Legal aspects of gambling

The Caesars Palace main fountain. The statue is a copy of the ancient Winged Victory of Samothrace.

Because religious authorities generally frown on gambling to some extent, and because of various perceived social costs, most legal jurisdictions censure gambling to some extent. Islamic nations officially prohibit gambling; most other countries regulate it. In particular, in the majority of circumstances - and perhaps all cases - the law does not recognise wagers as contracts, and views any consequent losses as debts of honour, unenforceable by legal process. Thus organized crime often takes over the enforcement of large gambling debts, sometimes using violent methods.

Because contracts of insurance have many features in common with wagers, legislation generally makes a distinction, typically defining any agreement in which either one of the parties has an interest in the outcome bet upon, beyond the specific financial terms, as a contract of insurance. Thus a bet on whether one's house will burn down becomes a contract of insurance, as one has an independent interest in the security of one's home.

Furthermore, many jurisdictions, local as well as national, either ban or heavily control (license) gambling. Such regulation generally leads to gambling tourism and illegal gambling - the latter often under the auspices of organized crime. Such involvement frequently brings the activity under even more severe moral censure and leads to calls for greater regulation. Conversely, the close involvement of governments (through regulation and gambling taxation) has led to a close connection between many governments and gambling organisations, where legal gambling provides much government revenue.

There is generally legislation requesting that the odds in gambling machines are fair (i.e. statistically random), to prevent manufacturers from making some high-payoff results impossible (since these have very low probability, this can quite easily pass unnoticed).

This guide is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia.

Psychological aspects of gambling

Though many participate in gambling as a form of recreation or even as a means to gain an income, gambling, like any behavior which involves variation in brain chemistry, can become a psychologically addictive and harmful behavior in some people. Reinforcement phenomena may also make gamblers persist in gambling even after repeated losses. Because of the negative connotations of the word "gambling", casinos and race tracks often use the euphemism "gaming" to describe the recreational gambling activities they offer.

The Russian writer Dostoevsky portrays in his short story The Gambler the psychological implications of gambling and how gambling can affect gamblers. He also associates gambling and the idea of "getting rich quick", suggesting that Russians may have a particular affinity for gambling. Dostoevsky shows the effect of betting money for the chance of gaining more in 19th-century Europe. The association between Russians and gambling has fed legends of the origins of Russian roulette.

Help for addictive gamblers

Many organizations exist to help individuals with a gambling addiction. They include Gamblers Anonymous and Gambler's Help(Australia).

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia.

Types of gambling games

Casino games

"Beatable" casino games

With proper strategy, a smart player can create a positive mathematical expectation.

Poker (Also recognised as a game of skill)
Blackjack -- with card counting
Video poker -- with proper pay table and/or progressive jackpot
Pai Gow Poker and Tiles -- player-dealt
Sports betting
Horse racing (parimutuel)
Slot machines -- only linked, multi-player jackpots whose prizes have reached a certain point

"Unbeatable" casino games

These have a negative expectation, players as a group will lose in the long run (unless they cheat).

Baccarat
Craps
Roulette (unless physical prediction is used)
Keno
Casino war
Faro (All but extinct)
Pachinko
Sic Bo
Let It Ride
3-card Poker
4-card poker
Red Dog
Pyramid Poker
Caribbean Stud Poker
Spanish 21 -- without counting

Non-casino gambling games

Lottery
Mahjong
Fan-Tan
Dice-based
Backgammon
Liar's dice
Passe-dix
Hazard
Threes
Card games
Liar's poker
Bridge
Basset
Lansquenet
Piquet
Put
Coin-tossing
Head and Tail
Two-up (Australian casinos offer versions of two-up)
Confidence tricks
Three card monte
The shell game
Carnival Games
The Razzle
Hanky Pank
Penny Falls
Six-Cat
The Swinger
The Push-up Bottle
The Nail Joint
Con Games (in bars)
Put and Take
The Smack
The Drunken Mitt

