Updated: 2024Top Casinos with Live Dealer Craps
Craps have become such a beloved game, that no brick-and-mortar casino would dare not include a couple of craps tables amongst its repertoire of games!
So, it was a no-brainer for online casinos to introduce craps as part of their game selection for online gaming when the internet started taking over!
But, which are the best online casinos to play craps at? And, how does one even play craps? And, are there any tricks to keep in mind? Not to worry, friends, we’ll answer all these questions in our article!
Craps Online – How to Play
Craps is an exciting classic online casino game where you bet on the outcome of a roll, or multiple rolls, of a pair of dice.
You’ve taken an interest in shooting the dice in a nice game of craps, huh? Well, craps is an exciting game to play with easy rules that any punter can pick up!
And, it makes no difference whether you’re the shooter or one of the bettors in the crowd, the rules apply equally to both these sorts of players, and it’s just as exciting for the both of them!
So, How Does One Actually Play Craps?
The games of craps revolves around 2 dice and the outcome of their rolls; yes, that’s all there is to it! The only ‘difficult’ part of the game is remembering all the different bets available!
→ Every player around the craps table (a digital one in our case) must make a bet, including the shooter, which is the person rolling the dice.
→ Once everybody has placed their bets, the shooter can throw the dice. In a real-life craps game, the shooter must hit the opposite wall of the craps table for the roll to count, but this is done automatically on online craps games, luckily for you!
→ The first roll that a shooter makes is known as the ‘Come-Out Roll‘, and depending on the result and the bet they placed, either wins or loses their bet, or must continue throwing the dice.
The ‘Come-Out Roll’, is the first roll of the dice or the first one after the previous betting round has finished.
→ This is where we come to the 2 most iconic, popular, and compulsory bets in craps: Pass and Don’t Pass. Every bettor around the table must make either one of these bets.
Pass wins on a 7 or 11 rolled (known as ‘Natural numbers’)
Don’t Pass wins on a 2 (also known as ‘Snake Eyes’) or 3 rolled (known as ‘Craps numbers’)
Both bets generally lose on a 12 rolled, however, sometimes a 12 is a ‘draw’ for Don’t Pass bettors, meaning that they neither win nor lose their bet.
Craps TIP! the Don’t Pass bet generally has a better house edge but betting on it at a real-life craps table will make you stand out. Craps is a very superstitious game, and betting Don’t Pass might get you a few scowls because players believe you’re betting ‘against the shooter’. Thankfully, this isn’t the case with online craps!
But, what if the shooter rolls a number other than Natural or Craps numbers? Then the shooter is said to have rolled a ‘Point’, and that’s when they must continue rolling the dice.
Natural
7 or 11
Craps
2, 3 or 12
Point
4, 5, 6, 8, 9, or 10
The dealer then places a white button or puck with the word ‘ON’ written on it on the number that was rolled, for example, a 6.
The shooter must then keep rolling the dice until he rolls his Point once again, whereupon Pass bets win. However, if the shooter rolls a 7 before rolling his Point, then he ‘sevens-out’, that is, he loses his bet (if he bet Pass) and loses his turn as the shooter, and a new shooter will play. When the shooter sevens-out, Don’t Pass bets win.
Those are the very basic craps casino rules if you only intend to bet Pass or Don’t Pass, which is generally a simple and effective strategy as these bets have excellent house edges: 1.41% and 1.36% respectively! That’s fantastic considering that you double your money each time you win one of these bets! But, what about the other bets?
Come and Don’t Come Bets
The simplest bets after the Pass bets are the Come bets: Come and Don’t Come. These bets are exactly like Pass and Don’t Pass except they can only be made after the Come-Out, that is, the shooter’s first roll.
So, if the shooter didn’t roll a Natural or Craps, you can make a Come or Don’t Come bet, and these work exactly like the Pass and Don’t Pass bets you made in the beginning.
→ After the Come bets, there are the Odds bets, or Free Odds bets. These bets can only be made in conjunction with another bet, which is the Pass, Don’t Pass, Come and Don’t Come bets.
You won’t see this bet marked anywhere on the craps table, which makes this bet a little inconspicuous. This bet can be made, removed, increased and decreased at any time after the initial bet has been made.
Place Bets
The Free Odds bet will be explained in more detail in the next section. Next up is the Place Bets, which are represented by the boxes with the numbers 10, 9, 8, 6, 5, 4 on them (9 and 6 are generally written out to avoid confusion between the two). These bets can only be made once the point has been established.
These are sort of like a secondary Point that you can establish yourself: you place a bet on one of the numbers on the table and if the shooter rolls that number before they seven-out then you win your bet!
These bets can be canceled at any time and they pay differently according to the number you chose: 4 and 10 pay 9:5, 5 and 9 pay 7:5, and 6 and 8 pay 7:6.
Field Bets
Then there are the Field Bets, which are located in a rather large section with the word ‘FIELD’ written on it. These are single-roll bets, that is, they are only up for one roll and then they’re taken off the table afterward, win or lose.
However, the bet wins on either a 2, 3, 4, 9, 10, 11, 12 and only loses when a 5, 6, 7, or 8 are rolled, giving you plenty of odds in your favour.
The Field pays differently according to what’s rolled: a 2 pays double, a 12 pays either double or even triple, and rest pay even (1:1). Another bet that punters can make are the Big 6 and Big 8: these win if a 6 or 8 respectively are rolled before a 7, and they pay even. These bets can be found at the corners with the words ‘BIG 6’ and ‘BIG 8’ written on them.
Proposition Bets
Finally, we have the Proposition bets, which are also single-roll bets, except for the Hardways, that can be made at any time. There are several of these bets on the table, including Big Red, where the shooter must roll a 7, Boxcars, where the shooter must roll a 12, and the Hardways bets, where either a 4, 6, 8, or 10 must be rolled the ‘hard way’, that is, with doubles before they’re rolled the ‘soft way’, with no doubles, or a 7 is rolled.
Proposition bets can be found as a table (which lists all of the bets and their payouts) on the craps table; they generally have a high house edge, and some of them have ridiculous odds (like Boxcars, or Snake Eyes, where the shooter must roll a 2, for example, both with odds of 35:1), but the good news is that they pay rather high: Boxcars and Snake Eyes, for example, both pay 30:1.
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