Roulette has long been hailed around the world as being one of the great classic casino games. Relying upon the pure luck of the spin, roulette is a game of chance where players can either win or lose big based almost entirely on how lucky they may be during a day. This does not mean, however, that there are no particular strategies that can be implemented to help support your intended plays and get you ahead of the rest of the crowd when it comes to making regular earnings and extending your time at the table.

One of the first and foremost things to do to help you get ahead initially is to choose the right wheel to play at. While most casinos in the US generally use an American table characterized by both the single green “0” and green “00” other European styles (both European and French tables) have only one green “0”. Additionally, at a French table anytime the green “0” comes up half of all bets are returned to players. This means that a proper strategy when used at a French table can limit the House’s advantage over you as a player to less than 1.5%, whereas an American table has an over 5% advantage to the House. That said if you ever have the option always go for a French of European table, but if you must choose an American table there are a number of ways you can still help minimize your losses and therefore maximize your earnings in at least the short-run.

The primary key to maintaining a reliable, long term strategy in roulette is to never overly focus on one particular limited number or small range in general. Instead, the larger ranges such as reds, blacks, odds, evens, highs, lows, dozens and columns all offer a high potential to be selected and minimize the overall likelihood of a loss occurring on a bet. This in turn equates to greater gains as you’ll be actively minimizing the House’s advantage on each spin and although the payout amount for each wager is comparably small verses other options (with a maximum of a 3 to 1 payout for dozens or columns whereas a straight-up bet placed on a single number pays out 35 to 1) the overall long-term earnings are higher thanks to the greater odds in your favor.

Finally, be sure to always maintain proper bankroll management while at the table. No matter what strategy you incorporate into your roulette game it is impossible to ever fully eliminate the House’s advantage, therefore never get too greedy if you ever find yourself holding considerably more money than you had when you came to the table. Cash out, deposit your winnings and walk away – or continue playing with your additional funds only so you can protect your original investment and be sure to not loose it on a misjudged bet when your luck finally unravels. Should this ever be the case simply learn from your mistakes and apply better strategies in the future to keep you from going under.

With the continuing development of the internet as a place for both business and pleasure, it is only natural that roulette, one of the most iconic casino games for the past 200 years, should move online to a virtual setting as well. While the differences between the virtual version of the game and the real-life version are small they are still present, however, and each player should consider these differences before getting involved in either to determine which may be best for you.

Speed

Because there is no need for any human being to physically manipulate the wheel and ball as is necessary in land-based casinos online roulette games can take place at a much faster pace than what can be found in offline versions. While this may be a major benefit to some people who are familiar with the game and want fast results for others who like to take their time and consider each of their actions thoroughly this may be a drawback as they will only feel more pressure to act immediately rather than having a slower, more enjoyable pace at which they can work.

The Wheel & Results

Land-based casinos offering roulette have long had the stigma associated with many of their tables that the wheel can become off-balanced over time and favor one particular number or number group over others. While this is hardly the case in today’s environment due to highly-calibrated machines and regular changing of the wheel throughout the day, it is still a distinct possibility that can occur. Unfortunately, to see if this is happening at all it will take observing roughly 1000 spins of the week to verify – meaning that even with an average speed of 1 minute per spin it will still take nearly 17 hours of constant observation to come to an even remotely possible conclusion.

Alternatively online roulette wheels base all of their number results on random number generators, meaning that no wheel is ever involved at all in the process. This creates a guaranteed random result for each “spin” that can make anticipating any number bias impossible (due to the fact that there is no actual bias).

Table Selection

While most casinos tend to offer one type of roulette table to players – an American roulette table with both a “0″ and a “00″ due to the fact that this table type offers the highest possible advantage to the House of the three common roulette tables – an online roulette game is not limited to such restrictions. In fact, thanks in no small part to the flexible nature of the internet players in the US may be able to find even a French-style roulette game with the highest possible odds in favor of the player available to them at a respected gambling establishment just a few mouse clicks away, granting players the best possible chances at realizing a return on their investment (but unfortunately not the same social appeal offline casinos have to offer).

Roulette: the classic game of chance that has enticed countless people the world over with its simplicity, excitement and – ultimately – it’s chance at giving out big, life-changing wins in the blink of an eye. Still, roulette as most people know it has not always been the same and over time (and location), different tables with slightly different rules have been developed to cater to different markets and casino needs. Of the classic tables the three used the world over are the French, the European and the popular American table.