Fixed-odds gambling

Fixed-odds gambling and Parimutuel betting frequently occur at or on the following kinds of events:

Horse racing (see below)
Greyhound racing
Jai alai
Football matches (particularly on Association and American football)
Golf
Tennis
Cricket
Baseball
Basketball
Ice hockey
Rugby (League and Union)
Snooker
Motor Racing
Boxing
Darts

In addition many bookmakers offer fixed odds on a number of non-sports related outcomes, for example the direction and extent of movement of various financial indices, whether snow will fall on Christmas Day in a given area, the winner of television competitions such as Big Brother, and so forth. Interactive prediction markets also offer trading on these outcomes, with "shares" of results trading on an open market.

Other types of betting

One can also bet with another person that a statement is true or false, or that a specified event will happen (a "back bet") or will not happen (a "lay bet") within a specified time. This occurs in particular when two people have opposing but strongly-held views on truth or events. Not only do the parties hope to gain from the bet, they place the bet also to demonstrate their certainty about the issue. Some means of determining the issue at stake must exist. Sometimes the amount bet remains nominal, demonstrating the outcome as one of principle rather than of financial importance.

Arbitrage betting

Arbitrage betting, deceptively advertised as no-risk or risk-free betting, is a special case of betting on events offered by betting websites which is not gambling but rather an unusual investment practice.

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia.

Staking systems

Many people have formulated staking systems in an attempt to "beat the bookie", but most still accept that no staking system can make an unprofitable system profitable over time. Widely-used systems include:

• Fixed stakes – a traditional system of staking the same amount on each selection. This method suits conservative punters if the stake remains below 5% of the bank.
• Fixed profits – the stakes vary based on the odds to ensure the same profit from each winning selection. This method suits conservative punters well, although if the profitability of one's bets varies independently of the odds the bettor simply reduces his or her cash flow.
• Due-column betting – A variation on fixed profits betting in which the bettor sets a target profit and then calculates a bet size that will make this profit, adding any losses to the target. For example, to make a target of $100 profit a bettor would wager $50 at odds of 2 to 1. If the bet loses, the target becomes $150. If the next bet is also at odds of 2 to 1, the wager therefore becomes $75. This type of wagering can prove ruinous in the long run.
• Kelly (optimal) – the punter needs to estimate fair odds (in the European/decimal format) and then calculate the stake using :

Stake= (Odds/(Fair odds-1))/(Odds-1) Many times used with a divider (most commonly 4 or 8) depending on your bankroll (for betting)

• Martingale – A system based on staking enough each time to recover losses from previous bet(s) until one wins. It is usually applied to even-money bets such as red/black on roulette. The Martingale guarantees failure in the long run - it would only work if the bettor has an unlimited bankroll, the bookmaker has no limit on the size of bets and neither party ever dies. However, it can usually be used to gain a small win in the short run, given a bankroll large enough to survive a streak of five or six losses.

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia.

Card games

The House of Cards - a painting by Jean-Baptiste Siméon Chardin, 1735.

A card game is any game using playing cards, either traditional or game-specific.

Seating of players

When a card game is played, the players arrange themselves in a circle around a horizontal surface on which the cards will be played. This surface is usually a table, although any flat surface can be used. The players face inwards, and are approximately evenly spaced (so that they cannot see each other's hand of cards).

The pack or deck

A card game is played with a pack of cards intended for that game. The pack consists of a fixed number of pieces of printed cardboard known as cards. The cards in a pack are identical in size and shape. Each card has two sides, the face and the back. The backs of the cards in a pack are indistinguishable. The faces of the cards in a pack may all be unique, or may include duplicates, depending on the game. In either case, any card is readily identifiable by its face.

The set of cards that make up the pack will be known to all of the players using that pack.

Pack is British English; deck is U.S. English. They mean the same thing.

However, there are some card games that require multiple decks. In this scenario, a "deck" refers to a set of 52 cards or a single deck, while a "pack" refers to the collection of "decks" as a whole.

