I'll never understand why people willingly lose their money at casinos. They KNOW the system is rigged and specifically designed to keep them from winning and yet they still go.
It's like going to an arcade. You obviously aren't going to make any money there. You might win a switchblade comb, but you know that's not enough to cover the $50 you spent playing games. But it was fun. Same reason people buy video games to play.
The issue is when people spend all their money. Most people do spend their money semi-responsibly at the casino. You go in expecting to lose $300. You lose your $300 and leave. Or maybe you make $200 and that covers most of the next time you go. The games are actually pretty fun. And there is a chance to win good money, it's not a huge chance but it's better than the lottery.
Now slot machines on the other hand are a whole different ball game. Those are scary. I say this as a dealer in a casino.
The only instances I've spent considerable time in an arcade have been infinite-play events. Pay $20 or whatever, play all the games as many times as you like, no reward coupons. So you're just paying a flat fee to spend all day playing whatever games you like, for pure entertainment value.
Had a friend in middle school who would do that for his birthday every year.
If you can manage you impulses, there are worse ways you can spend your time, I spent a few hours at a casino just after I turned 18, walked in with 50$, 4 hours later I left with 10$. The one I was at had free hot dogs. Personally I would rather be at a casino than pay to go to any concert.
Nah. Mine, it's 18 with I.D checking when coming and a clear reminder if a minor is with you ( Some comes with their kid ) they are forbidden from playing.
The impulse thing is really key. Right after I turned 18, my mom dragged me into a cruise ship casino and gave me $20. I was SO stressed the entire time but managed to turn it into $140 and wanted to stop. She told me to keep going or try doing bigger bets. I did a couple because what do I know about gambling? Then I remembered all the stories my mom told me about how she always lost all her money and stopped with $120. My mom, of course, won nothing. Crazy anxiety won me $100 and I’ll never gamble again
This has always been my approach to, not that I actually gamble all that much to begin with. As soon as I'm up a decent amount over what I started with (often double, also often only something like $20 anyway) it's set aside and no longer "in play". Any time I reach a reasonable break point, same thing, set the difference aside and then keep going.
If you put down $50 and are okay losing $50, even if you lose then everything's fine. If you put down $50 and are okay losing it, but are now up $300—even if none of it is "realized" yet because you're still in the game—whether or not it's strictly true it feels like losing $300 if it goes away again. But if you can get to a breakpoint of say $150 and pocket the $100, you're "starting over" with $50 but even if you lose it you walk away ahead on the day. If you're running hot and manage to turn that second $50 into $50+ profits again set the difference aside too and "start over". Repeat as long as you intend to keep going, or typically in my case until the first time I do actually lose the whole starting pool.
Though I mostly also play poker, and am mostly playing for pretty low stakes in cash games at a friend's house or something. Making a couple bucks on a single hand is a "big" win, and even if I lose it all I spent $20 on dinner and drinks at a friend's place. The horror.
Really if you're playing with a modicum of strategy it's not too bad. Sure, you have to be okay with potentially giving up that $500, but in actuality you're expected to walk away with anywhere from $470 - $490 for that 1 hour depending on what game you're playing.
When you go to casinos you get a lopsided perspective of the average gambler because so many of them are degenerate regulars. Filter out all of the people who live there and things start looking a lot less sad and pathetic.
If you have self control, its really not a bad time. I only gamble once every few years, when I end up in Vegas. I limit myself to 100 dollars for gambling, and more often then not I either leave with about 100, or a little more
Same way you lose money by playing in your mens league baseball team. The jersey costs, practice, fees -- all that "lost" for the experience of playing baseball with some buds.
Same thing with a casino. The fun is just trading that money back & forth until you lose it for good.
Gambling isn’t my thing at all. If I’m going with friends I take a 20 and I’m done when it’s gone. I don’t care how much money I win, the pretty flashing lights are the entertainment. Yes I am more or less a small child but I’ve never got the appeal of trying to beat the house. I’d rather take all that money and buy something I want instead.
Especially games like Blackjack because there can be a real sense of community at the table. People cheer for you when you hit a 21, people lambast the dealer for taking everyone's money, the players joke around with each other.
