I just made a quick visit to see this place as I was in the area. It is as nice as any 4-5 star hotel on the Vegas strip. As I walked around looking at the gaming tables I came upon the craps table. Previously I have seen the craps table at the Aqua Caliente Casino in Palm Springs. If your not familiar they have 2 shuffle machines, one on each side of the boxman, that each shuffles 6 cards, Ace,2,3,4,5,6. Each machine will spit out each pile of cards and the boxman will turn over the top card of each pile and that’s the roll. If an Ace & 6 are turned over, that’s a 7. Penchanga does it differently.
First they have one shuffle machine along with one stack of cards Ace-6. Once a new shooter starts, it spits out the cards and the boxman turns each card over and places them on 6 squares on the felt in front of him each labeled with a 1,2,3,4,5,6. Then the stickman pushes the dice to the shooter. The shooter shoots the dice and which ever 2 numbers the dice show represents the square in the felt containing the playing card. So if the cards are laid as follows in boxes 1-6: 3,A,2,4,6,5; a roll of 6-1 would be an 8. A roll of 6-3 would be a 7. A roll of 6-6 would be a hard 10. Get it? All based on what card is sitting in the designated box. HOWEVER after each roll the BOXMAN mixes the card and lays them in the squares again. Only on a new shooter do the cards go into the shuffler.
So a few things come to mind. 1st, all the math guys on the site, talking to you Skinny & others, what are your mathematical thoughts? 2nd, if one has very good dice control skills and can set the dice to attempt to hit the necessary boxes could be in a dice controllers favor. 3rd, the hard way set could be benifical because as long you get hard ways on the dice you can’t 7 out.
That’s what I saw, I didn’t play, I just observed for 5 minutes. Let me know your thoughts everyone.
Replies:
Posted by: Dr Crapology on November 20, 2015, 2:53 pm
Have not played dice in California and it has been several years since Rose and Doc have been there. However with that said we did have the opportunity to observe the dice game at two different casinos in the Southern California area. Here is what we saw.
1. There were two shoes of cards–one on each side of the box man. They had a bunch of set of cards but only the cards 1 through 6–probably 20 to 25, maybe 50 sets of cards in each shoe. No dice were used. The box pulled out one card from each shoe. If he pulled out a 3 and a 6 the "number rolled" was a 9. Totally random. A cut card was used so, like in BJ, not all the cards were used.
2. In this situation the box man had two sets of card but only numbers 1 thought 6. Don’t know that they did with the other 46 cards in the deck. The shooter actually got to throw the dice. If he/she rolled a 3/2, the box man would push out a 3 form one set of cards and a 2 from the other set of cards for number 5. So dice control might work here.
In both situations we only observed for a short period of time, so there might be other rules we did not see.
I think that the law in California is that the decision cannot be made with dice. I may even be in the California Constitution. Whether or not these two types of "craps" are legal is beyond me. These methods may not be legal any more as I have not been to a casino in California in many years.
The most interesting thing that I say was in Pow Gai poker. On a $25 bet the player paid a 5% commission or $1.25 before the hand was dealt. The $1.25 was "lost" whether the hand was won, lost or a push. So regardless of the outcome of each hand $1.25 was lost. A win was paid at even money—no additional commission. They did give back one concession and that was: the joker was (as we say in Texas) "hog wild." The joker could be used any way the player wanted–in other words not just in Aces, Straights and Flushes. Let’s look at an example: the player is dealt two 3’s and two 6’s as well as the joker. He can make this a full house. It appears to this math challenged advantage player that the commission far exceeds the joker being "hog wild."
Glad you posted this as it could become a most interesting thread. Hope others will give there thoughts on this.
Doc
Doc
Posted by: getagrip on November 20, 2015, 9:29 pm
If I am understanding correctly you are able to see the layout of the cards on each number Before you toss the dice. If that is correct I think it might be beatable or at least more beatable than the other California Craps games. I think you would really need to know the stats on each of your main dice sets to have any chance and also be at the top of your game that day to execute well enough to snipe the numbers that are statistically significant to your dice sets. You have been doing this for quite a few years so maybe it would be doable for someone like you. It does seem that it would be easier and more enjoyable to just save the money for those Vegas getaways.
Dice are Out!
Posted by: Skinny on November 21, 2015, 2:41 am
For a random thrower it is a random game. Every one of the 36 possible combinations of the dice produce all the 36 possible combinations with the cards. For example, with the card layout you gave, each of the hard way combinations produces one of the 6 hard way combinations.
1-1 with the dice would be a 3-3 with the cards.
2-2 with the dice would be a 1-1 with the cards.
3-3 with the dice would be a 2-2 with the cards.
4-4 with the dice would be a 4-4 with the cards.
5-5 with the dice would be a 6-6 with the cards.
6-6 with the dice would be a 5-5 with the cards.
As you can see, the 6 hard way combinations with the dice produce all the 6 hard way combinations with the cards. The same is true for the other 30 possible combination with the dice.
Then as Chuco says, if you know your edge with each of the different sets, it is possible to get an edge based on the card layout and your ability to control the dice. If you match your dice set to the layout to get the desired outcome you can do better than random.
Posted by: Chuco on November 22, 2015, 6:08 am
The cards are face up so you know exactly what your roll is when the dice stop. It’s very interesting.
