How casinos work lessons

The lessons in this track

1. 1.1The house edge: a price inside every betEvery bet carries a price that is settled before the ball drops, and you can find that price by counting pockets: here is where the price hides in the payout, and how to count it out.About 21 minutes
2. 1.4Do cards, dice and wheels remember?Whether the last spin, roll or card changes the next one — and why the honest answer is different for a shoe of cards than for a wheel.About 22 minutes
3. 1.5One night versus a thousandAn hour of bets on a dozen ends in front about four times in ten. A hundred hours almost never does. Same wheel, same bet — the only difference is how many times the house edge has been charged.About 18 minutes
4. 1.6Who runs Chilean casinos and who checks themOne law and one regulator for the whole country: a company runs each casino under a permit, and the regulator grants it, keeps the catalogue of games and checks the room. Here is who does what, and where a wrong payout goes.About 12 minutes
5. 1.7The club card and what is recordedA club card counts your play. At a table, what it counts adds up to the price of that play, not to what you took home. Here is what the card records, what else is kept about a visitor, and what self-exclusion does to it.About 12 minutes
6. 1.835 veces, 2 a 1, a la par: reading a payoutThe national catalogue of games writes “35 veces su postura” at roulette, “1 a 1 (a la par)” and “3a2” at blackjack, “40 a 1” at the Big Six and “6: 5” at craps. Here is how to read each one, and how many chips come back.About 10 minutes

What this track is for

Every figure in these lessons is worked out when the page is built, by the same engines as our tools, or comes from a source quoted on the spot. More on how we verify.

Nothing here is a way to win. The course explains what each game costs to play and what the rules on the table actually change, so that the money you take in is a decision and not a surprise.

Nothing you do in a practice table leaves your browser: what you answered is kept on this device and is sent nowhere. The course page lists what this device has saved.