I take your word for it, but I suspect there’s more to it than that. They may not be recognized as legal currency, but I assume that if I wanted to barter my oil paintings for two sheep and a bunch of casino chips, the govt wouldn’t have much to say about it.
Truly. It’s been ages since I studied up on the subject, but IIRC single-deck Las Vegas downtown rules with card counting, the player had an advantage of about a quarter-percent. With anything else, multi-deck, Strip or Reno rules, and not going deep, the advantage was with the house, even with counting. Counting would shave the advantage, but not tip it in favor of the player.
Mind you, even if you could find such a game, a quarter-percent isn’t much. The club I worked at bought a roulette table with two sides for playing and a single wheel in the middle. Somebody had goofed and the numbers 25 and 28 on the two fields did not match; one side had 25 as red the other black, and vice-versa for 28. While the wrong felt was being replaced the management decided that on the nights both sides were in use – the weekend mainly – for red and black bets, both would pay off if either number came up. This meant a big advantage for the player and one evening after my shift was over, I played just Red and Black bets for a couple hours – and still lost.
The percentages are signicant for the thousands of trials that a club gets, not just the 125 or so I as a player had.
Even with modern six deck shoes and cut cards, if you can count cards successfully you end up with an edge of 0.5%-1.5%. That means you’re taking money from the casino at the same rate they’re taking money from the guy to your right playing basic strategy. Of course, you have to count perfectly and there will be a lot of ups and downs, just like the casino sometimes loses money to the guy playing basic strategy. Also, if you screw up a decision, it’s entirely possible you just blew your edge.
There is an argument to be made that casinos are shooting themselves in the foot by coming down so hard on card counters. The majority of people playing blackjack are basically giving money to the casinos. Of the small percentage of players that are counting, most of them aren’t doing it right and are also giving money to the casino. Here’s the thing, though. In order to stop that small percentage of players who are counting cards effectively, the casino slows down the play for all the rubes who are throwing money away playing stupid strategies like “ape the dealer” or “always assume a 10”. It’s in the casino’s interest to play the game as fast as possible to rake in the rube’s money and constantly reshuffling or cutting the shoe short (to foil the card counter) slows down the play for everyone.
Concerning your example with the roulette wheel, if it was an American wheel with 0 and 00, the mistake on the felt you describe makes the black/red bet even money. Essentially betting on a coin flip. The house edge on this bet is exactly 0 so the casino isn’t losing money by offering it. (Except in the sense that people will play that bet instead of playing something else with a positive house edge.) If it was an American wheel with only one zero then the house edge shifts from 2.7% to -2.7% and you were pretty unlucky that night.
MarkofT said:
What I think that means is that they are not legal currency and nobody else is required to pay them out. I’m not sure what the requirements are on the casino that issues them. But you can’t walk in to your bank and cash them. Though in the casino’s home town, you might be able to find a compliant convenience store clerk who would take them. Though probably not. They would probably be wise to scams and rather let the casinos worry about authenticating them.
But if you and your buddies want to settle up by exchanging casino chips rather than cash bills, there isn’t anything illegal about that.
I would wager (Get it? Wager? Get it?) that there isn’t a law that says “casino chips aren’t real money” but rather that they are simply not specified as legal tender. So it’s not illegal to settle your debts with casino chips, so long as both parties agree to the transaction, but rather neither party is compelled to accept the payment in that form.
Although I’m far from authoritative on this topic, I’ve seen too many references to gambling debts being enforceable in Nevada, as well as unpaid markers / loans (which was intended for gambling use).
As far as counterfeit chips, here are some older ones.
The ones I’m more familiar with are the all-plastic, injection-molded plastic w/ slug or coin inlay. I don’t know much anything about injection molding, but logic dictates that it can’t possibly be that difficult to someone with access to hardware and attention to detail.
MarkofT, what are some of the “security features” you’re aware of? What features does a $100 chip have, that a $25, $20, $10, or $5 doesn’t have?
MarkofT hasn’t posted here in quite a while-his last visit was the fourth of July.
Reviving this thread because of a recent robbery at the Bellagio in Las Vegas which netted $1.5 million worth of casino chips, in denominations of $100 to $25,000. In this article, a police spokesman noted that there were certain security measures which might prevent some of the very high-denomination chips from being cashed:
Understandably he was being cagey about what exactly those safeguards are, but I’m thinking that the five-figure chips might have unique RFID chips hidden inside them, which can be scanned at the cash-in window.
That robbery was quite a story. What can the guy possibly do with those $25K chips?
Also, the article I saw made it sound like he just ripped off one craps table, at 4 a.m. Even at the Bellaggio, does one craps table have that kind of money floating around at that time of night? If so, the fact that this guy knew that suggests that he might be an insider, ISTM.
