Since all he wanted was to generate some numbers for scientific purposes, Pascal saw no need for a "0" on the wheel. The "0" was added later ( in 1842, to be exact by Louis Blanc) in order to increase the house edge. The European version of the game, without which we can't even imagine a casino anymore, still functions using a single "0".

Americans, however, felt they needed to further increase this edge. We all know that in America everything is bigger than in pretty much any other place, and, apparently, this had to be applied to the house edge as well. They added a second zero ( "00") or a picture of a bold eagle ( America's national bird) for good measure.

Before I start telling you how you can possibly beat the roulette or not, I think you'd be better off knowing a thing or two about the game itself and about the types of bets that it uses.


A roulette table is made up by the wheel itself, plus a section of the table where an intricate-looking table is displayed containing all the numbers from 0 ( and 00) to 36.

This table also contains several other fields: The black and red ones, the odd and even ones, the first 12, second 12 and third 12 fields, the 1 to 18 and 19 to 36 fields, plus separate fields for every column and row.

Bets are made by placing chips or stacks of them onto different sections of this table. The winner will have his chips ( plus the ones he won) pushed to him by the dealer.

The types of bets that can be made are the following ( I'll take the opportunity to explain the odds involved in roulette and where the house edge becomes apparent):

The simplest type of bet you can make is called a straight. This means that. you'll place your chips dead in the middle of a number square. If that number comes up you win. Let us now see what really happens here, mathematically speaking: Let's suppose you played a $1 chip on No. 6 ( it's black, but that doesn't matter here) Let's also suppose the ball stops on 6 black. You win. You get 35 dollars for the $1 bet you've made.

That means, the payout for a straight is 35 to 1. The odds, though, of you winning this bet, are 37 to 1. In layman terms, that means you win once every 37 times when you play a straight. ( these are mathematical odds of course, in reality it is possible that you'll win twice out of 5 bets then not win for the next 50. If you play for a very long time, though, and at the end of that long session you calculate your average win-ratio, you'll get 37)

Now, then, you bet 37 times to win once, spending 37 dollars in the process, and when you do get it right, you win 35 dollars. That's a difference of 2 dollars. That's your house edge right there. Divide 2 by 37, and you get the house edge on every individual $1 bet you make. I hope I managed to keep the explanation simple and reasonable.

Now that you know what your odds are, for a straight bet, let's see what other kinds of bets you can make.

Split bets happen, when you place your chips on the line between two numbers. In this case you win, if the ball stops on either of the two numbers. The payout is 17 to 1, and the odds against you winning are 18 to 1.

Betting on a row, ( for instance 1,2,3) will give you an 11 to 1 payout, and 11.667 odds against winning.

Likewise, betting on a column, offers a 2 to 1 payout but the odds will be 2.167 to 1. First, middle and last 12 will also carry the same odds and payout.

odd and even, red and black, 1 to 18 and 19 to 36 will pay out 1 to 1, and will carry odds of 1.111 to 1.

five number bets are also used. ( like 0,00, 1,2,3) but you need to know these bets are subject to the largest house edge ( on average $0,079/ every $1 bet)

In addition to the types of bets named above, some casinos offer other bets too, like 'the neighbors of 0' ( numbers from 22 to 25 on the wheel, 22 and 25 included)

'the third' and the 'orphans' are such bets as well...

Now for roulette strategy: there is no mathematical system that can beat roulette over a long period of time. If you were looking for something like that, forget it. If you find something like that somewhere, it most probably won't work. There are rumours that most real-life roulette wheels have some sort of a physical fault that can be exploited, but online roulette wheels never show any wear and tear.


There are a set of rules, though, that can maximize your chances, provided you stick to them:

• Do not play American roulette. Play European. ( house edge is bigger for American roulette (5.26%) than for the European one ( 2.70%)
  
  
• Avoid straight bets and betting on five numbers. As said before, these bets carry the biggest house edge.
  
  
• et even, odd, low, high, or red and black. These are the most profitable bets and come with the lowest house edge.

With all that being said, remember: online roulette never slips, never wears out a bearing, and never gets anything sticky onto its surface. It's the perfect random number generator and it will offer you the perfect roulette game.

Stick to the above tips and know when to stop.