The Casino Floor Plan (Chips, Cages, Tables, and Machines)

My goal with this post is to explain the casino floor plan and how things work there. It will take some time to get accustomed to life on the casino floor.

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The first thing new gamblers notice about the casino floor is the amount of sensory input. At most casinos, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, slot machines spin and table game players shout. Waitresses circulate constantly offering drinks.

It’s easy to feel confused and even dizzy in the face of all this. I’m not even going to get into the costs of building or buying a casino here; instead, I’m just focusing on the casino floor from a player’s perspective.

Here’s what’s going on and where:

The Casino Floor Plan

Most casino floor plans are similar. In the United States, at least 2/3 of the space on the casino floor — maybe more — devotes itself to gambling machines (slots and video poker). You’ll find the table games toward the center of the floor.

In most United States casinos, the largest percentage of table games are blackjack games (but not necessarily single deck games). Craps and roulette — both single zero and double zero — are also popular. And you’ll find plenty of the new poker-based casino games like Ultimate Texas Hold’em, too.

Baccarat usually has its own private area, if it’s present at all. In Asian casinos, though, baccarat is more popular than blackjack or slots. And, in a lot of European casinos, roulette is the most popular table game.

Poker players usually have their own area, usually a separate room. Not all casinos have poker rooms. And when I write about poker in this context, I’m referring to poker where you play against other players, not the casino.

The sportsbook, if there is one, has its own room, too. This includes casinos with racebooks. Sportsbooks, like cardrooms, vary widely in terms of luxury and amenities.

On the outskirts of the casino games are are the bars and restaurants. In fact, to get anywhere in the hotel, you’ll almost always need to traverse the games there. And you’ll find plenty of ATMs where you can get your hands on money to gamble with.

Casino Chips and Chip Cages

To play table games like blackjack or craps, you must buy chips. You buy your casino chips at the gaming table by exchanging cash with the dealer.

Always lay your money on the table. Casino dealers aren’t allowed to take money out of your hand or put chips in your hand. This is to prevent cheating.

Casinos use chips for two reasons:

1. Chips make it easier to conduct the bets and payouts.
2. Chips provide a psychological distance between the player and his money.

Even though you guy chips at the table from the dealer, you can’t cash out at the table. You cash out with a cashier in the “chip cage,” which is where the name of this site comes from. You can (and should), though, ask the dealer to “color up” your chips. This just means to exchange your lower denomination chips for higher denomination chips. You’ll have fewer chips to carry to the chip cage with you.

Slot machines don’t use chips; instead, they accept cash or tickets. When I started gambling in the mid-1990s, most slot machines still paid out in actual coins. Since then, casino gambling machines have switched to a ticket-in/ticket-out system. They just use pieces of paper with bar codes on them to indicate how much money they’re worth.

You can usually cash in chips or the tickets from the gambling machines at the chip cage. Casinos also usually have smaller machines where you can exchange your slot machine tickets for cash.

Table Games on the Casino Floor

Table games have signs on them indicating what game can be played there and for what stakes. You might think it would be obvious what game is being dealt, but keep in mind that not everyone visiting the casino has been there before. For many gamblers, this is their first time.

The stakes indicate what the minimum and maximum bets at the table are. It’s common to find table games with a minimum bet of $5 and a maximum bet of $5, but these limits change all the time based on what’s happening at the casino.

When the casinos are busy, they raise the limits. As long as plenty of people are playing at the table, the casino wants its gamblers betting as much as possible. In Vegas, this means that the betting minimums and maximums are higher on Friday and Saturday nights.

If a casino changes the stakes at a table where you’ve been playing, they’ll usually let you continue to play at your previous stakes. For example, if you’ve been playing blackjack for $5 per hand, the casino might change the minimum bet from $5 to $25. They’ll usually let you continue to play for $5 per hand.

The gaming tables are arranged in circles around an area called “the pit.” The number of tables varies based on the size of the tables. A blackjack pit might consist of eight tables, while a roulette pit might consist of just four tables.

The employees working in the pit are important. These employees include the dealers, who you’ll deal with directly most of the time. A floorperson supervises the dealers. And a pit boss supervises the floorpersons.

