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- Are All American Roulette Wheels The Same
- Numbers On A Roulette Wheel
- Are All Roulette Wheels The Same
Playing Roulette is sometimes metaphysical and like the wheel of life, it is raw and unscripted. In a game of Roulette wheel, there are subtler things that aren’t often discussed but have an incredible effect on the winning odds. So join me till the end to get answers to all popular questions on Roulette Wheel. Hi and first of all welcome to TGC. Regarding the video which I have seen before, roulette croupiers (good ones) have always had the ability to hit a number or at the worst its neighbours, this is due to something called muscle memory which is built over many years, pretty much the same way Ronaldo can put the ball where he wants on a soccer pitch, so can a decent croupier on the wheel. But watching computer-generated software spin a fake wheel and ball just isn’t the same thing. Some players also don’t like how a random number generator (RNG) is determining whether they win or lose. An RNG simulates the same odds that a regular roulette game offers.
Triple zero roulette has been introduced at two casinos in Las Vegas, Planet Hollywood and New York-New York.
Venetian got the first triple zero roulette table (two, actually) on The Strip back in Oct. 2016, and it seemed inevitable the much-reviled game would proliferate.
That it has.
Here’s a look at the triple zero roulette table at Planet Hollywood.
On the bright side, one of the “fun facts” about roulette stays the same: The numbers on a roulette table add up to 666.
“What is triple zero roulette?” you ask.
Well, a typical roulette table in U.S. casinos has two zeros.
On a table with two zeros, the house edge is 5.26%. That’s one of the highest house advantages in the casino.
On a triple zero roulette table, the house edge jumps up to 7.69%.
See, that’s what makes a much-reviled game so reviled.
Given the odds are worse on a triple zero table, why would people play it? You ask great questions!
Typically, the minimum bet on a triple zero roulette table is lower than on a double zero table.
Yes, there are some single zero tables in Las Vegas casinos, but they tend to be reserved for big spenders. An exception is the single zero table at Cromwell. There’s a premium to be paid for the better odds, of course. The minimum bet at Cromwell is $25.
The house edge in a single zero roulette game is 2.7%. You go, Cromwell.
How did we know more triple zero games would make their way to Las Vegas casinos? Another excellent question!
We knew because players at Venetian’s triple zero roulette table (see below) didn’t care at all about the less favorable odds.
Triple zero roulette tables are often packed when double zero tables are empty.
It was the same at Planet Hollywood during our visit.
Planet Hollywood has eight roulette tables. Seven have a $15 minimum, one has a $10 minimum. The lower table minimum is more than enough to entice recreational gamblers, and casinos couldn’t be happier about it.
Before you start calling triple zero roulette players stupid, consider this: They’re not gambling to make money. They’re playing to have fun.
And here’s a confession: We had fun playing triple zero roulette at Planet Hollywood, too. And we won money to boot.
We even made money on one of the bets you’ll only find at a triple zero roulette table. It’s a bet on any of the zeros, and it pays 11-to-1.
Big thanks to Planet Hollywood for not asking security to Taser us for taking photos.
Oh, and while we’re at it, here’s another counter-intuitive fact about triple zero roulette: It can actually make your money last longer.
It’s true!
Despite disadvantageous odds, the lower table minimum at triple zero roulette means a typical player (assuming they make the minimum bet) will lose less over time than someone betting more at a double zero roulette table.
That’ll teach you to be less judgy.
So, no, not everything is ruined. But that doesn’t mean we have to like triple zero roulette.
Triple zero roulette is a symbol of an evolution taking place in Las Vegas casinos. As gambling revenue declines, casinos have to find new and clever ways of bolstering their bottom lines.
If guests play games with a higher house edge, casinos will continue to find ways to raise them even higher.
The irony, of course, is gambling revenue is declining because the perceived value of gambling has declined. Casinos tighten their slots, so players play slots less. Casinos change 3-to-2 blackjack games to 6-to-5, so fewer play the game. It’s a vicious cycle.
Our strategy is to play the games where we have the most fun. That way, we can spend our time being entertained rather than doing math.
We’d love to hear your thoughts. Do you care about the number of zeros on your roulette table?
Thanks to our friends at the You Can Bet on That podcast for alerting us to the triple zero roulette table at Planet Hollywood.
Updated (4/26/18): Park MGM has also introduced triple zero roulette.
Updated (4/13/19): Since this story, a number of Las Vegas casinos have introduced triple zero roulette. Las Vegas casinos with triple zero roulette:
- Venetian and Palazzo
- Planet Hollywood
- Circus Circus
- Golden Nugget
- Park MGM
- New York-New York
- Harrah’s Las Vegas
- Luxor
- Wynn Las Vegas
- Linq
- Binion’s
- Four Queens
- Aria Las Vegas
- Caesars Palace
- Green Valley Ranch
- Palms
Just about as many people have studied the physics of a roulette wheel and ball as have tried to beat the wheel with a roulette system. The reward for being able to predict where the ball is going to land in any given spin on a roulette table is just too tempting!