The deal

Dealing is done either clockwise or counterclockwise. If this is omitted from the rules, then it should be assumed to be:

• clockwise for games from North America, North and West Europe and Russia;
• counterclockwise for South and East Europe and Asia, also for Swiss games and all Tarot games.

A player is chosen to deal. That person takes all of the cards in the pack, stacks them together so that they are all the same way up and the same way round, and shuffles them. There are various techniques of shuffling, all intended to put the cards into a random order. During the shuffle, dealer holds the cards so that she and the other players cannot see any of their faces.

Shuffling should continue until the chance of a card remaining next to the one that was originally next to is small. In practice, many dealers do not shuffle for long enough to achieve this.

After the shuffle, the dealer offers the deck to another player to cut the deck. If the deal is clockwise, this is the player on her right; if counter-clockwise, it is the player on her left. The invitation to cut is made by placing the pack, face downward, on the table near the player who is to cut: who then lifts the upper portion of the pack clear of the lower portion and places it alongside. The formerly lower portion is then replaced on top of the formerly upper portion.

The dealer then deals the cards. This is done by dealer holding the pack, face-down, in one hand, and removing cards from the top of it with her other hand to distribute to the players, placing them face-down on the table in front of the players to whom they are dealt. The rules of the game will specify the details of the deal. It normally starts with the players next to the dealer in the direction of play (left in a clockwise game; right in an anticlockwise one), and continues in the same direction around the table. The cards may be dealt one at a time, or in groups. Unless the rules specify otherwise, assume that the cards are dealt one at a time. Unless the rules specify otherwise, assume that all the cards are dealt out; but in many games, some remain undealt, and are left face down in the middle of the table, forming the talon, skat, or stock. The player who received the first card from the deal may be known as eldest hand, or as forehand.

The set of cards dealt to a player is known as his or her hand.

Throughout the shuffle, cut, and deal, the dealer should arrange that the players are unable to see the faces of any of the cards. The players should not try to see any of the faces. Should a card accidentally become exposed (visible to all), then normally any player can demand a redeal - that is, all the cards are gathered up, and the shuffle, cut and deal are repeated. Should a player accidentally see a card (other than one dealt to herself) she should admit this.

It is dishonest to try to see cards as they are dealt, or to take advantage of having seen a card accidentally.

When the deal is complete, all players pick up their cards and hold them in such a way that the faces can be seen by the holder of the cards but not the other players. It is helpful to fan one's cards out so that (if they have corner indices) all their values can be seen at once. In most games it is also useful to sort one's hand, rearranging the cards in a way appropriate to the game. For example in a trick taking game it is easier to have all one's cards of the same suit together, whereas in a rummy game one might sort them by rank or by potential combinations.

The rules

A new card game starts in a small way, either as someone's invention, or as a modification of an existing game. Those playing it may agree to change the rules as they wish. The rules that they agree on become the "house rules" under which they play the game. A set of house rules may be accepted as valid by a group of players wherever they play. It may also be accepted as governing all play within a particular house, café, or club.

When a game becomes sufficiently popular, so that people often play it with strangers, there is a need for a generally accepted set of rules. This is often met by a particular set of house rules becoming generally recognised. For example, when whist became popular in 18th-century England, players in the Portland Club agreed on a set of house rules for use on its premises. Players in some other clubs then agreed to follow the "Portland Club" rules, rather than go to the trouble of codifying and printing their own sets of rules. The Portland Club rules eventually became generally accepted throughout England.

There is nothing "official" about this process. If you decide to play whist seriously, it would be sensible to learn the Portland Club rules, so that you can play with other people who already know these rules. But if you only play whist with your family, you are likely to ignore these rules, and just use what rules you choose. And if you play whist seriously with a group of friends, you are still perfectly free to devise your own set of rules, should you want to.

It is sometimes said that the "official" or "correct" sets of rules governing a card game are those "in Hoyle". Edmond Hoyle was an 18th-century Englishman who published a number of books about card games. His books were popular, especially his treatise on how to become a good whist player. After (and even before) his death, many publishers have taken advantage of his popularity by placing his name on their books of rules. The presence of his name on a rule book has no significance at all. The rules given in the book may be no more than the opinion of the author.

