Dice Setting and Precision Shooting: Fact or Fiction?
How to Find and Profit from a Precision Shooter
by the Mad Professor
I don’t know any secret handshakes, I don’t have a Captain Crunch decoder ring,nor am I a lifetime charter-member of the Fraternal Order of Water Buffalo. ButI can recognize a Precision Shooter who is likely to win me some money. I can ventureinto any casino in the world that has craps, walk up to their tables, and in a fairlyshort amount of time determine if any of the players there are more than likelyto help me win. Oh sure, I can wait and hope and pray that someone will have a hothand and you can bet that I’ll be riding their wave of good fortune too. But I can’tmake a living off of luck alone, especially in a negative-expectation game likecraps. I look for a particular type of craps player who takes the game seriously,and who has added a weapon to his arsenal that just might give him that slight edgeagainst the casino. You can call it Rhythmic Rolling, or you can call it De-Randomizingthe dice. I call it an opportunity to make money!
Many people arrange the dice to a particular set, and then shake them in their handsbefore chucking them haphazardly down the table. That’s not a Precision Shooter.Some people will carefully set the dice, and then let go with a Nolan Ryan-typefastball pitch that could easily reach the back wall of the casino let alone theback wall of the dice table. That’s not a Precision Shooter. Still other peoplewill set the dice, and then loft them. After making quite a few rolls and hittingseveral numbers, they will shoot at an entirely new spot on the table because althoughthey’ve rolled eight or ten times and hit Place numbers most of those times, theirPoint number has yet to appear. Feeling impatient with their efforts, they feelthe need to “get on with it.” They surely do get on with it since the dice are invariablymoved on to the next shooter because of the 7-out that they just rolled. That isnot a Precision Shooter.
The Precision Shooter arranges the dice to various “sets” or dice-face combinations.These sets are dependent upon a number of variables such as his shooting style ormore importantly whether it is the come-out roll or the Point has already been established.He knows that a particular set will give him a higher occurrence of some numbersover others that would normally appear out of the thirty-six possible dice combinations.
The Precision Shooter grips the dice in such a way that he will have full controlof the dice through the entire motion of his arm and wrist movement up until thepoint when he releases the dice. There are several different grips such as the oftenused “three-fingers on the front and thumb on the back,” or the “stacked dice squeeze,”or my favorite “thumb and fourth finger axis-pincer” grip. The use of differentgrips in craps is exactly the same as grip variations in baseball such as the fast-ball,sinking-ball, slider, etc. all demanding different grips on different parts of thebaseball. Professional baseball pitchers don’t just randomly throw the ball forwardlike it’s a shot-put or bird seed in the unlikely hope that the umpire calls ita strike.
The Precision Shooter aims the dice to a specific spot on the table. Without gettinginto a long dissertation about where to throw the dice, suffice it to say that severalspots work well. The dice table is the batter’s box, and the strike zone can oftenvary from table to table. In fact, new dice at the beginning of a shift will reacttotally differently than heavily-used eight-hour-old worn dice. The same holds truefor worn out felt layouts versus new ones, or tables where a spongy underlay hasbeen installed under the felt. Each situation has to be looked at and evaluated.Too much work? For 99% of craps players the answer to that would be “hell yeah.”However, for the 500 or so people who make a fine living playing craps, I wouldhumbly suggest that their answer would be quite different.
The Precision Shooter lofts the dice without too much force or in-air spin. Whatspin you do see is on the forward axis only. When the dice land you will see a littlebit of forward tumbling, but the dice stay on the same axis. They may hit the baseof the pyramid-shaped “egg-crate” wall, and gently roll back a turn or two, or juststop dead at the base of the wall. The important observation is that the Precision-Shooterdoes it consistently. A consistent throw, whether in baseball, bowling, footballor craps, is the path to profit.
The Precision Shooter carefully observes the outcome of the roll. He knows fromhis previous experience that he will throw a heavier proportion of some numberscompared to others. He will set his betting pattern to take maximum advantage ofthose numbers as they are rolled. If particular numbers are showing up frequentlyon his current roll, he may even adjust his betting to account for these short-termopportunities.
The Precision Shooter understands the dice and what they are doing, their randomness,and the effect he can have on de-randomizing the outcomes of his rolls. He understandsthat if his shooting produces a lot of 3’s, his betting will reflect that knowledgeeven after the come-out roll, and even though the house edge appears to be veryhigh. That bet may be his consistent money-maker. Another Precision Shooter mayrecognize that he throws a lot of outside Place numbers and bets accordingly. Yetanother Precision Shooter doesn’t have any idea what he’ll be throwing, but he doesknow that his average throws before the 7 shows is currently 18 rolls and climbing.While this player’s betting pattern may be more difficult, his opportunity is higherbecause the longer he holds the dice, every roll becomes a potential windfall ofprofit.
So if you are standing at the craps table, observe each shooter. Are they settingthe dice, and using a particular grip? Do they seem to be taking aim at an invisibletarget area on the table, and gently lofting the dice without causing too much spin?Are some numbers appearing in disproportionate frequency than others? If he’s thrownnine 4’s and six 10’s, but neither the 6 or 8 have appeared, that would probablybe a sign to even a vision-impaired person that an opportunity to make money wasclearly at hand. If he is always throwing more than eight times before a “7-out,”and his roll-count is consistently over twelve, then you don’t need to call Jo-Jofrom the Psychic Friends Network; you need to be betting on this guy’s roll becauseyou have found yourself a bona-fide Precision Shooter.
Good Luck and Good Skill at the tables!
The Mad Professor is a regular contributor to the IrishSetter’s website.