Roulette is one of the world’s most popular casino games. Its rules are relatively simple and the game can be very fast-paced. While many players just want to have fun and enjoy the glamour of the spinning wheel, there are also serious betters who use complex strategies that can yield high rewards. The key to winning is correctly guessing which number or type of bet the ball will land on when the wheel stops spinning.
The Roulette wheel consists of a solid wooden disk slightly convex in shape, with 36 compartments painted alternately red and black (on European-style wheels, the 37th compartment carries the sign of 0; on American wheels, there are two green compartments) and numbered nonconsecutively from 1 to 36. The croupier then sends a small white ball spinning and bets are placed on the table, correlating to the numbers the ball can possibly land in. The odds of each bet are displayed on the table map and are shown to the player before he or she places a chip.
There are several different types of bets in roulette, including outside, inside, and special bets. The outside bets are the most common and include single-number, red/black, odd/even, column, and dozens. The inside bets are made on groups of numbers, such as three or four in a row, and the special bets, such as call bets and tiers, pay out at higher odds. The house edge is lower for outside bets because the probability of hitting them is greater.
The best way to win at roulette is to choose the type of bet you want and stick to it. There are also a number of betting systems that claim to increase your chances of winning, but they’re not foolproof. In fact, it’s very rare to find a system that consistently beats the house edge. The “Eudaemons,” a group of physics postgraduates, used theoretical insights and a rudimentary computer concealed in a shoe to beat the house at roulette in Nevada in the 1970s, but since they didn’t publish their research, nobody else knows how they did it.
Roulette has become a vital laboratory for the downtown-music scene, providing artists like John Zorn, Shelley Hirsch, and Ikue Mori with space, money, and recorded documentation of their work. But the 14,000-square-foot TriBeCa loft that houses the venue is now largely empty, and its founder, Jim Staley, has decided to retire as artistic director in June. As the venerable venue moves to its new home, its legacy of innovation lives on through the artists it has helped nurture and sustain.