Many casinos, at least the high roller ones like in vegas and europe, rotate their chips every so often. So if you come up to the window with chips they they havent used in a week they’re either going to know you’re a fraud or if your lucky they just assume you stumbled out of the casino drunk a week ago with x amount of chips and now you’re shit outta luck.
Why would a casino risk pissing off someone who can afford such chips?
I missed your posting back in October; sorry.
It was an American double-zero wheel and 19/38 is, indeed, 0.50 odds. I think I was counting both errant spots twice that night for 20/38 or 0.53 A wheel with no mistakes would be 18/38 or 0.47 A European single-zero wheel with no mistakes would be 18 0.49
I’ve never been to a casino in Vegas that does this. I’d forgotten about $400 in Mirage chips that I threw into my luggage after a good night at the tables and an even better night at the bar. Took 'em back a year later and had no problems cashing them in at the cage.
Also, I’ve had some casinos accept other casinos checks.
I agree that counterfeiting chips would be difficult (though done frequently), but cashing in chips is not a problem. I have frequently played poker games outside of casinos where actual casino chips were used - to one degree or another. After done, you go to the casino and cash them in and it is no big deal.
I have also left with chips and returned months later using the same chips. Just have to remember that chips are “retired” from time to time and become worthless.
“Every so often” means years in most cases. When that happens, the casino usually posts ads in the Vegas paper to let people know that the chips will be “retired” on a certain date. They do not change them every few weeks or such as chips are quite expensive to make in the first place.
Also, most casinos I have played at will allow you to cash in checks from other casinos or even play them at the table (though they generally convert them to their own checks). This is especially true with poker.
I didn’t see anyone else post this exact info - but I might have missed it.
In Vegas - they can pretty much ban you for counting - or whatever they want.
In Atlantic City - they can not ban you in theory - as in asking you to leave. There was a court case on this - and similar to what someone else had posted - it was decided this was totally legal.
What they CAN do in AC - is change the limits at any time (have to swap out the sign). Since counting cards ONLY works when you have variable limits (or can enter mid shoe when the count is high) - they can change the limits so the minimum equals the maximum - eliminating your edge. Also they can choose to shuffle whenever they want. If they do this every hand - they make it impossible to profit. Although they can’t “ban” you in AC - they can make it so uncomfortable to play that you will leave (including informing other patrons at the table that YOU are the reason the game is so slow).
As far as casino security goes - yes it looks great on all those TV shows, but once I saw a show with a major casino - and they were talking about busting people every MONTH for cheating at blackjack. The impression I got from these shows was this was going on every DAY. If they are only (at one casino at least) busting people every month - it leads me to believe it isn’t that common - or more people are getting away with it than you may think.
Also with the chips - I think - as other have posted they are mainly high valued chips being checked/swapped - I’m pretty sure the $1.00 and $5.00 chips are the same for over 10 years at a couple I have been to.
And it - as people have mentioned - is no problem to leave with chips and bring them back in play. Sure if I showed up with $100k in chips at a table - I might get some questions - but I have showed up with thousands from a previous day without a problem. I’ve never had a problem taking $500 chips from table to table. Sure if the break them - they announce it - but that is common proceedure for any half decent cash in.
I tend to think casino security is pretty good, but it isn’t perfect.
There is a great book called “American Roulette” about cheating at blackjack. I believe the guy is telling the truth - and he was certainly able to get away with a lot. He had a pretty ingenious method too.
If you look at the total number number of $10k bills still out there it is 339 - I suspect the same goes with high value casino chips - the number outstanding at any one time is pretty small (once you take into account the ones currently in play). That is the only reason they can get away with swapping them out.
OK – since someone woke this one up – from the numismatic side we are seeing more counterfeit chips that are being made to target collectors rather than the casinos themselves. Some chips, as collectibles, can get well over a grand each and with the Hobby Protection Act not being that strong or well enforced ---------- it happens.
Apologies for being the third or fourth person to resurrect this thread. Also, oh my god I just finished typing all the below and sorry for the length.
I’ve worked for nearly 20 years in the casino industry, having worked in both Table Games and Slots management.
Quick pedantry: “Cheques” or “Checks” is the term for a chip that can be cashed for its face value. A “Chip” is a non-value…chip. Chips are used in roulette where the value is determined by the player when buying-in. “Chip” can also refer to promotional chips that must be played and cannot be directly cashed-in.
Chip Fraud:
There’s three main types of chip fraud I can think of off the top of my head:
#1: Making your own cheques. We got a bulletin when someone tried this at a neighboring casino. They were laughably bad. I’m sure it’s happened several other times around the world but I’ve never personally heard of any cases.
