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About Roulette Systems
by Tony R. Frank
You’ve seen the numerous advertisements for roulette systems that claim you’ll
“win consistently”. Most of these systems sell for anywhere from $100 to several
thousand dollars. Do they work? Yes, but not for everyone and not all the time.
No one can honestly promise that a system will win consistently. Beware of those
who make such claims, they’re trying to rip you off!
And don’t spend big bucks. Just because information is high-priced doesn’t guarantee
it’ll win big profits. That’s why authors make their money selling systems,
instead of at the roulette table. Don’t fall for the line "I’ve already won
my share, now I’m going to help you win yours."
Most gambling experts tell us that systems can’t work because the house edge
can’t be overcome. It’s true, in the long-run, no system in the world can overcome
the casino advantage, but in the short term those odds can often be cheated.
Proving that a roulette system can’t work by running it through 100,000 computer-generated
spins doesn’t mean a thing. Because when you go to the casino you”ll, at most,
play a few hundred spins in a day. There is a big difference between long-term
computer predictions and short-term live gambling.
When they say “systems don’t work in the long-run”, it doesn’t mean they can’t
work in the short-term. Knowing that a system isn’t infallible shouldn’t keep
you from playing it. As long as it works more often than not, you’ll come out
ahead.
Playing a system means playing systematically, playing wisely, playing patiently
and with a determination to win. The idea of system play is to manipulate your
bets in such a way that the probabilities are tilted in your favor.
All systems are based on the laws of averages. If you flip a coin you know it’ll
land heads or tails, but you can’t predict which. If you flip that coin 100
times, chances are it’ll land heads 50 times and tails the other 50 times, but
in streaks and chops, not in neatly alternating fashion.
Because no one can predict the outcome of the next spin, a systematic betting
strategy will usually outperform random guessing. Roulette is a mechanical game.
System play eliminates guessing or emotional decisions. Your play becomes as
mechanical as the game itself.
The ideal roulette system aims to maximize winnings, minimize losses and let
you leave the casino with more money than you came in with. All systems promise
to do all of this, except they fail for various reasons. Some are way too complicated,
some require too large a bankroll and some are simply too boring to play.
Casinos win not so much because of their advantage in percentages, they win
mainly because they play their own version of a system. Their system is having
virtually unlimited capital with which they grind down the player.
Here is a simple illustration: Let’s say you have $10 and you make $1 even-money
coin-flip bets against someone who has $1,000. Before long you have an unlucky
streak, your $10 is gone and you can’t make any more bets. Your opponent did
not even have a percentage advantage, you simply didn’t last because you didn’t
have enough capital.
That’s why you have to be cautious with your money. A good system won’t let
short runs of bad luck wipe out a limited bankroll. System play gives you two
important advantages over the casino: you control your betting according to
how your luck runs and you quit the moment you have reached or exceeded what
you set out to win.
Too often players are defeated at the table because when they start losing they
are in too much of a hurry to get their money back. Or, if they win, they stay
at the table too long. They get greedy, start playing for higher stakes and
end up losing all. A good system prevents you from making those mistakes.
Most roulette systems involve some kind of betting progression. The idea being,
you start small and increase the size of your wager as you’re winning. One method
is to double your bet after every loss, wagering units of 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32
and so on until you win a bet, at which point you’d be ahead by one unit. Then
you start again at the one-unit level. This system works as long as the game
is choppy, meaning you don’t hit a long losing streak.
The argument is that no losing streak lasts forever, sooner or later you win.
You get all your money back and show a one-unit profit. There are three reasons
why this kind of system might defeat you badly:
First, you probably wouldn’t have enough capital (or the guts to wager it),
should you encounter a prolonged losing streak. Ten losses in a row would require
your 11th bet to be 1,024 units! Up to this point you have already wagered and
lost 1,023 units!
Second, even if you were able and willing to put that much capital at risk,
chances are you wouldn’t be allowed to make that big a bet because the amount
would exceed the maximum table limit.
Third, as you can see in the above example, starting with a betting unit of
only $1, the stakes can mount up very quickly. On the other hand, a $1 unit
is way too small. Winning $1 at a time, you’d have to stay at the table “forever”
in order to accumulate an appreciable amount.
One way this double-up progression might work is by waiting for a pattern. Example:
Don’t make any bets until you see one color (red or black) come up six times
in a row. Then bet on the opposite color. Even if it takes another half-dozen
spins before the pattern breaks, you’d have only 63 units at stake, because
you sat out the first 6 spins.
This method keeps your betting levels under the maximum table limit and practically
guarantees you a win, but you won’t play this system. Endless waiting and watching
for those patterns to develop is totally boring.
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The author, Tony R Frank is not a high roller or a gambling professional, just
an average casino player. His "Let’s Talk Winning" web site and weekly e-mail
newsletter feature free news, views, tips and strategies for recreational gamblers:
www.letstalkwinning.com
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