Chance Your Arm At Baccarat
If you fancy a change from a normal diet of blackjack and roulette in an online casino, why not chance your arm at baccarat?
You might be familiar with the game from James Bond films, as the hero has always had a soft-spot for playing - for high stakes against various villains - at casinos around the world.
Also known as "punto banco", the game is great for newcomers because it's impossible to get it wrong. Once you have placed your chips, there's no other decision to make as the game play is automatic, depending on what cards appear.
In land-based casinos, this tends to be the game where the real high-rollers gather, and up to $10,000 per hand is not unknown.
One of the curious things about the game is that you can actually bet with the house. Everywhere else in a casino, it's either you against the house or you play against other players if poker is your game.
Baccarat allows you to back the banker to win. While this seems like a no-brainer, there is one rider - winning banker bets are subject to a five per cent commission.
Even so, it means the house edge for this type of bet is 1.06 per cent which makes it an attractive proposition.
Cards marked 2-9 are worth face value, aces are one point and 10s and picture cards worth zero.
The best possible score in baccarat is nine, and the worst is zero. Sometimes, the player and the banker will each only receive two cards, but depending on the value of those cards they could need to draw more.
The actual rules as to how many cards are used are fairly complicated, but it doesn't really matter whether you understand them as the dealer will automatically issue cards when required.
Written by Alex Corcoran, an enthusiastic bingo player who likes to pursue her bingo hobby by playing at posh bingo and learning the ways of the game.
