Craps 7 Deadly Sins Revisited

[heavy]

This post is based on an article I did back in 2005 called Craps Seven Deadly Sins. I thought I'd revisit here and solicit your comments. Some of the "sins" may seem a little repetitive, but there are minute differences. Here's what it breaks down to:

1. Betting when you don’t have an advantage. Okay, we're all guilty of this one. We all bet SOMETHING on the randies - even if it's just a DP with no odds. In truth, players who wager on every shooter who touches the dice are driven by false hopes and unreal expectations. A random stroke of good fortune can make things even worse – reinforcing the player’s mistakes and leading him to repeat them in the future. Be content to win consistently on your own hands and the hands of qualified shooters you trust. Anything else is just gambling. Thoughts?

2. Playing with an insufficient bankroll. You see it everyday – players stepping up to the table, buying in for $100, then putting the entire stake into action. The player has about as much chance of winning as a gang-banger armed with a cap pistol shooting it out with the police. If you are an advantage player you should size your wagers according to two things – your bankroll and your positive expectation. If you are betting beyond that you are just asking for trouble. Personally, I'll buy in for $300 - $500 for a very specific reason. The more chips I have in the rack the more I "gamble." With fewer chips to work with I tend to do a better job of wager management. What about you?

3. Failing to maintain discipline. I define discipline as how you manage your emotions at the table. For some players, losses are a catalyst that triggers irrational actions. They lose control of their emotions and stay too long at the table. They double up after losing in an effort to “get back” in the game. They just know that “things have to turn around” eventually. But hanging around and trying to get even is the gambler’s curse. Instead of increasing your bets in an effort to recoup your losses all at once, view your play as Lance Armstrong did in his last Tour de France win. You’re not going to win every leg of the race; it’s the overall final decision that counts.

4. Impatience. How many times have you seen someone rush up to the table and throw down a lot of action without taking time to chart the shooters and trends. And even when we stay and track rolls - often in our eagerness to play, we believe they see something that isn’t really there. It may be a Don’t trend or a streak on the sixes and eights. Or you may think another shooter at the table is tossing with an edge and you mistakenly try to capitalize on it. Relax. The game isn’t going anywhere. Don’t play just to get in the action. Wait until you know you are playing with an advantage – then strike.

5. Failing to set objectives. It is amazing how many players step up to the table without a win objective or loss limit in mind. Refusing to properly and intelligently approach theses aspects of the game will set you up to fail. There’s an old Management by Objectives theory that applies quite well to what we do every day in the casinos. “What gets measured gets done.”

6. Buying a betting system. Are you listening? Have you spend somewhere between $299 and $2995 for a betting system. Have you noticed that a lot of other players play similarly? Do you think EVERYONE who plays that way paid for a system. I honestly believe that intelligent players will eventually settle onto something very close to the same betting strategy. A system is nothing more than a betting strategy that you pay for. Most of these systems have one thing in common. They are so complex that the average player cannot follow them. Still want to try? Virtually every system on the market is available on-line in one form or another for free. There’s nothing new in the world of craps betting – except the packaging. Save your money for the tables

7. Playing a hunch and other superstitious claptrap. Let’s face it. In craps, hunches are a dime a dozen and superstitions are bad luck. If you are going to place money in action or take money out of action – at least have a valid reason for doing so. That means you put money into action when you have an edge – and you take it down when you don’t. Then again - if I see a Horn I'm going to bet a Horn. It is what it is.

What do you think, guys? Let's talk about this stuff a bit. It will benefit the new guys and you might even learn something yourself.

[acpa]

Well said Heavy, but I find it hard to reconcile # 6 with what you do on your store, or do you justify it by saying enough people are going to buy a betting system and I can help them get it cheaper.

Noah

[heavy]

Interestingly enough, I posted an article on this same topic earlier today, ACPA. Did you read it? It's called Systems versus Strategies (or maybe it's Strategies versus Systems). Whichever. The fact is, some people will never spend a dime on a strategy they think they can learn on their own. Others, particularly professional people with discretionary income but no time to spare, would rather have someone else do the hard work for them. Why would a guy who works as an anesthesiologist, for example, waste 40 hours trying to "create" a strategy that already exists when he can buy that system for the equivalent of what he makes an hour at the hospital? In any case, here's a link to that article. Check it out. viewtopic.php?f=4&t=4309

Now, from time to time someone who can't grasp this will criticize me for offering a couple of systems for sale on the forum - in both cases at a discount to what they normally retail for. So let me address that as succinctly as I can.

This forum is a commercial enterprise. Like a lot of commercial enterprises, it is a labor of love on the owner's part (that's me). I tend to this baby seven days a week - three-hundred-sixty-five days a year. It's "on" when I get up in the morning and "on" when I go to bed at night. Unless I'm completely off the grid it travels with me everywhere I go. There's no getting away from it if you want it run right. When it's broken I stay up nights trying to get it put back together, and pony up the cash to have my IT contractor fix it. When it comes time to pay for the servers we have this site and my other websites hosted on I pony up the cash for that. Once a quarter I write a check to the great State of Texas for sales tax on products sold in the Lone Star State. Once a year the income from the websites and the various products I sell hits my tax return. I pay Federal Income Tax and Self-Employment tax on that income. Most of the rest of the income gets plowed back into the economy. On average I'll spend around $2000 a year on dice to retail on the site. I spend thousands of dollars on DVD disks, boxes, and program duplication. Then there are the printing charges from places like Kinkos, the money I spend on packaging and shipping with the Post Office. The expenses of renting dealer schools, flying across country for seminars, renting a car locally or driving my personal vehicle to locations I where I think it makes economic sense. There are the hotel expenses that aren't comped, the meals on the road or outside of the casinos, the checks I write to the guys who assist at the seminars. The list goes on and on. So when I hear someone who has never really supported the forum financially (whether that be from purchasing our products, attending a (paid) class, or even kicking a couple of bucks in the toke box) complain about the crass commercial content here - well, let's just say I get a tad annoyed. But to address your question directly, the simple fact is I don't HAVE to reconcile anything I do as far as running the site is concerned - to you or anyone unless I choose to. If you wonder why that is then you need to re-read the above.