If there is a sense in which a card game can have an "official" set of rules, it is when that card game has an "official" governing body. For example, the rules of tournament bridge are governed by the World Bridge Federation, and by local bodies in various countries such as the ACBL in the USA, and the EBU in England. The rules of skat in Germany are governed by the Deutsche Skatverband which publishes the Skatordnung. The rules of French tarot are governed by the Fédération Française de Tarot. But there is no compulsion to follow the rules put out by these organisations. If you and your friends decide to play a game by a set of rules unknown to the game's official body, you are doing nothing illegal.

Many widely-played card games have no official regulating body. An example is Canasta.

Rule infractions

An infraction is any action which is against the rules of the game, such as playing a card when it is not one's turn to play and the accidental exposure of a card.

In many official sets of rules for card games, the rules specifying the penalties for various infractions occupy more pages than the rules specifying how to play correctly. This is tedious, but necessary for games that are played seriously. Players who intend to play a card game at a high level generally ensure before beginning that all agree on the penalties to be used. When playing privately, this will normally be a question of agreeing house rules. In a tournament there will probably be a tournament director who will enforce the rules when required and arbitrate in cases of doubt.

If a player breaks the rules of a game deliberately, this is cheating. Most card players would refuse to play cards with a known cheat. The rest of this section is therefore about accidental infractions, caused by ignorance, clumsiness, inattention, etc.

As the same game is played repeatedly among a group of players, precedents build up about how a particular infraction of the rules should be handled. E.G. "Sheila just led a card when it wasn't her turn. Last week when Jo did that, we agreed ... etc.". Sets of such precedents tend to become established among groups of players, and to be regarded as part of the house rules. Sets of house rules become formalised, as described in the previous section. Therefore, for some games, there is a "proper" way of handling infractions of the rules. But for many games, without governing bodies, there is no standard way of handling infractions.

In many circumstances, there is no need for special rules dealing with what happens after an infraction. As a general principle, the person who broke a rule should not benefit by it, and the other players should not lose by it. An exception to this may be made in games with fixed partnerships, in which it may be felt that the partner(s) of the person who broke a rule should also not benefit. The penalty for an accidental infraction should be as mild as reasonable, consistent with there being no possible benefit to the person responsible.

Types of card games

Trick-taking games

500
Cassino
Bridge
Écarté
Euchre
Hearts
Pinochle
Piquet
ROOK
Spades
Sixty-three
Sueca (game)
Whist
Wizard
Pairs(u/c)

Rummy-style games

500 Rum
Canasta
Concentration
Durak
Five Crowns
Gin rummy
Go Fish
Haihowak
Happy Families
Jolly
Kemps
Robbers' rummy
Seven Bridge
Shanghai rum
Spoons/donkey
Tonk
Tri
Wyatt Earp
Steal the old man's pack

Casino or gambling card games

Baccarat
Bingo
Blackjack
Blind Hookey
Bouré
Cribbage
Poker
Primero
Red dog
Texas hold 'em
Thirty-one
Three card brag

Solitaire (or Patience) games

Ace of the Pile
Baker's Dozen (solitaire)
Calculation
Concentration
FreeCell
Kings in the Corner (multi-player)
Klondike
Russian Bank
Solitaire Showdown

Shedding games

Bartok / Bartog
Bullshit
California Speed
Chase the Ace/Old Maid
Craits
Crazy Eights
Eleusis
Mao
President
Shichi Narabe
Shithead
Spit / Speed
Spite and Malice
Tien len
UNO

Accumulating games

Beggar-My-Neighbour
Egyptian Ratscrew
Seven Spades
Slapjack
Snap
Top Trumps
War

Miscellaneous playing card games

Sevens

Multi-genre games

Eleusis
Poke
Skitgubbe
Tichu
Tripoli

Collectible card games (CCG's)

