5 Things Only Dealers Know About Gambling At A Casino

Another thing the Mohegan Tribal Police can do is investigate crimes and haul your ass off to casino jail, which they will do if you try to cheat. We may not have AI super-software to help us catch con men like in Ocean's Thirteen, but remember our closed-circuit porn channel that I mentioned earlier? There are seriously cameras everywhere, and people are watching. Just fumbling with your chips raises our suspicion. We even have special cameras that can read invisible ink, in case you try to mark cards or, I don't know, write secret smutty messages on the life-size Neil Diamond cutouts.

Luckily, we aren't exactly left to fend for ourselves. Every pit boss has a secret panic button under their desk to summon security in case of an emergency. It's actually quite spectacular to see a bunch of black suits appear seemingly out of nowhere and subdue an angry customer. It's even more fun if they struggle, because then security straps them to a gurney to keep them from thrashing. Yes, it's an adult time-out bed.

Poker, blackjack, roulette, craps -- call them whatever you like, they are all just different versions of Fuck Off, the popular casino game where you give the house all your money and then you ... well, it's all in the name, really. Unless you're a team of MIT grad students like in the movie 21, you're probably not gonna beat the house.

Speaking of 21: Do you know why the movie's protagonists used blackjack to beat casinos? Because it has the best odds for players, giving them a 48 percent chance of winning. That is the best deal a casino can give you: a chance of success slightly lower than that of a coin toss. But let's imagine that you beat the odds and hit the jackpot. Celebrate quickly, because we'll get most of that money back before you leave the building.

Every casino is a giant Skinner Box that records and analyzes the behavior of patrons. That's how we've learned to only use smaller-denomination chips during payouts. So if you win, say, a thousand bucks, instead of giving you one $1,000 chip, we'll give you 10 $100 chips, because the human brain doesn't really understand the value of objects. All it really understands is quantity, and to it, 10 $100 chips is more than one $1,000 chip.

By splitting your money, we make you more likely to go for that one last bet before leaving, which of course quickly turns into the first of many bets you will make that night. Even our money cages are designed so that you have to walk past rows and rows of tables to make it to them. And with no clocks or natural sunlight anywhere in the building, well, let's just say your typical casino makes the island of the lotus-eaters look like a TGI Friday's.

Are you getting paid by check? Great, bring it over to the casino.

Most casinos will cash a personal check with no charge. Sometimes, they'll even throw in a drink or a free pull on the slot machines. This is, of course, meant to get you to stay and gamble, but if you have enough willpower to stop yourself from doing that, you'll be able to use a casino to your advantage and not vice-versa. Then there's the food: The buffet at the Mohegan Sun is probably the best cost-value dining option in about 40 miles. It's like $20 per person and there's some really great stuff: lamb chops, lobster, steaks, etc.

After the meal, you can enjoy the live, free bands. On weekends we actually get some pretty big names -- maybe not exactly the Billboard Top 100, but there's bound to be somebody exciting there sooner or later. Just don't get too excited. We have to clean that up, after all.

Cezary Jan Strusiewicz is a Cracked columnist, interviewer, and editor. Contact him at c.j.strusiewicz@gmail.com

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