The Martingale System is the most commonly used strategy in the game of Roulette. Originally developed in France in the 18th century, this system is designed for games with a heads or tails format. It can be directly applied to a simple guessing game and it can also be adopted for use in casino games which follow a 50\50 betting pattern. To expand on this further, here’s a detailed look at how the Martingale System works in a casino.
Using the Martingale System
The concept behind the Martingale System is that you increase your bet after every loss. The bet is increased in the hope that you will get all your money back after a winning streak and you can start betting with the initial amount again. The strategy seems quite logical and it’s quite easy to understand and implement. However, the Martingale is rather risky and all it does is actually increases your chances to win in the short term. Basically, you are betting big to win a small amount of money. You will likely win more spins, but the winning amount will be quite small.
One of the most effective ways of using the Martingale is to bet on only even-money outside bets – 1-18, 19-36, Black, Red, Even and Odd. They have the highest odds of winning (almost 50%) but offer the lowest payout of all (1:1). This means that you win the same amount of money that you bet. In general, these are the safest bets that you could place in Roulette. The bet progression that you will use for even-money bets is:
1 – 2 – 4 – 8 – 16 – 32 – 64 – 128 – 256 – 512 – 1024 – 2048 – 4096 – 8192.
Placing bets and doubling down
Players start with a small amount and keep betting the same amount until they lose. Upon a losing streak, they double the size of their bet for the next spin. In this manner, you will recover the money lost in previous rounds. If losing streaks appear for a number of times, keep doubling your bet. As soon as you win, you must restart with the smallest amount for the next spin.
You can continue this forever if you have an unlimited bankroll. However, in reality, there are various factors that screw over your perfect system and you can lose a lot of money. As the house advantage is represented by the Green Zero on the Roulette wheel, the odds will always be against you. The probability of the ball landing on the outside bet you put your chip on is over 50%. Also, this applies to any Roulette strategy because there is practically no way to compensate for the house advantage.
Hidden dangers of the Martingale system
As discussed earlier, the Martingale system is considered extremely risky and is rarely used by professional players and high-rollers. The main problem with this strategy is that you can quickly run out of money if bad luck strikes. On top of that, the bets might hit the table limit if you lose multiple times in a row, which forces you to double and redouble your bet again and again. Once the limit is reached, you don’t get another chance to double your bet again. This means that you won’t be able to recover your losses.
If you get to the point where there is no chance to double your bets, you’ll lose massive amounts of chips. Thus, you’ll lose a huge amount of money in a short period of time.
Of course, it seems very unlikely to lose 10 or 15 times in a row. But the thing about Martingale is that you will have to play a lot of games to win an acceptable amount. The more games you play, the higher are your chances of having a bad streak. It’s this risk that keeps the pros away from Martingale System.
The odds of a losing streak
Let’s do some calculations to see how likely it is to have consecutive losing streaks for European Roulette. For instance, the chances of red not hitting for 10 spins are 0.1275%. In European roulette, the odds of your colour not hitting for 10 rounds in a row is 1 in 784. This might sound good, but keep in mind that these will be offered only at the start of the game. The odds will change during the gameplay and if you have five consecutive losing streaks, the chances that you will continue doing it will increase with time.