Knowledgeable gamblers have long recognized "The Big 4" - blackjack, poker, sports betting and thoroughbred racing - as the standard games in which an astute player can actually turn the odds in his favor and achieve an advantage over the casino.

But what about craps with its 1.4% house advantage or roulette in which the casino holds a seemingly insurmountable 5.6% advantage over the players? Can an advantage actually be achieved, the house odds overturned, in these two games?

In this first of a series of articles on Advantage Play, let's start by defining just what an advantage is. If you're flat betting, i.e., betting the same amount on even money bets on each roll of the dice or spin of the wheel or blackjack hand, you gain an advantage over the casino by winning more bets than you lose. If you're varying your bet size, you attain an advantage by knowing when you enter the advantage arena and, thus, when to increase your bet size. Put another way, if a system cannot beat the casino by flat betting on even money bets, it is not an advantage system.

In subsequent articles in this series, I will describe how to attain an advantage in casino craps by using dice control. I'll discuss the issues of whether or not an advantage can actually be achieved, present some ideas for how to prove to yourself that an advantage exists, and give you some suggestions on how to attain and exploit an advantage by using dice control.

Casino craps is an easy game to learn and the only game where you, the player, can create your own edge over the casino and hold your winning destiny right in your own hands.

If you're not familiar with the rules of play, think of craps this way: Holding the dice in your hand, you throw them down the table, hit the back wall and they come to rest. If they land on a 7 you lose; if they land on a 4, 5, 6, 8, 9, 10, you win if you are betting on those numbers; if they land on 2, 3, 11, 12, you neither win nor lose.

Now, think of the power you would possess if you could throw the dice to avoid the losing 7. That's what dice control is all about -- to set and throw the dice in such a way as to avoid the losing 7 during the point cycle when your objective is to repeat the number you threw on the first roll of this series - called the "come out" roll.

Mastering dice control will give you to power to walk up to a craps table knowing that you have an excellent chance of creating a hot table, that when your turn comes to pick up the dice, you will throw number after number without the losing seven showing, collecting profits on almost every roll of the dice. Not every time, but often enough to collect winnings, sometimes substantial winnings, before throwing the losing seven and handing the dice to the next shooter for his turn.

This article was written by Jerry Patterson. For more on dice control, or to learn the rudiments of casino craps, pick up a copy of Jerry Patterson's #1 selling gambling book - Casino Gambling: A Winner's Guide to Blackjack, Craps, Roulette, Baccarat and Casino Poker. Click here to purchase Jerry's book or go to his website at www.casinogamblingedge.com. Jerry's book and dice control course called PARR are also featured on About.com.