The Percentage is the single most important element of winning at gambling. When it comes to wagering, whoever has the Percentage on their side will win in the end. The overall effect of the Percentage is that it grinds away the player’s bankroll. The larger the Percentage, the sooner the player will end up going bust.
In simplified terms, an edge of 5% is the same thing as a 95% payback. That means over the course of repeated wagers the house/casino will, on average, keep five cents out of every dollar wagered by the player. A good example would be flipping a quarter in a coin-toss. Half the time the player would win. Half the time the player would lose. But if there was a 5% edge, then whenever the player lost he would have to pay the casino a dollar, and whenever the player won, the casino would have to pay him ninety cents. Water slowly wearing away a stone is an apt analogy in such cases.
A big house Percentage will erode a player’s bankroll a lot faster than a small one. If the house has an edge of 2%, that means that the casino will win 51 times out of 100; so the probability that the house will win is 0.51 and the probability the player will win is 0.49, a difference of 2%. The house’s percentage on slots is normally 8%, meaning the player stands a 96.1% chance of losing, with corresponding 3.9% chance of doubling their money. On games like roulette, where the house has a percentage of 5.26%, there is 99.983% chance of going bust, which means a player will get wiped out 9,999 out of every 10,000 times. |