In this section, we take a look at some basic roulette physics to see if this can help us, in any way, to understand the dynamics of the game and thus to gain an edge. Roulette probabilities are fixed. But that hasn’t stopped people from trying to predict those outcomes.
There might be some roulette mathematics involved here by the way!
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The first thing to say, is that the roulette wheel is designed to generate outcomes of pure chance. There is no purer form of gambling, and although most wheels are not 100% random (they may be biased, or the dealer may have a signature), they are as close to random as you can possibly get. Casinos aren’t bothered about having perfect roulette wheels. They just need them perfect enough so that humans are unable to spot any trends.
Let’s take an American Roulette Wheel. There are 38 pockets into which the ball can fall, and all are the same size. The probability of the ball landing in any of them is equal. You could say that a roulette wheel is a random number generator or an RNG.
Are All American Roulette Wheels The Same
But, and it’s a big but- the result isn’t determined by an electronic random number generator like it is in virtual or video roulette. It is determined by the mechanics of a ball going round a wheel, and friction and gravity acting on that ball. Eventually the ball will lose all of its kinetic energy thanks to friction with the wheel and the air, and will eventually bounce across pockets losing more and more energy faster and faster until it comes to a stop.
In theory, if you are able to measure certain parameters, you should be able to work out the pocket into which the ball will fall. Even if you are unable to predict the exact pocket, you should be able to predict a “zone” of numbers. And that is enough in roulette to give you an edge, because of course you can make multiple single number bets.
Visual spotting, or even lasers have been used to collect the necessary initial values of the variables in the system. All this becomes easier if the wheel is biased- even a minor tilt of the rotor, for example, can create shadow zones on the wheel where the ball never falls.
Here we get into the actual physics of a roulette wheel, a topic that has been covered by many scientists including , using the work of Edward Thorp who wrote Elementary Probability (1966), The Mathematics of Gambling (1984) and several mathematical papers on probability, game theory, and functional analysis and Eichberger who has attempted to beat roulette with a computer in his Roulette Physics paper.
In these approximations, friction and air resistance need to be plugged in to the model. Another paper worth looking at, as this comes from the casino’s perspective, is Dixon’s Roulette Wheel Testing in which he claims that an angle of as little as 0.1° will cause a discernable bias in the wheel.
The Physics of Roulette
Friction and Drag
Let’s look at a roulette wheel. It consists of an outside s a rim along which the ball rolls at the beginning of its journey. At some stage the ball will drop down from the rim when it loses momentum and travel towards the centre of the wheel. The ball will hit a set of bumps, which will send the ball scattering in a chaotic fashion. Then the ball reaches the inner section of the wheel, with 38 identically sized pockets into which it can land.
Say there was no friction, drag, or tilt, the ball would roll around the rim of the wheel in the opposite direction to the wheel spin, infinitely. It’s path can be determined by the initial angular velocity of the ball and the initial angular velocity of the wheel. Here we are going to use Eichberger’s equation of motion for the wheel without tilt:
Numbers On A Roulette Wheel
ω is the angular velocity of the ball, and α is the angular acceleration of the ball. Freespin casino no deposit. The constants a and b refer to the effects of friction and drag
Tilted Wheels
If the wheel is tilted, (ie you have a biased wheel), you need additional parameters to describe this. Andy Hall (2007) has written a paper on this called the Forbidden Zones of Roulette Wheels, which make for interesting reading if you are keen on roulette physics. His equation for tilted wheels is as follows:
Are All Roulette Wheels The Same
The ball’s angular acceleration α, now depends on the speed of the ball, AND its location, theta. This is due to the tilt- in some areas the ball is deccelerating up the tilt, and in others it is accelerating down it.
Using these and other equations to model the ball’s behaviour, the authors have made claimed that they are able to predict the final resting place of the ball with a high enough degree of accuracy to be able to get an edge over the casinos, by predicting:
Where the ball leaves the Rim and
Working out the Departure Angle of the Ball
Working out the Departure Angle of the Ball
Summary
The amount of tilt that a wheel has affects how big the “shadow zones” are on roulette wheels, as modelled by these equations. But importantly, these shadow zones or “forbidden zones” relate to where the ball comes off the rim of the outer wheel, not where it stops. The casinos still have one ace up their sleeve- and that is the “bumps” that chaotically scatter the ball in all directions.
This is a far harder thing to model. Can you beat roulette with chaos theory? Well, that’s a whole different subject!