Casinos Want You to Play. For some reason, this statement feels controversial or, at the very. Casino games can be a fun and enjoyable way to spend your extra time. The great thing about casino games is that now you can play in a land casino or online, the choice is yours. Many people love going to land casinos from time to time for the experience, but more and more people are turning to online casinos to join in on the fun.
If you've ever been to a casino, you've seen casino chips. If you play gambling machines exclusively, you might have never used casino chips, but you're bound to have at least seen them on the tables where people are playing blackjack, craps, and/or roulette.
You'd be surprised to know that there's more to casino chips than you probably thought.
Here are a few things you probably didn't know about casino chips:
You Buy and Sell Chips to the Casino
Casino chips are multi-colored clay disks that you use to wager with in the casino. You usually buy such chips from the dealer at the table by putting cash on the table. When you're ready to cash out, you must visit the cage and sell the chips back to the cashier.
You cannot sell your chips back to the dealer, but you CAN exchange lower-denomination chips for higher denomination chips with the dealer. This is called 'coloring up.'
For Example:If you have enough $5 chips to exchange them for a $25 chip, you can do so with the dealer. But if you want to exchange that $25 chip for cash, you must visit the cashier's cage.
Casino Chips Have Specifications
Most of the chips you'll play with in the casino are made of clay, but they're not 100% clay. They're actually made from multiple materials (including clay and chalk) that make the chips harder to break. Different casino chip makers use different processes to manufacture these chips.
You'll notice that in most casinos, the edges of the chip are 2 different colors – the main color of the chip along with a 2nd color. That's not paint – that's where the manufacturer took pieces of clay off the chip and replaced it with clay of a different color.
The logo of then casino is normally printed onto the chips, too – this is called an inlay, which is actually a piece of paper covered with a piece of plastic. The paper and plastic don't peel off, either – they're fused to the chip during the manufacturing process.
Casino chips in the United States generally weight 10 grams.
If and when you buy casino chips for a home poker game or the like, look for chips that weigh at least that much.
Casino Chip Colors Are Close to Standard Throughout the United States
Most casinos in the United States follow the same color scheme as it relates to the denominations. Silver oak instant play. The $1 chips are almost always white, and some casinos also have pink chips worth $2.50. (Those are rare, now, though.)
- $5 chips are red, and yellow chips are worth $20 each.
- $25 chips are common, and they're colored green.
- Then you start getting into the higher denominations. Black chips are worth $100 each, and you can even find purple chips worth $500.
- $1000 chips are usually orange, and $5000 chips, gray.
Casino Chips Are Also Collectibles
In the 1980s, it became popular to collect casino chips as a hobby. This shouldn't surprise anyone who knows a coin collector, and it's probably accurate to think of casino chip collecting as being a sub-category of coin collecting.
I've kept casino chips from the casinos I've visited just as souvenirs, and I suspect that's common.
But collectors take casino chip collecting more seriously, and you can find all kinds of casino chips for sale on eBay. Free games keno.
When I did a search for 'casino chips' on eBay, I got almost 40,000 listings.
At one time, you could subscribe to magazines about collecting casino chips. Casino Collectible News is probably the most popular publication on the subject today. It's a quarterly publication, and ChipGuide.com is a popular site for collectors.
In fact, casino chip collectors even have their own convention each year.
As with most collectibles, casino chip collectors have a grading system – the better the condition the chip is in, the more it's worth. You can buy price guides that provide estimates of what a specific casino chip might be worth on the collectors' market, but keep in mind that a collectible is only worth what you can get someone to pay for it.
You Never Use Casino Chips With Slot Machines
Slot machines used to use coins, and I have fond memories of carrying around the plastic buckets that the casinos provided for transporting those coins. For the most part, those days are now gone. Gambling machines in casinos now use a ticket in/ticket out system.
Most slot machine players insert cash into the machine, and the gambling machine converts those into credits. When you decide to cash out, you get a paper ticket you can exchange for cash. You don't have to visit the cage for this; the casino has multiple machines which convert these paper tickets into cash for you.
You can use debit cards to fund your play on some slot machines, but in most states, you're not allowed to use a credit card for this. In fact, some states don't allow debit card use at the slot machines, either.
I've never seen a casino with slot machines that accepts or pays out in chips, though.
Five Star Solutions is the company that developed the technology that made ticket in ticket out the standard for putting money into and taking money out of slot machines. MGM bought the technology in 1992. MGM went on to team up with multiple slot machine manufacturers to create a reader that could accept cash or a ticket with a bar code. International Game Technology (IGT) eventually bought the patents for the technology and rolled out their own version.