French Tables

The original forms of the roulette table, not much has changed from the original design of the wheel and the playing board since it was first introduced to the gambling world in 1796. Some notable characteristics to a French table over other tables, however, is that similar to the European table a French board only has 37 numbers (18 red, 18 black and 1 green, as opposed to the American’s 38 consisting of 18 red, 18 black and 2 green) and if the single green “0” is ever landed on then half of all of the wagers placed on the table are returned to those that initially placed the bet. This makes the original French version of the game the most “gambler-friendly” due to the fact that it has the least possible House advantage over the three common variants (with the fact that 50% of all wagers being returned to gamblers on the event a “0” is landed on making the total advantage in favor of the House a mere 1.35%), so if at all possible go straight for a French table when entering a casino if you’re looking at the best possible chances to win.

European Tables

Derived from the original French tables, both European and French roulette designs are similar in the fact that they both tout 37 total numbers as opposed to the American’s 38. The difference between the general European table as opposed to the French table, however, lies in the fact that landing on a “0” on a European table won’t return 50% of the initial wager to gamblers if they were to lose. While this difference is small still due to the fact that there is only a 1 in 37 chance of landing on the 0 the lack of the 50% return means that European tables have a total House advantage of roughly 2.7% – not the most ideal, but still not the worse possible advantage against players out there.

American Tables

Designed when roulette became popular in the United States and used today around the world by most casinos, gambling establishments tend to love American tables as they offer the highest House advantage possible out of all three table varieties. With two separate green slots (“0” and “00”) as well as no return of cash to gamblers should one of the green 0s be landed on the total minimum house advantage over players using an American table is an impressive 5.26% – nearly double the European table and four times as much as the French tables. These tables should generally be the last choice of any roulette gambler, though unfortunately due to their popularity the chances of finding one of the other two is much more likely in today’s casino world.

So what exactly were the police aware of and what exactly was Vladimir Granec doing. Well it seems certain now that the big clue as to what was going off was the incident in the London casino that was caught on camera. But the mere thought that one individual could be responsible for getting people on the inside and hitting casinos all over the world for millions is absolutely incredible.

But the authorities certainly did not see it that way as they persisted in going after Granec and he eventually was jailed for five years and fined in the region of half a million dollars for his crimes. Granec had a very successful and highly professional team at his disposal that were getting access to Roulette wheels after the casino had closed and then creating some sort of bias within that wheel. The casinos that were selected were the ones that had the weakest security systems and the most accessible places for his associates to hide.

Once the team had fixed the wheels then a big betting accomplice would go in and the rest as they say is history. So how much did Granecs organisation make in total? This is a very good question and one that cannot easily be answered. I have read numerous figures and reports regarding this and the sum of ten million dollars seems to be the commonly accepted figure but I think that this figure is pitifully low in my opinion.

If the authorities could prove and estimate ten million based on what evidence they had they what about all of the incidents that they could not prove. Also who is to say that Granec was not secretly masterminding coups long after his “retirement”. It seems logical to me that knowledge like this does not stay dormant for long and tends to get re-used or past on to others. Granec had a desire to hit the gaming industry and this is a desire that never goes away, I can speak from personal experience. If the total accepted figure of ten million dollars was not at the very least doubled by Granec and his team then I would be very much surprised.

It seems feasible to me that this figure could have been or could have ended up running to as high as fifty million dollars. This guy was the real “mr big” of Roulette and the “Godfather”. But what it proves beyond any shadow of a doubt is that the casinos can be got at by anyone who has the drive and the resources and not to mention the intelligence to do it.

Yes I know that deliberately fixing Roulette wheels is a criminal offence and this makes Granec a criminal. Yes I know that I should not be singing the praises of known criminals but you cannot help but admire a man with that much determination and guile.

Granec was a man after my own heart and I am sure that had I ever got the chance to meet the man that we may have had an awful lot in common. Granec hit the casinos just like I had done but many times greater. The man was in a league all by himself and I have no shame whatsoever in bowing to the King.

Carl “The Dean” Sampson
Author – “Killer Roulette”
Come and play roulette and other online casino games at bwin.

There is a massive difference between the genuine biased casino roulette wheels exploited by the likes of Billy Walters and Rashid Khan to biased wheels that have only got that way by interference from the outside.

Casinos in France in particular were especially hit leading to Roulette wheels all over the country being carefully removed and examined for bias….nothing whatsoever was found. But there was soon to be a very significant turn of events that would lead to almost undeniable proof that something sinister was afoot. A motion detector situated inside a London casino was triggered one early morning after the casino had closed to the public. The motion detector triggered the camera which amazingly filmed a group of individuals tampering with a Roulette wheel.

