Red Dog Strategies and Odds
Red Dog is a rather simple game to learn. The premise of the game is easy. You have to place a bet. The dealer will then flip over two cards. A space is left between the two cards for a third card. You win your bet when the third card's rank is in-between the other two cards.
The only decision you have to make is after the two cards are dealt, and it's a major one. You have to decide whether or not to raise and place a second bet on the board. This is how you can double up on a high spread hand such as the example above.
The spread is important because the close spreads pay more than 1 to 1. A one card spread pays out 5 to 1, a two card spread pays out 4 to 1, a three card spread pays out 2 to 1 and all other spreads payout 1 to 1.
The hand can tie in one of two ways. The first way is called Cons and it occurs when the cards are of consecutive rank (Jack,Queen). A third card is not flipped when this happens.
The second way to tie is call a Pair. Obviously, this happens when two of the same cards are flipped over. After a pair is flipped up on the board, the third card is flipped over. If the third card makes a three of a kind, you will win 11 to 1 on your bet, otherwise it is a push.
Red Dog Strategy
There isn't a whole lot to talk about as far as strategies go in Red Dog. The bulk of my strategy here is based off of the odds of winning a particular hand, which I go into detail in the red dog odds below.
Your basic strategy is going to be to raise when you have spread of 7 or more. This is because 7 is the closest spread that you have a greater than 50% chance of the third card falling between the other two cards. This is also the first spread that the player has the advantage over the house.
If you want to get crafty, I would say that you can raise with a spread of six because your chance of winning is still close to 50%. But, I would never raise with a spread of 5 or fewer.
Red Dog Odds
This may seem like an easy enough of a game to master, but you
should really be familiar with your odds of winning a bet.
The higher the odds, the more likely a raise bet will win. Like I said before, you should always raise if you have an advantage over the casino.
The following odds are assuming that the casino is using 6 decks of cards.
Spread:
- One number between cards - pays 5 to 1, probability of winning: 7.7%
- Two numbers between cards - pays 4 to 1, probability of winning: 15.5%
- Three numbers between cards - pays 2 to 1, probability of winning: 23.2%
- Four numbers between cards - pays 1 to 1, probability of winning: 30.9%
- Five numbers between cards - pays 1 to 1, probability of winning: 38.7%
- Six numbers between cards - pays 1 to 1, probability of winning: 46.5%
- Seven numbers between cards - pays 1 to 1, probability of winning: 54.2%
- Eight numbers between cards - pays 1 to 1, probability of winning: 61.9%
- Nine numbers between cards - pays 1 to 1, probability of winning: 69.6%
- Ten numbers between cards - pays 1 to 1, probability of winning: 77.4%
- Eleven numbers between cards - pays 1 to 1, probability of winning: 85.2%
House Edge
In addition to knowing your odds of winning, you should know the advantage the house has over you or that you have over the house.
Spread:
- One number between cards - house advantage of 53.5%
- Two numbers between cards - house advantage of 22.5%
- Three numbers between cards - house advantage of 30.3%
- Four numbers between cards - house advantage of 38.1%
- Five numbers between cards - house advantage of 22.6%
- Six numbers between cards - house advantage of 7.1%
- Seven numbers between cards - player advantage of 8.4%
- Eight numbers between cards - player advantage of 23.9%
- Nine numbers between cards - player advantage of 39.4%
- Ten numbers between cards - player advantage of 54.8%
- Eleven numbers between cards - player advantage of 70.3%
Other Odds
Here are a couple of trivial stats that may interest you:
On any given hand, you have a 0.5% chance of getting a three of a kind or it should happen about 1 in every 200 hands.
In that same hand, you have about a 46% chance of not raising and losing and about a 6% chance of raising and losing. This means your overall odds of losing a given hand is 52%.
There is about a 21% chance that any particular hand will be a push. Simple math will tell you that this means you have about a 27% chance overall of winning a given hand. If you had a higher chance of winning, you wouldn't be offered the raise bet.
You are most likely to win 2 to 1 odds, which you have about a 14% chance of doing on a random hand. This is because you will be raising when the spread is big enough. Compare this to the second highest winning payout, 1 to 1, which you have about a 9.5% chance of winning in a particular hand.
