The best shooter in the world can't win if he doesn't bet his hands correctly. It seems so obvious that even the newest newbie should recognize it. Yet everytime I step up to the table with a group of precision shooters I see bizarre betting strategies that all but negate any positive expectation they may have achieved through their tossing.
How should you bet your hands? A good place to start . . .
. . . is with a copy of Maddog's superb toss analysis program - BoneTracker. An Excel based open-code program, BoneTracker is available for free download at www.CrapsFest.com.
Begin by building a book of 720 of your own rolls. If you are serious about practicing and becoming a precision shooter this should take no more than a couple of days. Once you have your first book of rolls review the toss stats and optional dice set arrangements and look for plays where you have an advantage. Then toss another 720 rolls focusing on those specific plays. Incorporate virtual betting into your toss tracking so you know whether you are getting the results you want by betting those numbers. Then analyze the second book of 720 rolls to see if the edge you thought you have with the first book of rolls is still there. If not - you may have an issue with your grip and toss. The consistency simply may not be there.
Continue roll tracking in this manner until you have seven books of 720 rolls. That's a total of 5000 rolls and is the MINIMUM number of rolls you should track in your virtual sessions before taking it to the tables and risking money in a live game.
One of the ways I like to approach the game is to focus on my POWER NUMBERS as identified in BoneTracker. My preference - to establish one of my power numbers as the point - then snipe the point out through the POWER SET I've developed through BoneTracker's permutation function. This allows me to play more of my available bankroll on my Power Numbers instead of spreading chips out all over the layout.
Think about that. If the five and nine are your power numbers and you typically play the Pass Line with odds and $85 inside when one of these is the point - why not take that $60 off the six and eight and put it where you get the most bang for your buck - in additional free odds on the point?
Here are a couple of ways I handle this. One is to focus all of my wagers on my Power Numbes, then take an initial steep regression after the first hit. Once I have a profit locked up I power press these numbers back to their pre-regression level, hold at that level for a couple of hits, then progress to a second level. This strategy works great when your toss is "on" and you are banging out power numbers. However, in the real world inconsistency can creep into your game. On days when my toss isn't quite at 100% I like to play a slow progression such as the Fibonacci.
The Fibonacci strategy is a mathematical progerssion where each wager is the sum of the prior two wagers. Bets are progressed to the next step with each LOSS and down two steps with each WIN in the original Fibo - hence it is a negative progression. By that I mean you progress your bets on after a loss. My preference is to either regress one step or stay at the same betting level for two hits - then regress two steps and continue from there. It carries a little more risk than the basic Fibo, however it's a risk that is more than offset with my advantage on my Power Numbers. In this modification I ONLY play the Fibo on Pass or Don't Pass wagers. I adjust the flat bet so that the total amount in play on the line bet with odds equals the next bet. Let me run through an example for you.
An eight step Fibonacci progression looks like this: 1-2-3-5-8-13-21-34. You can design your own Fibo progression all the way up to table max. My preference is to limit my Fibo action to six steps, with a maximum bet of 13 units. For the sake of this example let's go with the eight step progression. For the sake of simplification we'll use a $10 Base Bet.
The first wager is $10 on the Pass Line with no odds. If that wager wins you continue to play $10 Pass Line bets with no odds. If that wager loses your next wager is two units total - a $10 Pass Line wager with $10 odds. In the basic Fibo, if that wager wins you would regress to a $10 flat bet with no odds. But if it loses you'll progress to a $10 flat bet with $20 odds. As long as you continue to lose you continue to increase the bet. The next step would be $10 with $40 odds. After that - $10 with $70 odds. Let's assume this is a 10X odds game. In the real world my next step would be a $15 flat bet with odds, but to keep the math simple, we'll just use an increase to $20. So the next wager would be a $20 flat bet with $110 odds for a total $130 wager. The next bet would be a $20 flat with $200 odds. Finally, you hit the wall with a $40 flat bet with $300 odds.
What happens when you hit the wall? Well, that's why I limit myself to a six step Fibo. I don't want to find out.
Betting systems are a lot of fun to work with, but there is no mathematical way to beat the game without first influencing the dice and changing the odds in your favor. Know your edge - bet you edge - then get in, get it done and get gone.
Copyright January 2007 by Steve "Heavy" Haltom - All Rights Reserved