Slot machines are a different story, they're just designed to be as psychologically predatory as possible and suck up all your money.
I absolutely do not have a gambling addiction and I’d still willingly loose money at a casino or slots. A lot of the time, it’s just a fun thing to do/gives a dopamine rush when you do it. I maybe go to a gambling place once a year, or will see a slot at a bar and be like “eh, I feel lucky, why not?” However, I never feel like I NEED to play. If I do play, I have a very set amount I’m willing to lose and when it’s done, it’s done.
Now, there are people who are straight up addicts and it’s terrible. My best friend always had a bit of a gambling bug, but once he moved back home, it was like there was nothing holding him back. He rarely has his phone turned on now. Sometimes we’ll chat and he’ll tell me he won 5 k the night before, yet a week later, he’ll text me asking me if I can loan him some cash before payday. It really sucks and I wish there was a way to help him.
Basically, gambling CAN be an addiction, but most people I know just go out and play on a set budget because they get some enjoyment from it.
Like with every "vice" there are some people who are addicted. That doesn't mean that gambling, in general, is an addiction for everyone who participates.
I go maybe once a year and bring $200. If I lose it in 30 minutes, I go home. If it means I can stay entertained for an hour or two, great. If I bring back more money than I arrived with, even better.
Yeah, it’s rigged and you’ll leave with less money more often than not, but it’s not lottery odds. You have a decent chance of making money. It’s exciting and fun when you do actually win. That’s why people go
And will make you think How does one is so lucky ?
Due to her being able to come in with just 300€ and leave with 10x the pool she put up because she is skilled at poker and falls on players who think she is a newcomer out of the egg.
Some of her afternoons are literally poker games without any bets outside of chips used.
I love going to casinos to people watch and eat food. Other than the atmosphere the gambling side of it is so depressing, but the people entangled in it are characters.
You can have a lot of fun with friends at those mechanical horse racing machines or whatever though, but there is a point where if you're there to make money it's only ever a losing game.
When I go to a casino I have really good self control and only spend a very small amount of money. I also use a tip I read in a financial book where you don’t spend your winnings. Whatever I spend I think of as worth the amount of time and fun I’m getting. Recently I went with friends while in Tahoe and I spent $20, came away with $16 and change, so basically spent $4 to have some fun and silliness with friends for about an hour. We went to the machines that do roulette or blackjack bc they have a $3 play and skipped dealer tables where it was $15 minumum I believe. I realize most people don’t gamble like this, but I am frugal, low income, and this works for me. I think I’ve gone maybe 7 times total? Similarly I play Overwatch and have spent maybe $30 over 2 years and play often, I am just not that easily tempted bc the skins aren’t actually useful just fun.
A night of gambling can be a lot of fun. Especially if you happen to be at a table with cool people, you build up a sort of comradery, congratulating eachother on good hands/good plays, or offering sympathies when someone gets unlucky. It can actually be kind of wholesome
Because “responsible” gambling is treating the whole thing like a really ritzy arcade and playing with the expectation that every dollar you put on the table is one you’re okay with losing.
Sometimes you’ll be pleasantly surprised with a free night or two.
Because it’s fun. And if you understand the odds just bring an appropriate bankroll and it’s unlikely you lose it all. Even for slots which have the worst odds the return to player is like 80%, you will over time get $.80 back for each dollar you put in.
Problem is people show up with $500 and play $25 min bet tables. You’re in trouble if you show up with 20 min bets worth of bankroll. To get your risk of ruin down to say 3% depending on rules, for a typical $25 blackjack table you need tens of thousands of dollars. Generally you should bring about $5-10k.
People do not understand this and that’s why they view Vegas odds as worse than they really are, their bankroll is way too small to play $25 tables. This is part of why slots are popular, folks who don’t want to bring more than $500-$1000 to gamble can comfortably sit at a slot machine with very low risk of ruin as the minimums are so low.
I know that if I spend $50 at an arcade, the best case I'll have fun and I'll be out $50. and the worst case is that I won't have fun and I'll be out $50.