Opinions are mixed about the change still. The casino likes the new system because they no longer have to fill hoppers with coins. Gamblers also like the system because they don't have to wait for a slot machine attendant to pay off their big wins.
From the casino's perspective, ticket in ticket out is convenient from an accounting perspective. After all, there's no cash to count.
Critics dislike the system because tickets aren't the same thing as money, which makes it easier for gamblers to become addicted. It's also easier to lose a ticket than it is to lose a plastic bucket full of coins. Speaking for myself, I miss the sound of a bunch of coins falling into the payout tray. There's nothing quite the same as the sound of coins falling into a metal tray.
The Use of Casino Chips Can Be Traced to 18th Century France
In France during the 1800s, games like Ombre and Quadrille used counters for scorekeeping. You can consider casino chips the direct descendants of these counters. Like modern roulette chips, the different colors signified who the chips belonged to rather than their denomination.
At one time, you could subscribe to magazines about collecting casino chips. Casino Collectible News is probably the most popular publication on the subject today. It's a quarterly publication, and ChipGuide.com is a popular site for collectors.
In fact, casino chip collectors even have their own convention each year.
As with most collectibles, casino chip collectors have a grading system – the better the condition the chip is in, the more it's worth. You can buy price guides that provide estimates of what a specific casino chip might be worth on the collectors' market, but keep in mind that a collectible is only worth what you can get someone to pay for it.
You Never Use Casino Chips With Slot Machines
Slot machines used to use coins, and I have fond memories of carrying around the plastic buckets that the casinos provided for transporting those coins. For the most part, those days are now gone. Gambling machines in casinos now use a ticket in/ticket out system.
Most slot machine players insert cash into the machine, and the gambling machine converts those into credits. When you decide to cash out, you get a paper ticket you can exchange for cash. You don't have to visit the cage for this; the casino has multiple machines which convert these paper tickets into cash for you.
You can use debit cards to fund your play on some slot machines, but in most states, you're not allowed to use a credit card for this. In fact, some states don't allow debit card use at the slot machines, either.
I've never seen a casino with slot machines that accepts or pays out in chips, though.
Five Star Solutions is the company that developed the technology that made ticket in ticket out the standard for putting money into and taking money out of slot machines. MGM bought the technology in 1992. MGM went on to team up with multiple slot machine manufacturers to create a reader that could accept cash or a ticket with a bar code. International Game Technology (IGT) eventually bought the patents for the technology and rolled out their own version.
Opinions are mixed about the change still. The casino likes the new system because they no longer have to fill hoppers with coins. Gamblers also like the system because they don't have to wait for a slot machine attendant to pay off their big wins.
From the casino's perspective, ticket in ticket out is convenient from an accounting perspective. After all, there's no cash to count.
Critics dislike the system because tickets aren't the same thing as money, which makes it easier for gamblers to become addicted. It's also easier to lose a ticket than it is to lose a plastic bucket full of coins. Speaking for myself, I miss the sound of a bunch of coins falling into the payout tray. There's nothing quite the same as the sound of coins falling into a metal tray.
The Use of Casino Chips Can Be Traced to 18th Century France
In France during the 1800s, games like Ombre and Quadrille used counters for scorekeeping. You can consider casino chips the direct descendants of these counters. Like modern roulette chips, the different colors signified who the chips belonged to rather than their denomination.
Early Poker Games in the United States Used Various Tokens to Stand in for Money.
Gold coins were commonly used, but early poker players also often used early versions of chips made from a variety of materials. In the late 19th century, multiple companies started manufacturing chips for poker players to use.
Most of these chips used the same color systems you'd find if you bought a set of poker chips today.
High Stakes Games Use Gaming Plaques
Songs About Casinos
In really high stakes games at some casinos, it's common to use gaming plaques in the place of chips. These are only used in games where the stakes are $25,000 or more per bet. Since they're so valuable, they're larger and have serial numbers on them.
If you want to add a little spice to your home poker game or your charity casino event, you can buy ceramic poker plaques for as little $1 to $5 apiece. They're usually ceramic and weight 40 grams or so. You can buy them blank, or you can buy them with denominations printed on them.
The $1 plaques look almost exactly like poker chips, but they're rectangular and larger. The patterns around the edges are much the same, though.
Conclusion
Casino and poker chips make for an interesting discussion. Next time you're playing poker with your buddies, you can pull a Cliff Clavin and share some of these pieces of poker and casino chip trivia and impress everyone in the game with you.
