This article first appeared in the Chinese New Year 2010 special issue of World Gaming magazine.
Many people claim to have worked out the secret to playing baccarat. Some people win and some people lose, that is the nature of the game. The most important thing however is to make sure you enjoy yourself while playing and play whichever way works for you.
There are two sides to the story when considering baccarat strategy. The first is that there are many people who claim to have perfected long term winning strategies for the game. The second is that there are many gambling experts who refute these claims and say that there is no strategy that will help you beat baccarat. Either way there is no denying that baccarat is an exciting and enjoyable game to play and that thousands of players win big dollars when things go their way.
Gambling is about taking risks and hoping that the luck of the game is on your side when you need it. People gamble because they enjoy it as a pastime and that is certainly a legitimate form of entertainment. Some people like to play golf, others like to play baccarat – the choice is up to you. The best thing about baccarat is that it is one of the best gambles going around – the house percentage is very low compared to most other forms of gambling.
As there are only three options when playing regular baccarat it is easy to determine the best bet. The house edge on a banker bet is only 1.06 percent and this includes the 5 percent commission you pay on winning bets. The house edge on the player is 1.24 percent which is not quite as good but is still less than half the house edge on roulette. The edge on the tie bet is 14.36 percent which is certainly nowhere near as good. What this all means is that betting on the tie is a bad bet compared to the player or the banker. If you have no feeling on what the next hand will be then the math suggests you should bet on the banker even though the difference between the player and the banker is very small.
Good money management is the best way to ensure you stay in the game for longer. We all know that we should only gamble what we can afford to lose but there are some ways that we can increase our chances of winning. Try and set a limit as to how much you intend to play with on any given session. For some it might be HK$500 for others it might be HK$1 million. Obviously some people will play higher stakes than others. If you reach your limit for any one session take a break and come back in a few hours after a rest; you never know your luck might change.
Don’t ever underestimate luck. It is true the game is random and that the math is the same every hand, but that doesn’t mean that you can’t have incredible runs, sequences and trends. Some people are lucky and others are not. If you feel confident on any given day go with your feelings, you’ll feel great if you win. If you feel someone else is on a hot streak that you want to jump on then there is nothing lost by following their lead. The other good thing about a lucky run is that you are betting with winnings – psychologically those winnings are still “the house’s money” which is a great time to take advantage of a good run and press your bets.