The People on the Casino Floor

Plenty of other employees are working on the casino floor. The “pit critters” make up only a fraction of the employees working on the casino floor. The pit bosses have supervisors, too — the shift managers. They report to the casino manager. You’ll rarely deal with these layers of management.

Cocktail waitresses also work on the casino floor. They’ll offer to bring you drinks, and these drinks are free while you’re gambling. Free drinks are the most common comps in the casino. You should always tip the cocktail waitresses. The more you tip, the likelier you are to get drinks more often. Give her at least a buck for bring you a drink, but give her $5 the first time she brings you a drink. That will keep her coming back.

Casino security is also present on the casino floor. You might think that these personnel are there to look out for you and your belongings. They are, but they’re more concerned with looking out for the casino and its money. They don’t just have personnel on the floor, either — they have cameras in the ceiling watching the action. The casinos also have people managing this “eye in the sky.”

The casinos are also full of two-way mirrors. You should assume that any mirror you see on the casino floor are two-way mirrors.

Gambling Machines on the Casino Floor

You’ll find a bewildering variety of slot machines throughout the casino. In an average United States casino, 60% to 80% of the floor is made up of slots games. That number varies in other countries — in Australian casinos, slots are even more popular than they are in the USA. In European casinos, you’ll find a higher percentage of casino space devoted to table games.

Most people interested in gambling machines’ locations on the casino floor are looking for the secret to finding the “loose slots.” That’s a more complicated task than most gambling writers want to admit.

The first problem is deciding what constitutes “loose.” It doesn’t necessarily mean that a game has a higher payback percentage. You can find two slot machine games, both with a payback percentage of 92%, adjacent to each other in a casino. One of those games might have a hit ratio of 25%, though. And the other might have a hit ratio of 45%.

If you play those two games long enough, you’ll see the same average results.

But, in the short term, the game with the higher hit percentage seems looser.

Many gambling writers suggest that a gambling machine’s location in the casino is the key to understanding which are loose. A common line of thought is that the slot machines at the end of the rows, close to where people walk, pay out more often. The theory is that this is meant to attract more gamblers to the slot machines.

You’ll also see people suggesting that the slot machines in the busiest part of the casinos are the loosest. That’s not necessarily true, either. In fact, you might see games with a higher hit ratio but a lower payback percentage in those areas.

Slot machines are dead simple. You put your money in, spin the reels, and hope for the best.

Video poker games, like Jacks or Better (full pay or not), offer a lower house edge. But they’re not as simple as slots. You need some poker sense to play, and if you make bad decisions, you might as well just play slots.

How to Get Comfortable on the Casino Floor

The best way to get comfortable on the casino floor is to watch what’s going on for a while without getting involved in any of it. Resist the urge to put some money into a slot machine or buy into a blackjack game. Just walk around and look at where everything is and what everyone else is doing.

Learn where everything is before placing your bet. Decide where you’re going to eat when it’s time for lunch or dinner. Know where the restrooms are. Knowing the answers to these questions will increase your comfort level.

Slot machines are a lower-pressure way to start gambling. Slots are mostly a solitary activity. They also require no skill at all. You shouldn’t feel any pressure when playing a slot machine.

The table games offer much better odds. But they are scarier. The good news is that you don’t have to sit down and start playing immediately. It’s perfectly all right to stand back and watch the action until you feel like you know what’s going on.

If you’re really nervous, find a table with only one or two players. Make sure the dealer looks personable. You can then decide to sit down and ask questions without having to feel nervous.

Questions and Answers

Here are some commonly asked questions and answers about the casino floor.

Do Casinos Really Pump Oxygen into the Air?

It’s a popular myth that casinos pump oxygen into the air to keep gamblers alert and playing. This is just a myth, though. And it should be obvious why it’s a myth.

Most casinos have a lot of cigarette smoking going on in them.

And what’s more flammable than anything?

Oxygen, that’s what.

Why Don’t Casinos Have Any Clocks Visible?

Casinos don’t put clocks on the walls on the casino floor because they want you to lose track of time. The biggest factor affecting how much money you lose on a casino trip is the amount of time you spend gambling.

Wear a watch.

Conclusion

That’s as good an introduction to the casino floor and what’s on it as I can come up with. If you have questions, or if I left something out, please let me know in the comments section.