Craps"a negative expectation game", but not for you!

A good craps strategy should help you in one of two situations:

• When you are having a lucky streak and are winning your strategy should help you profit the most from this run of good luck.
• When you are not so lucky and keep on losing your strategy should help you minimize your loses, that is lose as little as possible.

Do you think you have found the perfect strategy, or at least one that is best suited to you? If this strategy tells you exactly when to bet, where to bet and what to do at the craps table, then you are using a system, not a strategy.

When you are using a system you are trying to systematically beat the house. A system uses math, calculations and statistics in an effort to give the player the edge. The truth is that no matter what you do, the house will always have the edge. Craps is known as a "negative expectation game" and no system will take the edge away from the house and give it to the player. During the course of time many mathematicians have tried to do so, but unfortunately they could not crack the code of craps.

Playing according to a strategy on the other hand allows you to play a smart game. A strategy is nothing more than a style of playing craps. The best advice that a good strategy offers is to know when to walk away. Leave the craps table while you are still ahead and do not try to make up for loses if you keep on losing. Just walk away when you are continuously losing and do not chase your loses.

The best strategy that you can use is proper bankroll management. Unfortunately this requires a lot of willpower and discipline. Not many players find it easy to leave the table when they are winning and not many of them know when to walk away if they are losing.

Before heading to a casino you should establish how much money you can afford to lose. If in your session you keep on losing, walk away when you have reached that amount. This also applies to situations when you are winning. Think of a sum of money you want to win and walk away when you have reached that amount. Make sure to set up that amount before starting to play. This applies to both cases. Also do not stray from this amount and do not modify it while playing craps.

Here is an example. Let's say that you have a bankroll of $1000. You can afford to lose $500 and are happy to win $400. This means that you will walk away if you lose $500 and you will also walk away if you have a total bankroll of $1400.

Take $100 from your bankroll and start gambling with this money. If you manage to turn this into $200, then pocket the initial amount of $100. Keep playing, but use the $100 that you have won. If you lose this money then go back to your initial $100. If you also lose this $100 note that you have already used 1/5 of the amount that you feel comfortable losing. It is extremely important to always keep track of this and always be aware of the amount that you have lost.

If you do not do so you will not know when you have reached your $500 losing limit. Repeat the process and keep trying to double your initial $100. This strategy requires you to be focused on the game and always be aware of how much you have lost. The good part is that you get to play with the money that you win from the casino. Basically you are playing with the casino's own money. When you're winning that is.