#2: Changing the denomination of a lower value cheques. I see this happen at our property once every few years. The quality ranges from using permanent marker to make a chip black ($100) without bothering with the printed value up to very, very detailed full conversions. The problem is, the cheque may look perfect when viewed alone but once they enter the dealer’s or cashier’s float they stick out like a sore thumb and are detected fairly quickly. Cheques become dirty and wear down quite a bit after being in circulation for a while so fresh looking cheques are easy to spot and very suspicous.
#3: The easiest and most common chip fraud is the roulette color-up scam. Since several players may place wagers on the same layout, each player is generally given their own color of non-value chips. The player designates what those chips are worth during the buy-in. For example, a player may give the dealer $100 in cash and $200 black cheques, and want to play with $5 chips. The dealer will give him 60 non-value chips and mark that particular colored chip as $5 in a special tray near the wheel.
The scam works like this: John exchanges $60 for 60 blue NV (non-value) chips he designates as $1. While placing some bets he covertly pockets 20 of the chips (pocketing NV chips is a major no-no). Soon after pocketing the chips he exchanges the remainder for value cheques and leaves the table. John then gives his pocketed 20 chips to Dave. Dave walks up to the same table and buys-in for $1,000, requests blue, and designates them as $25 chips. During his play he covertly removes the 20 blue chips from his pocket then exchanges all of his NV chips for value cheques; he’s just made an easy $480.
In theory this scam shouldn’t work since there is a set amount of NV chips of any given color on a table and any missing chips should be spotted when a player tries to leave. In reality sloppy dealers on a packed game are often too lazy or too distracted to bother verifying their bank.
Chip Security:
[ul]
[li]Chip security isn’t really that great. Serial numbers are rarely used and are generally only used on very high-denom chips such as $10k+. No counterfeiter in their right mind would try to counterfeit those regardless of serial numbers. The serials are a theft deterrent, not a counterfeit deterrent. [/li][li]In the case of theft of large value cheques the casinos will either swap the color or pull them off the floor entirely until the thief inevitably tries to smurf them through the cage using an agent.[/li][li]RFID debuted around a decade ago and was promised to be the answer to all the casino’s problems. The best feature wasn’t theft/counterfeit deterrence but rather the ability to accurately rate patrons’ bets. Unfortunately the 13.56Mhz RFID chips were patented, the promised partnership between several large casino vendors fell through, and the product that was delivered was underwhelming and extremely overpriced. As a very rough estimate I’d say that less 5-10% of US casinos currently use RFID in their chips and those that do typically only use the readers in the cage.[/li][li]You CAN pull chips out of your pocket at any time and generally not arouse any suspicion. Many players “rathole” chips: putting them in their pockets during play and taking them out later. It’s not a big deal.[/li][/ul]
General Casino Security:
[ul]
[li]Casino security ranges from horrible to acceptable with most properties leaning towards horrible. [/li][li]There are thousands of cameras on a typical casino’s floor and each table has at least two angles at which it can be viewed from. If we think you’re doing or did something you shouldn’t be you will be caught 9 times out of 10.[/li][li]That said, we have to think you’re doing/did something. When you see the Surevillance room on TV or in the movies it’s always something that looks like NASA mission control with dozens of people watching live games and catching people left and right. In reality it’s 3-10 guys and a supervisor in a small, dark room. If there’s 10 guys, one is on lunch, two are filling out paperwork, three are reviewing old tapes of known suspicious activity that happened previously, leaving four guys actually watching live play on the floor. Keep in mind there may be dozens of tables, hundreds of banks of slots, and dozens of point-of-sale registers to watch at any given moment. [/li]
Then there’s the Pit Bosses and dealers. Due to the economy a supervisor may watch up to a dozen games at a time. He’s busy trying to rate players, watch his dealers, and flirt with the cocktail waitress. It’s rare that the supervisor catches a cheater. The dealers are the first, and too often the only, line of defense. However they’re not specifically trained to catch cheaters and the cheaters know how to prey on the weaker dealers.
A surprisingly large percent of amateur/opportunistic cheats are caught by the other players. I can’t begin to count how many times I’ve had a player come to me complaining that another player is doing something shady.
