Craps Simulator

A craps simulator is the best way to see which bets hold up and which ones just look exciting. Take $500 of play money, bet $10 on the pass line with 3-4-5× odds, and run 1,000 sessions of 100 rolls. The edge you’ll see on the total action is well under 1%, because the odds bet pays true odds with no house edge at all. Now switch to the iron cross. It wins on almost every roll and still loses money faster. The free simulator above lets you roll by hand or test a strategy over hundreds of sessions.

Using the craps simulator

At the table, pick a strategy and roll one at a time, ten or a hundred at once. The board shows the point, your bets and the bankroll as it moves. The tester runs your chosen strategy over many sessions, each starting from the same bankroll, and reports the average result, how many sessions ended ahead, how many went bust, and the house edge it actually measured across every dollar wagered.

Strategies included: pass line with odds, don’t pass with lay odds, pass plus two come bets with odds, place the 6 and 8, the field, and the iron cross.

What you’ll find

• Odds are the best bet in the casino. The pass line has a 1.41% edge; add 3-4-5× odds and the combined edge drops to about 0.37%.
• Place 6 and 8 is respectable at 1.52%, as long as you bet in multiples of $6.
• The field looks better than it is. It wins on seven numbers, but they’re the less likely ones. With 12 paying 3 to 1 it’s 2.78%; at 2 to 1 it’s 5.56%.
• The iron cross combines the field with place bets on 5, 6 and 8 and wins on every number but 7. Its edge is still around 2.4% on each roll, and the 7 shows up one roll in six.

For the odds on any individual bet, use the craps calculator. To check a dice outcome, the dice probability calculator covers any number of dice.

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