This was the breakthrough that the authorities had been searching for and when the wheel was inspected, a bias was found which had not been there before and the cause of the bias was also detected. It is assumed although it cannot be proven that this group of individuals had somehow hidden inside the casino somewhere just prior to closing time and then came out of their hiding place after everyone had gone home.

But for these individuals to know beyond doubt that there would not be one single person present inside that building from gaming staff to casino managers to security staff defies belief. This seems to indicate once again the distinct possibility of an inside assist in my book. It did not take long however for the suspects to be caught and questioned by the police. What they found upon questioning each individual was that one name above all others kept on cropping up, that name was Vladimir Granec.

Granec was Czechoslovakian by birth but was living in Germany but he actually owned casinos in England and other countries throughout Europe. Further questioning was revealing an operation that was highly professional and disciplined and was being planned down to the last detail and the mastermind was looking more and more like Vladimir Granec.

After shadowing Granec for some considerable time, the police finally raided his home in Germany. What they found confirmed their suspicions, they found various bits and pieces of Roulette equipment and detailed notes of biased wheels in casinos all over the world. Granec’s excuse was that because he was the owner of several casinos that the Roulette equipment was inside his house for valid reasons. An excuse which hardly holds any water as I am sure that Donald Trump’s house is hardly brimming with Roulette wheels and spare parts.

The police obviously did not believe his story and arrested him but were forced to let him go for lack of evidence. Despite letting their man get away, the police were not to be put off and arrested Granec again about two years later but the result was the same, Granec walked because of a lack of evidence. Look out for part three of this absolutely amazing story coming soon.

Carl “The Dean” Sampson
Author – “Killer Roulette”
Why not play casino slots and other great games at bwin NOW!

Conspiracy theories abound in many fields and we all love mysteries and stories of shady underworld characters who no one ever gets to meet who seemingly control everything and make millions in the process. Whether these people exist in organised crime, the stock market, politics or whatever, we are guilty of sometimes thinking and believing that our fate and destiny is guided by a handful of very powerful and extremely clandestine characters.

The gambling world is certainly no different in this aspect. The world of Horse Racing is awash with stories of big betting coups with certain “in the know” punters who have the inside knowledge to hit the bookmakers very hard indeed. But gambling establishments of whatever capacity are fair game as are casinos and there to be shot at for the handful of people who are shrewd enough to hit them where they are at their weakest.

Only a fool takes on a multi-million pound organisation that possesses unparalleled expertise at its disposal in the deluded belief that they can get the better of it by attacking it where it is at its strongest. But whether it is the bookmakers, casino owners or whatever, all of them have strengths and they all undoubtedly have weaknesses. The small time shrewd punters who hit them never get noticed as their winnings are lost in an absolute sea of money that is lost by losing punters.

But sometimes be it in Horse Racing, sports betting or Casinos, there belongs an individual that has aspirations to hit the gambling organisations not just for a few thousand but for tens of millions. The name of Vladimir Granec is a name that few people who will read this article will ever have heard of and that is not exactly surprising.

Firstly because the events that I am talking about happened from the mid nineteen seventies to the mid nineteen eighties and secondly because of the fact that once again most of the story was swept under the carpet. In fact even many people within the gaming industry itself will not have heard of the name Vladimir Granec. But in and around 1975, many casinos across the world experienced big losses on Roulette and several casinos were hit so severely that they actually failed to make their yearly targets.

The European gaming police and even the police forces from many different countries were brought in as casino bosses were suspecting a sting on a potentially massive scale. But despite the fact that the gaming industry were receiving substantial help from these authorities, all they basically had was suspicion and nothing else. They had no idea what was happening or indeed who was behind it but they knew that something was not quite right.

But it was the sheer size of Granec’s organisation that enabled him to remain anonymous and successful for so long. The casino industry has long since been aware of biased wheels and they were beginning to suspect that they could be on the receiving end of a massive biased wheel operation of some description. But there are biased wheels and there are biased wheels. Look out for part two of this story coming soon.

Carl “The Dean” Sampson
Author – “Killer Roulette”
Come and play online casino games at bwin.

The overwhelming number of biased casino roulette wheels happen purely and simply by accident rather than some underhandedness on behalf of the employees or the punters. A wheel can be biased in numerous ways. The ball drop off point from the ball track can be repeatedly in the same place although this is a characteristic that very rarely crops up these days on modern roulette wheels.

