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Roulette is one of the oldest and most popular of the hundreds of available casino games in the world.  It also enjoys the distinction of being perhaps the easiest game for many gambling aficionados to understand and play.  Today you will find that this game is not just a top draw of the glittering exotic worlds of Monte Carlo, Las Vegas, and Atlantic City, but it is being enjoyed in casinos around the world.

This game of chance and luck, gets its name from a French word meaning “small wheel”. The wheel is the main component of the game and players can place bets on a single number, a range of numbers, whether the number will be odd or even, or even on the color red or black.  

A croupier spins the wheel, there is another circular track surrounding this wheel, and in this one, a ball is being spun in the opposite direction.  Once the ball loses momentum, it will fall onto the wheel and will eventually come to rest in one of the colored and numbered slot.  There are 37 of these slots on the wheel in European roulette and 38 in American roulette.


The slots alternate between red and black in color and they are numbered from 1 to 36.  In addition, there is a green slot numbered “0.”  The American roulette wheel, however, has a second green slot numbered “00.”  The former is known as the single-zero wheel and this design is the roulette wheel that you will find in casinos in Europe, while the latter is known as the double-zero wheel, which is the dominant roulette wheel in the United States and South America.  The addition of the double zero increases the house’s edge in the game; you may hear people referring to these two slots as “house numbers”.


Roulette originated in 18th century France, and is believed to have been derived from the English board games Roly-Poly and Ace of Hearts, as well as two earlier Italian board games.  During the 1800s, roulette first began to become a popular draw across Europe and the United States.  An 18th-century French novel contains one of the first descriptions of a roulette wheel, describing two slots reserved for the house, a zero and a double zero.



 In 1843, Frenchmen Francois and Louis Blanc introduced the single-zero roulette wheel in the city of Hornburg, Germany.  They introduced this new wheel to compete with casinos that offered the double-zero wheels.  The Blancs later took the single-zero wheel to Monte Carlo after the German government banned gambling in the 1860s. It was in Monte Carlo, that roulette began its meteoric rise as a favorite casino activity. The game was dubbed the “King of Casino Games” because of the association with the exotic glamour of casinos in the principality of Monte Carlo.


Roulette Layout
    
The modern roulette layout that is commonly seen in today’s casinos actually dates back to 1842.  It features two betting areas:  the inside, which contains the individual numbers, and the outside, which has boxes for betting columns, betting red or black, betting odd or even, and betting different combinations of numbers.  Players will learn that each roulette table has a set minimum and a set maximum bet.  

Placing Bets

There are basically two types of bets in roulette:  inside bets and outside bets. Players cannot combine inside and outside bets to meet a minimum call.  Inside bets refer to placing a wager on which numbered slot the ball will land in. or betting a range of slots based on their position that may include the winning slot.  

Outside bets refer to betting slot color, an odd- or even-numbered slot, or various groupings of these slots.  The payout for each wager on the roulette wheels will be varied because they are based on probability.  Outside bets typically have smaller payouts, but offer better odds of winning. An example could be seen by placing a wager on red…this covers many slots and numbers…..so you would have a great chance of winning, unless the ball ends up in the black.

Examples of inside bets:
•    Straight Up…  A bet on a single number.
•    Split Bet… These are when there is a wager on two numbers.  Players make this bet by placing their chip so that it straddles the line between any two numbers.
•    Street bet… This involves a player wagering on any three numbers in a single line.
•    Corner (or quad) bet… A bet on four numbers in a square layout.  Players place the chip so it touches four corners of the numbers the player is betting.

 
Examples of outside bets:
•    Red/Black or Odd/Even…  Betting on which color the ball will land in, or whether it lands in an odd- or- even numbered slot.
•    Dozens bets…  Betting on 12 consecutive numbers.  Places wager on the boxes marked 1-12, 13-24, or 25-36.
•    Column bets…  These too are 12-number bets.  Players wager on the combination of numbers in one of three vertical columns.
Playing Tips


Croupiers are required to keep the wheel moving, even between spins.  Once the croupier spins the ball, players may place their bets and continue to do so until the croupier calls no more bets.  Players have their own color chips to prevent confusion.
Over the years, various individuals have claimed to have various betting strategies for roulette.  Albert Einstein, however, is reputed to have once mentioned the game of roulette by saying that, “You cannot beat a roulette table unless you steal money from it.” There are still more than enough people willing to take the chance, and many of them come up winners.