Roulette is a wonderful game to take part in and a surprisingly easy game to learn. There is nothing exclusive about it as some folks would have you feel. And when you are online playing it you can operate at your own pace, because the casino software allows you to be at the controls.
There isn't much that is complicated about the rules of roulette. At the center of the whole thing is the roulette wheel, which is composed of 37 slots (if it is the European version) or 38 slots (in the American version). Okay, why is that? Because the European wheel has numbers 1-36 plus a single zero (0), while the American game has everything the same on the wheel plus a double zero as well (00). So there is more of a chance that the ball will land in any single slot when playing the European game. Both the American and European games are available in most online casinos.
The ball, when the wheel is spun, will wind up in one of those slots, and that will determine which bet will pay off. Individual numbers from 1 to 36 (this does not count the zeroes) pay off at 36-to-1 odds. And there are two types of bets. When they are made on a single number, or a small combination of numbers, on the inside part of the layout, they are referred to as the "inside" bets. A "neighbor" bet is one where you could create a combination out of numbers that reside on either side of a designated number on the roulette wheel.
"Outside" bets are made on the outside of the general layout. This is where you can bet eighteen numbers at a time. So, for example, you can bet on whether the next spin of the wheel will produce a number that is either Red or Black, Even or Odd, High or Low. There is basically a 50-50 chance that these bets will win, although that is not the case, as the presence of the zeroes makes the possibility less. They pay off at even money, creating an edge for the house.
Remember that roulette is a game that is based on "independent trials," which means that any single spin of the wheel has absolutely no effect on what the next spin of the wheel is going to produce. So if you are interested in tracking the numbers that have already been drawn because you think that is somehow going to affect what comes next, your efforts will probably go for naught.
Keep in mind that roulette, as it is played online, is powered by a random number generator, also known as an RNG, so the idea of the wheel having any kind of "bias" does not hold up..
Know the payoffs for any of the bets you make at the roulette table; for example, a split bet, which covers two numbers, pays 17-to-1, while a corner bet, which encompasses four numbers in a block, is an 8-to-1 payout. At the same time, understand that regardless of the bet that is made, the house edge in American roulette is going to be 5.26% in every case except one.
That case involves the "five-number" bet, which you would put at the point where the 0, 00, 1, 2 and 3 intersect, in the American version of the game obviously. You get paid at a 6-to-1 rate, but because the odds of hitting the bet are 6.2-to-1, the house edge here is 7.9%. Stay away from that kind of bet.