I know that if I spend $50 at a casino, the best case is that I'll have fun and make money, and the worst case is still that I won't have fun and I'll be out $50. Most probable case I lose money but still have fun and probably don't lose the whole $50.
One common "trick" to casinos is to just set the max amount you're willing to lose, put that amount (say $50) into a pile of chips, put anything you win into a separate pile, and don't combine the "winnings" pile with the play pile. Play the play pile till it runs out then stop and cash out the winnings pile. You might lose some of it, you might lose it all, you might win something, but what you DON'T do is you don't chase losses and you don't increase that amount you were willing to lose when you got there AFTER you've started playing because you're sure you can make it back.
Treat it like an arcade: Go in with the assumption you're going to lose everything you started with and you're just there to have fun. And anything you happen to win, even if you won $20 but spent $50, is just a bonus.
Edit: Also - if you don't have the money to lose, stick to low stakes games and bet safe. Bet red/black on roulette, play blackjack and hit conservatively. Play poker and be willing to fold early if you get shit in your initial hand. The trick to maximizing your fun in a scenario where you're going in assuming you're going to lose is losing the minimum amount possible on each game. I still don't recommend slots unless you just really like flashy lights, but so long as you're going in with the assumption that you're prepared to lose a specific amount and that that's the amount that entertainment for the evening will cost you - like an arcade or a movie - then your most bang for your buck is to play the lowest stakes you can find, and therefore more games, and therefore longer fun.
Its a form of entertainment, how hard is that to understand? If you have any form of self control you wont be wasting all your money away. You bring X amount of $ and spend just that, if you win, then great, if you don't, who cares. Its not for everyone but with some friends it can genuinely be fun.
I didn't get it until I said fuck it and dropped 50 bucks in the slots on a cruise and won 1k in the first 10 spins. Now I have to fight the damn urge to go in there and blow money. It happened to my wife too on the cruise prior. Seemed fishy, like the first one's free type shit.
Honestly, it's because the system isn't designed to keep THEM from winning, it's designed to keep a slight majority of players from winning.
I wrote something similar earlier, but casinos couldn't keep getting customers if everyone was losing. People need to see wins, and experience wins, to stay playing. So for any individual game of blackjack, a player is only slightly disadvantaged, with a 48% chance of winning any given hand.
Hell you could go into a high stakes table, drop 10 grand, and you've got NEARLY a 50/50 chance of doubling your money. That's not a terrible risk compared to something like horse races or roulette.
The danger is, and has always been, how the averages trick you. Because for every additional hand you play, the odds that you stay in the green drops and drops and drops.
tl;dr If you go to vegas to bet a bunch of money, play 3 hands of blackjack, and if you win, don't play anymore.
The house wins just a little above 50%. So technically anyone could get lucky and cash the fuck out. Over time and millions of players the casino still wins, but individually if I told you that your chance to win money is 48% would you not take it?
It's fun once or twice a year, with a set budget, have cash on you with the ammount being your budget, no credit card, expecting to blow all that money & lose it as your default mindset.
In that case, it can be a fun thing to do for the dopamine if you do end up winninh & just a fun evening with friends if you do end up losing what you expected to lose anyways
Anyone going in there multiple times a year in addition to actualy expecting to make bank is stupid as shit
In Japan they have entire floors at arcades where it's just various coin gambling games (and sometimes virtual horse races). You go buy your tokens, start dropping them in machines, win more tokens, and... that's it. You can't exchange the tokens for anything. They exist solely for the sake of playing the game.
Can't really knock it, because I do basically the same thing with regular arcade games (i spent a LOT on the Pokemon Frienda machines while I was there), but it was definitely odd to see gambling machines where you never actually win anything, even when you win.
Edit: Not sure why I'm getting downvoted, nothing I said was false =/
the problem is people are dumb and do not understand probability so they get stuck in the one more bet trap.
it's possible to win more money than you bet but it just means you had gotten lucky. for every game at a casino if you play 100 rounds you will lose the majority of the time unless you have some kind of edge. The kelley criterion proves this
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u/god_forsaked_me Jul 20 '26
I'll never understand why people willingly lose their money at casinos. They KNOW the system is rigged and specifically designed to keep them from winning and yet they still go.