[li]Security officers on the floor aren’t trained to detect any sort of Table Games cheating. They simply respond to a call from the pit or Surveillance to detain an individual. There may be state Gaming Commission agents on the floor but they are more worried about the staff than the players.[/li][li]Yes, casinos do share information about cheats both directly and through various agencies. However, facial recognition software isn’t quite as sophisticated as it is in the movies and is usually used after an individual is suspected and only if there’s a decent shot of him looking towards a camera.[/li][li]Cheating is illegal but amateur/opportunistic cheats are almost always just barred and almost never prosecuted. Too many stories in the paper about cheats in casinos is bad for business. That said, if you start marking cards or use any sort of cheating device you will be prosecuted.[/li][li]Sophisticated cheaters are pretty rare (or rarely caught?). A typical casino may catch one to two a year. Opportunistic cheaters that attempt to alter their bets during play and other such amateur moves are caught several times per week. Dealer’s colluding (cheating) with players are caught once every year or two. There’s usually at least one card counter barred per week. [/li]
It’s very rare, but occasionally we’ll find someone doing something we just can’t figure out. People are constantly finding new ways to cheat or otherwise gain an edge that no one else knows about. If someone’s win is extremely far outside their expected range we may occasionally bar them without knowing their exact method. Different properties have different acceptable ranges but in general casinos will never bar a player for winning too much unless it’s somehow suspicious. An exception might be no long taking a whale’s action because the corporate accountants can longer stomach the million dollar swings.
[li]Backrooming is still done but usually only if the patron was spotted doing something obviously illegal. There have been some fairly recent lawsuits against some casinos stemming from backrooming of non-cheaters that cost those casinos millions. No one in the US is going to get a hammer to the hand.[/li][/ul]
Card Counting:
[ul]
[li]Card counting is not cheating. There are many ways to gain an edge over the house using only information available to all players that are not considered cheating. That said, using a computer or other device to assist in counting IS considered cheating in most jurisdictions (known colloquially as device law in Nevada).[/li][li]Card counting is way easier than it seems. An average third grader could be taught to keep the count in under an hour. The hi-lo count simply requires you start at zero, add one for every 2-5 you see and subtract one for every ten and ace you see. Divide that number by the number of decks remaining in the shoe and you have your count. Up your bet at certain count intervals and follow basic strategy and you can eke out a 0.5-1% edge over the house. There are even easier counting systems such as Knock-Out blackjack that reduce the difficulty substantially.[/li][li]Card counting is way harder than it seems. The theory, as stated above, is simple. However:[/li][LIST]
[li]The casino environment isn’t conducive to concentration. [/li][li]At a 1% edge you’d need to bet an average of $100 per hand to make $100/hour. This level of play at small to mid-sized casinos will draw at least some attention. There are various ways of camouflaging your counting but most of those reduce your edge over the house.[/li][li]It’s very mentally exhausting while being both incredibly tense and incredibly boring at the same time. Playing for more than a couple of hours at a time is difficult at first.[/li][li]A couple of small mistakes in your play per hour is all it takes to wipe out your edge over the house. [/li][li]If you want to make decent money the bankroll requirements are huge. At $100/hand the standard deviation in your win for an hour session is going to be roughly +/- $3,300. Those swings can really hurt.[/li][/ul]
[li]Smart casinos love card counting. The idea that the game can be beat is what makes it the most popular table game in the US. For every legitimate card counter there exists a hundred people who think they have the edge for some reason or another.[/li][li]Individual card counters do not scare most casinos. Teams do. MIT is still intermittently active in addition dozens of other successful counting teams. They often hit casinos using slash-and-burn methods where they take the casino for tens of thousands of dollars over a weekend before getting barred.[/li][li]Multiple decks do not prevent counting nor make it significantly harder. It does reduce the amount the count swings up and down which is bad for the counter. However, most casinos relax around their six-deck games more than they should. A counter that would be barred betting $25-$100 on a double deck game can often get away with betting $10-$200 on a six-deck game making the six-deck a much more profitable game.[/li][li]As mentioned by others, Atlantic City can’t bar a counter but can take such harsh countermeasures the game becomes unplayable. [/li][li]There are many games other than BJ that can be beaten legitimately. Baccarat and a few of the poker carnival games come to mind. However most of the methods I know of offer very small edges over the house with very, very large swings in bankroll. There no non-cheating method to gain an edge over the house in Craps except for dice setting (dice SLIDING is a straight up cheat move). Dice setting well enough to gain an edge is so insanely hard no rational casinos fear it.[/li][/LIST]
Collecting Casino Debt:
I don’t know much on the subject and wouldn’t pretend to know anything about law, but DBA Fred nailed it: markers are simply post-dated checks written against a previously vetted bank account. The player then purchases the check back from the casino to settle the marker. Lawsuits regarding markers are considered the nuclear option and are rarely brought up. It’s bad press and bad business. At higher levels of play often times markers will go unpaid and the Cage will be unable to contact the player. Months later he’ll show up, pay off his marker, and go on to lose several hundred thousand more.
Great post Blacktop and welcome to the boards.
Great post and contribution.
What is Dice setting and dice sliding?