of going 10-25-75 and nothing…). 5-9 made it up to 75 once. (10, 25, 35, 50, 75).
So – no real good rolls. Probably the best roll was due to making points. But not many people made points. There was a series of rolls, where people were 2-3 rolls and out – that I eventually went to betting the don’t. Which of course, forced the roller to hit his point. So then I switched back to pass. One point was his limit. So back to don’t. Next roller able to make one point. So switch to pass. One point is his limit too…it was a crazy stretch of betting.
Lots of soul searching during that time. Imagining ways to help pass the time while the money is being squeezed out of me…after all, making money on good rolls isn’t really hard – place bets or come bets – doesn’t matter too much. What is difficult, for me at least, is having my bankroll survive in between the good rolls.
A few options came to mind:
- Don’t press as fast.
- Don’t press bets until initial money is recouped.
- Bet the Don’t until people make a point.
The strategy to relax my pressing of the bets is to try and save a little money from the rollers that already make a few numbers. The 2nd don’t press strategy is to be even more strict about it.
The problem with the first two strategies is that I’m basically phasing myself out of the game. Maybe that’s not a problem. Just a side effect – but my gambling genes see that as a problem.
Starting off with a don’t bet seems like bad table karma but considering how the tables were this last trip, karma shouldn’t be my main worry. Dusting off the craps simulations:
~60% of the people don’t make a single point.
~25% make 1 point
~10% make 2 points
~4% make 3 points
And it gets depressing after that. By switching to don’t on the first roll for a player, I’d be winning on all the chumps that give us 2 rolls with no coffee. Like me sometimes.
And I will need to forget about the people that don’t make a single point but roll the dice 100 times. Or maybe I need to prove to myself that those rolls don’t happen every often and that if I do see one of those rolls, throwing up would be a reasonable response.
Seems like the craps simulations need more than just a dusting off…(probably some validation too…)