How To Play Craps - Learn How To Play Craps

This how to play craps site is broken into three sections. The first section starts a little further down this page and gives you the basics of playing craps. The second section, found on the craps bets page, outlines all of the possible bets and wagers you can make while playing craps. The third section deals with craps strategy and arms you with not only the simplest craps strategy there is, but also the one that gives you by far the best chance to have a winning craps session. Surprisingly they are the exact same system. Imagine that, both a simple system and the one cutting the house odds to their smallest all wrapped into one. I am sure you are ready to get started, so to start learning how to play craps, read on.

How To Play Craps Lessons

How To Play Craps Rules

The how to play craps rules start with an explanation of how to get chips to start playing and who the casino personnel around the craps table are. Your first how to play craps lesson is how to buy chips to play. The first thing you need to do in a live casino is exchange your money for chips. Simply place your money on the craps table in front of you and say change. The casino personnel manning the craps table will take care of the rest. Always remember in a casino to not try to hand money directly to a dealer. They can not take money from anywhere except the table. This is because the cameras in surveillance need to be able to clearly see everything that happens at the craps table in case there is a mix up. Once you have your chips you can either hold them or place them in the chip rack tray built into the craps table in front of you. If you are playing craps at an online casino, you don't need to worry about this because the craps software takes care of your chips for you.

Continuing with the how to play craps lessons, the casino personnel around the craps table are as follows.

• Dealer or dealers - There are usually two craps dealers at the table. Occasionally you will play in a game where there is only one dealer, but not often. The dealers make change for players, collect losing bets and pay off winning bets. They are usually on each side of the box man.
• Box Man or Boxman - The box man is in charge of the craps table. He takes care of any player disputes or questions and is in control of the cash at the table.
• Stick Man or Stickman - The stick man announces the total of each roll, uses the craps stick to collect the dice and also acts as the focal point of most craps games. He or she often talks about different betting options and in general tries to make the craps game as exciting s possible. A good stick man can really liven up a craps game.

You are only allowed to place certain bets of your own at the craps table. On all other bets you have to place your chips on the table and call out your bet so a dealer or stick man can place it. Here are the craps bets you can place yourself. Pass line, don't pass line, come line, odds bets, big 6 and 8 and field bets. (To see what each of these bets means, see the next page titled craps bets.) Any other bets you want to make have to be placed by one of the casino personnel. If you are learning how to play craps using an online casino you just pick you bet amount and click where you want to wager.

The last thing you need to know about the craps rules is when one or both of the dice don't stay on the table playing surface. When this happens it is announced as a no roll and a new set of dice are given to the shooter.

How To Play Craps Shooter

Once all of the bets have been placed, the shooter, or person who is rolling the dice, pitches the dice down the table against the back wall of the craps table. This first roll either wins the pass line bets and loses the don't pass line bets with a 7 or an 11 or loses the pass line bets and wins the don't pass bets with a 2 or a 3. On a 12 roll the pass line bets lose but the don't pass bets don't win or lose, they stay. Any other roll sets a point. When a point is set, if the shooter rolls the point again before rolling a 7, the pass line bets win. If a 7 is rolled before the point is rolled again, the pass line bets lose and the dice are passed to the next shooter.

The way to tell if the shooter is on a come out roll or a point roll is to look at the disk, usually black on the off side and white on the on side, on the table. It is marked off on one side and on on the other. When it is turned to the off side, the roll is a come out roll, or first roll of the round. If it is on the on side, it is placed on the point number that has been set.

Ok, now that you know the basics of how to play craps it is time to look at all the possible bets you can place at the craps table. Go to the craps bets page.

This howtoplaycraps web site is for informational purposes only.