Please enable JavaScript to view the comments powered by Disqus.Believing myths about slot machines can cost you big
By Frank Scoblete
The big progressives are actually the toughest machines on which to win since they must withhold money for those large jackpots.
The world of the slot machines is filled with misinformation or semi-truthful information. Players often have the wrong idea about what is going on within the machine when they put their credit voucher in. So here are some untruths quickly followed by some truths that slot players should take to heart.
The da vinci treasure. Untruth: Slot machines are programed to give out a certain amount of money. Therefore, if a machine has been cold it must warm up to fulfill its programming. If you learn of a cold machine hop on it because it is going to change to a hot machine.
Truth: The idea is correct as far as it goes, but it is also wrong. Yes, machines are indeed programmed to give a certain percentage of the money played in them as wins for players. But there is a big except here. There is no time limit as to when a machine will get hot. It may be cold when you watch it or play it but you have no idea whether it was hot or cold yesterday and will be hot or cold tomorrow. The programming of a slot machine is based on a random-number-generator (RNG) and it is not programmed to get hot or cold to keep handing out the same percentage of wins over the short term – and all slot players are playing in the short term.
Untruth: I saw a television commercial where a man claims that he knew he was going to win the big jackpot and that he shaved because of this foreknowledge so he would look good for the picture the PR and news people would take. Can such foreknowledge actually happen? New free online casino slot games. Or is the commercial an actor telling us what we want to hear?
Truth: The commercial is real and the man is a real person who indeed had a feeling that he was going to win. Unfortunately thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of players every day think they are going to be lucky but instead they lose. There is no such thing as psychic knowledge of when a machine will hit. But all of us can applaud the guy who won, but his foreknowledge is (sadly) meaningless.
Untruth: Loose slot machines are always placed on the outside areas of the casino to lure players in. That has been going on for generations.
Truth: There was a time, long ago, when casinos did have strategic placement of loose slots to draw people in but that is not necessary any more. Slot players don't care about being drawn into the casinos; indeed today's slot players run into the slot aisles to play. It might be the closest thing to indoor rugby.
Untruth: The best slot machines to play are the progressives such as Megabucks and Wheel of Fortune. These give you the best chance of winning on any given night since they are programmed to give out really large jackpots.
Truth: While the idea of winning a fortune on a slot machine is the fancy of many slot players – and Megabucks and Wheel of Fortune certainly play into that fantasy – the big progressives are actually the toughest machines on which to win since they must withhold money for those large jackpots. Your chances of coming home with a win are therefore less than coming home with a win on stand-alone machines not linked to any other machines.
Untruth: It is better to play full coin on all slot machines to assure getting the maximum payout on the jackpot. It makes no sense playing just one coin or credit.
Truth: Here is where I differ from most of my writing colleagues on slot play. Yes, if you are going for one of those monster jackpots then of course play full coin. Let me take a traditional three-line stand-alone slot machine. Using full coin means you play three times the money or credits than someone playing a single coin or credit. Think about it; you are playing many games against the house edge. The amount you receive in a jackpot does not make up for three times what you are spending to get to that jackpot. So in such cases only play one coin or credit. That might seem like radical advice but I think it is the best advice.
Untruth: The best advice anyone can give is to quit while you are ahead.
Truth: This is purely wishful thinking. In fact, at times it is absurdly wishful thinking. You've bought your expensive plane ticket and booked a room in a fabulous Las Vegas hotel. You go down and buy put credits on the slot machine of your choice. As luck would have it, you win your first decision. How to win online roulette every time. You are now ahead after your very first moment of gambling. Do you leave?
Or, you lose that first decision and you are behind and although you win some decisions and lose some decisions, you never get ahead of the machine – do you keep playing until you lose every penny you have because you were never ahead at any time in your play? Or do you finally give up and say, 'That's it for me' and quit even though you are behind?
Untruth: The IRS is sent all the information about the total amount of money you put into a machine if you use a player's card. Also, once you have a player's card the machines are programed to give back far less money.
The Truth About Gambling
Truth: No and no.
[Read Frank Scoblete's books I Am a Card Counter: Inside the World of Advantage- Play Blackjack, I Am a Dice Controller: Inside the World of Advantage-Play Craps and Confessions of a Wayward Catholic! All available from Amazon.com, on Kindle and electronic media, at Barnes and Noble, and at bookstores. Visit Frank's web site at www.frankscoblete.com]
