Are there any useful betting / probability strategies for playing street craps?

[astro]

Street craps is the classic “shooting dice” street game. The game playis described below. Assuming you are using fair dice it seems like a fairly random statistical walk on the surface. Is there any way to bet strategically to win on this type of gameplay?

If you’re talking about street craps, it’s just an abbreviated version of casino craps. You still use the basic craps sequence but the betting is simplified.

One person is chosen to be the shooter and is handed the two dice. The rest of the people can either bet that the shooter will make a pass or will not make a pass but they needn’t bet at all if they don’t want to. Only the shooter is REQUIRED to bet. Each bet made needs to be “covered” by somebody else. Example: Someone bets $1 that the shooter will make the pass; someone else needs to cover that bet by betting that the shooter will not make the pass.

The shooter’s first roll is called the “come-out roll.” If it’s a 7 or 11, they’ve made the pass and the bets are distributed (those that bet against the shooter pay those that bet with the shooter). If the shooter’s first roll is a 2, 3 or 12, they have not made the pass and the bets are similarly distributed (except that those that bet with the shooter pay those that bet against the shooter). In either case, the same shooter keeps rolling and everybody continues to bet before the new come-out rolls.

If the come-out roll is anything else (4,5,6,8,9,10), that becomes the shooter’s “point.” The shooter keeps rolling repeatedly until they either roll that point again (they’ve made the pass) or they roll a seven (they’ve not made the pass). All other numbers are meaningless at this point. Either way, the bets are distributed as before. The dice are passed to the next player only when a shooter first establishes a point and then rolls a seven before rolling the point again, called “sevening-out.”

[Great_Antibob]

Those are basically the same rules as casino craps if you ignore everything except the pass line bet.

The same house advantage applies. Bet against the shooter. It doesn’t work out to much of an advantage, though, since craps has one of the smallest house edges in a casino. It’s just over 1%. And, of course, the variance is very high, so you can see huge swings either way.

The existence of any side bets would, of course, change the analysis.

Also, it assumes the dice are fair and none of the shooters are dice mechanics.

Oh, and there may or may not be some social customs about always betting against people. The “don’t pass” line bets are also allowed at the casino (but appropriately modified to have a house edge), and it’s often considered very rude to play that bet with any regularity. You are, after all, betting everybody else loses.

[Chronos]

Bring your own custom dice, on which you’ve memorized all of the pips. Note: The success of this one depends on whom you happen to be related to.

[Gary_T]

@Chronos

Bring your own custom dice, on which you’ve memorized all of the pips. Note: The success of this one depends on whom you happen to be related to.

Maybe a better plan is to bring marked dice and sneak them into play.