But please note that I said rarely and not never, and please don’t expect the dealers or inspectors to notice this either. They really couldn’t care less and wouldn’t know a biased wheel if one dropped on their head. Of course with the use of bias detection programmes then anyone can identify a biased wheel but the real skill is to be able to identify one without the use of software and to be 100% sure in your own mind that what you have located is true bias.

The reason why this bias is so crucial is not because you can then necessarily identify numbers that will come up like what the Billy Walters team did for instance. But having a consistent ball drop off point significantly aids a players ability to be able to read the spin. In fact based on just how lax the casino was where I first worked, it seems highly likely now to me that this particular flaw may have been the major reason for the success of “the salmon”.

Any part of a roulette wheel that comprises of metal can be subject to bias effect. This means that a very large percentage of the wheel is vulnerable to any kind of outside force that effects metal. In that wheel we have numerous components like the wheel head, spindle, turret, frets, canoes etc and each component can be a potential bias waiting to happen.

Another major factor in bias forming on roulette is whether or not the wheel is level. Any bias may or may not be accentuated by the wheel not being totally level. This is another avenue where temporary bias can and does occur. The gaming industry in my experience do not do enough to deter bias but they get away with it for the simple reason being that the vast majority of punters do not know anything about roulette wheels in this capacity.

This ignorance is partly just that but in some cases the roulette side of a casinos operation is closely monitored anyway. In my experience there is rarely a proper balance in this area as I have also worked inside a casino where the actual table maximums were reduced in response to one single punter who was having a successful period of winning sessions.

Looking back I don’t believe that this punter had found a biased wheel but I do believe that he was reading the spin and the casino management knew it as well. So you often have to give these people credit for being professional and knowing their jobs but that mainly does not involve needing to know the in and outs and the weaknesses of roulette wheels.

Carl “The Dean” Sampson
Author – “Killer Roulette”

Come and read my highly entertaining bwin casino blog

But the most that any casino roulette wheel manufacturer can achieve is to produce a wheel that is “almost random”. The word “almost” leaves an area that is as potentially exploitable to roulette as card counting and shuffle tracking are to blackjack.

Most of the time that 2.7% house edge (single zero roulette) is more than enough to take care of any small bias that may exist anyway and even though a number may be appearing more than it should, it may still not be occurring often enough to give the player an advantage.

But the main point here is that if a small bias does indeed exist then it only takes a series of accidental events to swing this into a full blown player advantage providing that it is identified of course. But identifying it or even trying to identify it is beyond the scope or the patience of the overwhelming majority of punters. The vast majority of them who even bother to look at all arrive at incorrect conclusions anyway as detecting true bias as opposed to imagined bias is not straight forward.

The main factor that causes wheel bias is repetitive wear and tear either by the wheel being in motion for long hours or through the operation of it by the dealer. At the end of the day, it is only manufactured from wood and metal and they are hardly impervious materials are they. This constant use is a factor in why the wheels are relocated within the casino periodically although it is far from being the only reason as I have already stated.

A wheel that is on a left handed table will incur usage differently than a wheel on a right handed roulette table and vice versa. Recently, there have been developments in the field of bias detection with firms manufacturing bias detection software.

In fact the new Saturn wheels that are in circulation now can be fitted with in built memory that is built into the base of the wheel that can record data for up to six years. The Saturn data logger theoretically detects bias whether it is caused by inaccurate wheel balancing, table movement or whatever.

What is more difficult to detect however is temporary bias because permanent bias is simple to detect and it does not actually take that long to find. It is in the area of temporary bias where casinos are vulnerable and this introduces the very shady area of wheel tampering.

The people who have direct access to the wheels are the casino employees in whatever capacity. Because the level of action inside your average UK casino is not that big then casino management do tend to let their guard down with regard to these things. Replacing very expensive roulette wheels or having them rebuilt is hardly an acceptable option for many casinos and especially if that wheel is a consistent money earner.

If strict security procedures were always adhered to then casinos would not be took to the cleaners as often as they are. Sure they may have got the game sewn up with regards having an unbeatable edge in their favour but that assumes that the roulette player is playing by their rules.

If everyone in the world played roulette the way that the gaming industry wanted you to play it then there would be no medium to long term winners and your positive expectation would always be in the negative. Luckily you don’t have to play by their rules but if you don’t then they will bar you from playing or possibly even prosecute you if they catch you cheating. Look out for part three coming soon.

Carl “The Dean” Sampson
Author – “Killer Roulette”
Come and play slots and other great casino games on bwin.