Duelmasters
Magic: The Gathering
Pokémon
Yu-Gi-Oh! Trading Card Game

Other card games

1000 Blank White Cards
Blitz
Bohnanza
Chez Geek
Chrononauts
Flinch
Fluxx
GOLF
Gother Than Thou
Grass
Hanafuda
Illuminati
Karuta
Lucky Seven
Mille Bournes
Munchkin
Mus
Numero
Pens
Pit
Pits
Scopa
Scopone
Set
Sheepshead
LeCardo

Fictional card games

Cripple Mr Onion - from the Discworld book series
Diamondback - from the Cerebus comics
Double Fanucci - from the Zork series
Dragon Poker - from the MythAdventures novels
Fizzbin - from the original Star Trek
Pazzak - from the Knights of the Old Republic video game
Pyramid - from the Battlestar Galactica series
Sabacc - from the Star Wars universe
Tall Card - from the Firefly television series
Triple Triad - from the Final Fantasy VIII video game

Dice

A die (Old French de, from Latin datum "something given or played" [1]) is a small polyhedral object (usually a cube) suitable as a gambling device (especially for craps or sic bo).

Traditionally, a die is seldom seen alone, rather than as one of a pair of identical dice that are sized to be comfortably rolled or thrown, together, from a user's hand. (The singular word "die" is therefore rare, and treating "dice" as interchangeably singular or plural is not uncommon.) A traditional die is a cube (often with corners slightly rounded), marked on each of its six faces with a different number of circular patches or pits called pips. All of these pips have the same appearance within a pair (or larger set) of dice, and are sized for ease of recognizing the pattern the pips on one face form. The design as a whole is aimed at each die providing one randomly determined integer, in the range from one to six, with each of those values being equally likely.

More generally, a variety of analogous devices are often described as dice, but necessarily in a context, or with a word or two preceding "die" or "dice", that avoids the assumption that traditional dice are intended. Such specialized dice may have cubical or other polyhedral shapes, with faces marked with various collections of symbols, and be used to produce other random results than one through six. There are also "loaded" or "crooked" dice (especially otherwise traditional ones), meant to produce skewed or even predictable results, for purposes of deception or amusement.

Use of Dice for Divination

Some people believe that dice can be used for divination. Using dice for such a purpose is called cleromancy. A pair of standard 6-sided dice is generally used.

Astrological dice are a specialized set of three 12-sided dice for divination, using the concepts of astrology and containing astrological symbols for the planets, the zodiac signs and the astrological houses. The first die represents planets, the Sun, the Moon, and two nodes (North Node and South Node). The second die represents the 12 zodiac signs, and the third represents the 12 houses. In simplified terms, the planets, etc. could represent the 'actor'; the zodiac signs could represent the 'role' being played by the actor; and the house could represent the 'scene' in which the actor plays.

Rune dice are a specialized set of dice for divination (runecasting), using the symbols of the runes printed on the dice.

References

• Persi Diaconis and Joseph B. Keller. "Fair Dice". The American Mathematical Monthly, 96(4):337-339, 1989. (Discussion of dice that are fair "by symmetry" and "by continuity".)
• Bias and Runs in Dice Throwing and Recording: A Few Million Throws. G. R. Iverson. W. H. Longcour, et al. Psychometrika, Vol. 36, No. 1, March 1971
• Knizia, Reiner (1999). Dice Games Properly Explained. Elliot Right Way Books. ISBN 0716021129.

Links

• MathWorld: Dice Analysis of dice probabilities.
• Fair Dice is an illustrated Math Games column about all the possible fair dice, and the mathematical reasons why other shapes are not fair.
• Roman Board Games (See, in particular, Tali and Tesserae.)
• Properties of Dice is a page describing all solids that make for provably fair dice.
• Openroleplaying.org's automated Die Roller - allows rolling any combination of any die using standard RPG 'Dice Equations')
• Worlds Largest Dice Collection Links, Photos, Information about dice

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia.