Avoiding the Pit

If you are playing live poker, you’ll need to learn how to
avoid the pit. Before you take this statement too literally
though, there needs to be some clarification. If your only
motivation in playing poker is profit, you should not be playing
any other games in the casino. They are built and put in place
so that you can lose your money, not for you to win in the long
run.

With that said, there’s a lot of fun to be had playing
many of these games. The important thing isn’t that you never
play, but that you play with only relatively small amounts and
that you are extremely responsible. Many poker players have gone
broke because they lost all of their money playing games in the
pit.

If you haven’t realized it by now, most casinos will earn
less in their
poker room than with any other area of the casino.
You might wonder why they even have a poker room at all if it
makes them so little money. One reason is that it does still
make them money, just not as much as the other sections of the
floor.

The main reason, however, is because poker is used as a
tool to funnel players into the other games that are available.
The casino doesn’t care whether you win or lose when you are
playing poker, all that they really want is for you to hit the
slot machines or the
blackjack tables when there’s a break. If
you are a serious poker player, you might find other casino
games to be of no temptation whatsoever, but this is hardly the
case for most people.

When to Most Avoid the Pit

The time of greatest temptation to play casino games will
usually be after a
bad loss. Just as table games will deliver many big losses,
they are also capable of creating a big win. Players look to
these games as a quick opportunity to get back to even. You’ll
undoubtedly feel a great sense of relief if you are able to get
lucky on a spin of roulette and walk away with a break even day,
but you’ll feel even worse if you double your losses. In the
end, you are only going to lose more if you chase your losses.

Another reason to stay away from games when you are losing is
because you are unlikely to be thinking very clearly. A losing
player is going to be frustrated and will often times put all
logical thoughts to the side. This is the perfect recipe for
losing everything that you have in your pocket. You might start
playing a game and say to yourself that you will quit if you
lose “x” amount, but this amount may very well multiply with a
few more losses. Even the most controlled emotional player will
lose his senses and put it all on the line if they become tired
enough of losing. Using the pit as a way to chase losses is
literally the second worst financial move for your bankroll,
sitting only behind handing the money away altogether.

Playing for Fun

There’s nothing wrong with playing casino games for
fun. If you are in a calm mood and simply want to have fun,
hitting the pit can be very enjoyable. The first thing that you
can do to ensure that you don’t lose too much is to only take a
certain amount of money with you. If you only carry around a set
amount of funds, there will be a limit to how much you can lose.
The next thing that you can do is to ensure that you are playing
with small bets. The quickest way to compound your losses is to
start off with high wagers, since any losses are going to entice
you to bet bigger in order to recoup them.

If you aren’t having any fun or don’t feel like the games are
exciting at all, it probably means that you should quit. Your
ultimate goal when playing these games should be to have fun,
with making money being an element of the thrill. If you are
playing these games solely to make money, you are going to be
disappointed on many occasions, because this isn’t a viable long
term plan for profitability. It may be very cliché, but all
gambling should be done responsibly, whether in the poker room
or anywhere else in the casino.

The Worst Games to Play

If you are going to play games for fun and entertainment, it’s still in your best interest to game select. Many casino games
will have much larger house edges than others. If you can stick
to the games with the best odds for you as a player, you’ll
stand to lose much less money in the long run. The important
thing to remember at all times is that you are always playing at
a disadvantage. No matter what you think, a casino game isn’t
going to be working in your favor, unless it’s broken or you
are cheating.

The top game for most players is craps. Craps has a very low
house edge if you play under the most optimal of strategies,
with less than 2% of all bets going to the house. Of course, the
reason that craps is offered is because the majority of players
don’t adhere to the most optimal craps strategy.

This is also true in
the second best game in the casino, blackjack. If you play
perfectly, you are only going to be a 1-2% dog in the long run.
Make sure to
learn the
perfect blackjack strategy if you don’t have it memorized. Learning how to play either of these games the right way isn’t
that difficult. Baccarat is another game with a very small house
edge, but this game is much less popular than blackjack and
craps.

The games with bigger house edges also happen to be a few of
the most popular: slots and roulette. Slots can have an edge
that ranges from a few percent all the way up to 10 or more
percent. The more competitive that casinos are in your area (Las
Vegas for example), the greater payback that most machines will
have. While there’s little arguing that slots can be very fun,
they are definitely a big time money drain barring some big
hits. Roulette has an edge of around 6%, which makes it about
the same or marginally better than slots. Roulette won’t leave
you in as much control as blackjack though, because your only
decision is on which number or section to place your bets.