In previous articles that I have written, I have talked about certain players who made very substantial amounts of money by discovering and then exploiting biased casino roulette wheels. What we did not talk about was just how a wheel becomes biased. What we are entering into here is a very complex subject as many of the reasons for bias are still a mystery even today to modern roulette wheel engineers.

But despite the advances in roulette wheel technology and construction, the problem with biased wheels is still very real and certainly still exploitable. The casino hierarchy certainly do not want this kind of information getting out and with very good reason. But we had at least one biased wheel to my knowledge at the first casino that I worked in and another at the second. Like a fool, I never exploited this situation until after I had left gaming which is something that still niggles me even now but I have wised up an awful lot since those early days.

I have read confidential reports on roulette wheels that indicate to me that for a roulette wheel to be totally random it needs to be flawless and perfect in every single way. This is an impossibility because a roulette wheel is just too complicated for it to reach anywhere near perfection.

There are a lot more components to a roulette wheel than meets the eye. Nearly all of the modern roulette wheels that are manufactured today are highly tuned pieces of equipment. Whether they be the latest models by John Huxley or the Paulsen or Paul Tramble wheels, the quality is exceptionally high in them all. But bias still appears and will continue to appear.

The major problem is that whenever the technicians service these wheels then they only tend to look for identifiable faults. This means faults that they can understand and faults that they are trained to detect. Many times down the years casino officials have detected biased wheels and have known full well that a wheel was biased but still could not find what the fault was. In my mind, we have the makings of a problem here that can only partly be solved by science.

There are forces at work that are taking effect on roulette wheels that as yet we do not fully understand. Because we do not understand them then we cannot detect them but that does not mean that they are not present. I was doing some research a few years ago on “temporary bias” on roulette wheels. My studies were merely supposition but I believe that it could be certainly possible that a roulette wheel could be influenced over time by outside forces or even temperature differences.

Physical abnormalities are easily spotted by the casino or at least they should be. I have worked in casinos where the frets (number dividers) and the canoes (diamond shaped ball deflectors in the balltrack) have been loose and I have even pulled them out on occasion. Should this have happened, absolutely not but it does highlight just how certain casinos fail miserably when it comes to wheel maintenance. Look out for part two on biased wheels coming soon.

Carl “The Dean” Sampson
Author – “Killer Roulette”

In the space of 15 minutes, he had parlayed that 50p into £600 before he cashed in. As soon as I knew that this guy was not winning by luck then I set about trying to find out what was doing. He became my motivation to find out the truth about roulette and how to read the spin. I had practiced trying to hit certain blocks and spin out of certain blocks before but without much success.

This time would be different because I was now conducting my own exhaustive study of casino roulette. Within six months I had figured out just how to beat the game but the problem was that I could not manage to do it consistently. I knew for a candid fact that I was dramatically altering the odds in my favour whenever I was dealing which meant that I could also reverse that effect as well.

But “the salmon” seemed to be doing something that I wasn’t because he was far more successful at it than me and he never played the same numbers so there was no chance whatsoever that he had discovered a bias. Suddenly a thought struck me like a bolt of lightening, oh my god why did it take so long to realise this…what a dummy! Now I knew why “the salmon” was being far more successful than me, he was sticking to the same roulette wheel.

I thought back to all the times that I had seen him and he only ever seemed to play on American Roulette 1. Suddenly the thought that each particular wheel was behaving and performing independently from the others became apparent to me. Yes that was it, this was why my results were erratic. I was trying to do too much, I was trying to remember the characteristics of six American roulette wheels at once while “the salmon” was only remembering one.

One particular night after we had closed, the duty manager ordered a shuffling of the wheels and the wheel that had been positioned on AR1 was relocated to another table. The following night, “the salmon” came in and went straight to AR1 as usual and I was watching him intently from the other side of the pit to see if he would notice the difference in the wheel. The fact that he looked puzzled and was looking around the pit told me that he knew that something was not right.

He systematically inspected all the other roulette wheels until he found the wheel that had been on AR1. As it happened, that table was yet to be opened but “the salmon” hung about well past his bedtime until it was. Within ten minutes of it opening, he was £200 ahead having only bought in for £20. When I eventually left this casino in 1994, “the salmon” was still winning money and will likely continue to do so.

I never encountered him again because he never came in any other casino where I worked but I didn’t need to see again because now……I knew his secret! But fate would bring us together anyway as we met up purely and simply by chance when I was out shopping one afternoon and I will speak about that in a later article.

Carl “The Dean” Sampson
Author – “Killer Roulette”