The Roulette Wheel that keeps on Giving

Ever since the first casino opened its doors, players have been trying to figure out how to gain an advantage over the house and walk away with a big win. At the same time, casinos have fought to keep their advantage, thus securing profits. The Roulette Wheel presented players and casinos with an interesting opportunity for profit.

Roulette may seem like a sure thing for the casinos themselves. As with any game, the house has a slight edge and the same is true for roulette. So while an individual player may win, overall the game should lead to a steady income for the casino. However, what happens if a biased roulette wheel is introduced to that equation?

What exactly is a biased Roulette wheel?

Before we go any further, we should probably explain exactly what a biased Roulette Wheel is. This is basically a wheel that will give results that aren’t as random as they should be. For example, a certain set of numbers will keep appearing, more than they should.

There are two main ways this can happen and has happened in the past. Either the casino themselves can rig the wheel for their benefit, or the wheel itself could have some form of imperfection, which causes the results to be biased.

Rigged Roulette Wheels are all but extinct today, but in the early 20^th century, underground casinos used to be able to get away with this and made a healthy profit, while ripping off their customers.

Has a biased wheel ever been exploited?

There have been several documented cases of this happening, so we’ll quickly look at two of these cases. Back in 1873, a gentleman was able to observe all the Roulette Wheels in a Monte Carlo casino over the course of several days. He did this with the help of six clerks and discovered which wheels were biased. In the end, he made about £3 million, adjusted for inflation of course.

A far more recent example occurred in the 1990s in Madrid, where a player again observed the wheels for a few days and managed to identify the biased wheel. The player then went on a winning spree, earning over a million Euros before the casino caught on and attempted to take legal action. The courts ultimately ruled against the casino, saying it was the casinos fault for not maintaining the wheel properly.

Finding a wheel of your own

While it is entirely possible that there are biased wheels out there that you could take advantage of, things have changed dramatically these days that makes the endeavour pretty much pointless. Generally, it is going to take a lot of observation to even identify if a Roulette Wheel has a bias and these days, European Casinos tend to swop the wheel from the spindle on a regular basis.

Even if there was a bias, you won’t be given nearly enough time to identify and begin to take advantage of it. Casinos all over the world are likely to do similar things these days so, unfortunately, you’re just going to have to take your chances like everyone else.