Vegas Craps Rules & Terms

How to Play Vegas Craps

Take a look at the Vegas Craps table. There are so many different betting areas, with such strange-sounding names, it can make your head spin. For this reason, many people think Vegas Craps must be very hard to learn, and they give up without even trying. This is a real shame, because Vegas Craps is a great game, and it is really not that difficult to learn. The key is to take it one step at a time.

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In Vegas Craps, as in any craps game, you have to bet on the outcome of the roll of a pair of dice. The player rolling the dice is called the Shooter. In a land-based casino, the role of Shooter rotates among the players around the craps table. In online craps, the shooter is always you.

The Pass Line Bet

The Pass Line bet is the most basic craps bet. Learning the Pass Line bet is all you need to start playing craps.

The shooter's first roll of the craps dice is called the Come Out roll. You make a Pass Line bet by placing you chips on the Pass Line area of the craps table before the Come Out roll. If you have made a Pass Line bet, there are three possible outcomes of the Come Out roll:

(1) You roll a 7 or 11. This is called a Natural, and you win the game.

(2) You roll a 2, 3, or 12. This is called Craps, and you lose the game.

(3) You roll any other number. In that case, the number you rolled is called the Point. The game is not over, so keep rolling the dice. If you roll the Point again before you roll a 7, you win. If you roll a 7 before you roll the Point, you lose.

Once you have mastered the Pass Line bet, you can enjoy many hours of craps gambling without ever learning another bet. So, you see, learning craps is not that difficult after all.

All Those Other Craps Bets

The game of craps allows many types of bets besides the Pass Line bet. These are some of the other craps bets you can add to your repertoire:

Odds bet: This is an additional bet, made after the Point has been established, that you will roll the Point again before rolling a 7. You can make an Odds bet only if you first made a Pass Line bet prior to the Come Out roll.

Don't Pass bet: This is the opposite of the Pass Line bet. On the Come Out roll, a 2 or 3 wins, and a 7 or 11 loses. If a Point is established, you win if a 7 is rolled before the Point; you lose if the Point is rolled before a 7.

Come bet: This is just like the Pass Line bet, except it is made after the Come Out roll. The next roll of the dice acts, in effect, as a Come Out roll: a natural wins, craps loses, anything else becomes your Point. A Don't Come bet is the opposite of the Come bet.

Place bet: With a Place To Win bet, you get to pick your Point instead of letting the dice pick it for you. You win if your chosen Point number is rolled before a 7. You can also make a Place To Lose bet; you win this bet if a 7 is rolled before your Point.

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Hard Way bets: Rolling a double is hard. If you bet on Hard Way 6, you win if your roll 6 "the hard way" (3 and 3) before you roll 7 and before your roll 6 "the easy way" (1 and 5, or 2 and 4). You can bet on Hard Way 4, Hard Way 6, Hard Way 8, or Hard Way 10.

Any 7 bet: This is a bet that the next roll will be a 7.

Crap 2 bet, Crap 3 bet, and Crap 12 bet: These are bets that the next roll will be a 2, a 3, or a 12, respectively.

Winning at Craps

There are as many different ways to win at craps as there are craps bets, which is a lot.

The payout for a winning craps bet depends both on the type of bet you made, and on the specific number you bet on.

Pass Line, Don't Pass, Come, and Don't Come bets all pay even money.

A Place to Win bet on 4 or 10 pay 9:5; on 5 or 9 it pays 7:5; and on 6 or 8 it pays 7:6.

A Hard 4 or Hard 10 bet pays 7:1. Hard 6 or Hard 8 pays 9:1.

The Any 7 bet pays 4:1. Crap 3 pays 15:1. The biggest payouts in craps are on the Crap 2 and Crap 12 bets. These bets each pay out 30:1.

It's All on the Craps Table

By now, you're probably worrying about how you're going to memorize all those different payouts for all those different bets. Maybe you're thinking that you should just forget about craps, after all.

Stop your worrying! There is nothing to memorize. All the payouts are printed right on the craps table. If you play craps in a brick-and-mortar casino, they are printed on the felt. If you play craps online, they are printed on the virtual felt. Either way, all the bets and all the payouts are always right in front of you for easy reference when you play craps.

Definitions & Terms for Vegas Craps

Box Cars are when the Shooter rolls two Sixes.

The Come-Out Roll is any roll before a point is established. It is an attempt to win a Pass Line bet by rolling a Seven or Eleven. Pass Line bets lose if the come-out roll is a Two, Three or Twelve. After rolling a Two, Three, Seven, Eleven or Twelve the Shooter comes out again. If any other number is rolled, a Point is established.

Craps Out is when the Shooter rolls a Two, Three or Twelve on the come-out roll.

"Establish a Point" happens when you roll a Point on the come-out roll.

"Making a Point" happens when the Shooter re-rolls the Point, after it has been established. Once a Point is established, re-rolling the Point wins, a Seven loses, and any other number does not affect the Pass Line bet.

The Point is a number, Four, Five, Six, Eight, Nine or Ten that the Shooter is trying to roll to win the Pass Line bet.

The Shooter is the Player who rolls the dice.

Snake Eyes are when the Shooter rolls a Two.

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