Best Places To Gamble

Nov 11, 2020 Aruba is best known for its beautiful beaches, but it’s also a top casino destination in the Caribbean. There are casinos in downtown Oranjestad and also at Palm Beach. To get into the island spirit, make sure to play a game of Caribbean Stud Poker because Aruba is known as the birthplace of the game. Neighbors like China has made it one of the best countries to visit to gamble. Investments have been made with the opening of large casinos like the Marina Bay Sands and the Resorts World Sentosa.

Gambling can assume many forms, particularly within the cryptoconomy, which is an entire industry predicated upon speculation. From conventional gambling – think slots, dice, and blackjack – to wagering on the price of cryptocurrencies, there are a lot of ways to grow your crypto stack.

If crypto is one big casino, its large tent accommodates an array of side stalls where wagering of all kinds can be enjoyed in a permissionless manner. Here are four of the best places for risk-on cryptocurrency holders to put their assets to use in the hope of winning big.

1. Hit up the Casino

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If you’re looking to gamble with crypto in the classic sense of the word, the online casino has to be top of your list. Platforms that accept cryptocurrency provide greater privacy than their traditional counterparts, thanks to the pseudonymity that is inherent to blockchain.

This obviates the need to trust the online casino with your credit card details, and prevents curious partners, employers, and other busybodies from scrutinizing your bank statement. Crypto was made for casinos, in other words, and vice-versa.

Choose a crypto casino with a long-standing record and a good selection of the latest and greatest games. Think live roulette, branded slots, keno, and a regularly changing smorgasbord of promotions, from cashback to free spins. Ideally, pick a crypto casino that supports provably fair gaming.

These are games that use a hashed algorithm that can be independently verified after each turn to ensure that the house hasn’t cheated the player. In the future, every casino will offer provably fair; until then, stick to the ones that have already adopted this tech to demonstrate that they’re on the players’ side.

2. Make a Prediction or Two

Prediction markets are a simple but extremely fun way to profit from being right. From the outcome of political elections to the price of bitcoin on a particular date, prediction markets are where you go to wager, using the wisdom of the crowd to guide you.

Markets such as Guesser, which is built upon Augur, make placing predictions as easy as clicking a button and waiting for the event to play out. Omen, despite lacking the same high quality UI as Guesser, is also a popular platform with prediction market proponents.

The benefits of using a prediction market as opposed to a conventional betting platform include no requirement to create an account and automated market determination and payouts, all provided by smart contracts and oracles.

3. Ape Into Uniswap

Decentralized exchanges (DEXs) such as Uniswap provide a launchpad for new crypto projects, which can issue a native token and distribute it to the community in a fair and transparent manner.

At least that’s the official reason why DEXs exist. As anyone who’s spent a little time on them will attest, however, they’re a gambler’s paradise, filled with new tokens that anyone can ape into, swapping their ETH for ERC20 assets in an instant.

Naturally, YOLO’ing into unknown tokens from unproven projects can end badly, and thus it is incumbent upon you, the trader, to perform your own due diligence. Uniswap traders are apt to swap sob stories of “rug pulls” from projects that exit scammed after removing all liquidity and leaving holders with worthless tokens.

That said, Uniswap regulars will also talk fondly of that one token they bought that did a 100x. You win some, you lose some, and when you’re trading on Uniswap, expect your fair share of triumphs and defeats. It’s all part of the game.

4. Experiment With Algorithmic Stablecoins

If Uniswap isn’t degenerate enough for your tastes, you should take a look at algorithmic stablecoins. They are the purest embodiment of game theory, and a fascinating exercise in human psychology.

Basically speaking, every time the price of the stablecoin in question (ESD and DSD are the most popular) goes above $1, users who have staked their coins will receive additional tokens. And every time the asset dips below $1, token-holders are given incentives to burn their tokens, in exchange for a coupon that can be redeemed when the coin returns to over $1.

It’s a lot to wrap your head around, and like any form of crypto gambling, there’s no guarantee of profit. If you’re prepared to put in the work and do the research, though, algorithmic stablecoins can be a very profitable pursuit.

As these four examples show, there’s more than one way to gamble with your crypto. Pick your platform, choose your vice, and get to work. May the dice roll kindly and the markets shower you with satoshis.

Most people in the United States live within driving distance from a casino. Flights are cheaper now than ever before. And the number of options you have when deciding where to gamble is overwhelming.

What criteria should you use to decide where to gamble? My suggestion is to start thinking about what places would be cool to hang out or visit.

Here are my picks for the seven coolest places to gamble in the United States.

1 – Your Local Bar or Tavern

It’s not legal to gamble at most bars. This doesn’t mean that gambling doesn’t happen there. If you’re a regular at a bar, you should have no trouble finding someone who’s willing to place a friendly wager on a football game with you.

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In fact, you shouldn’t have any problem finding a bookmaker who’s willing to take your action regularly.

I used to hang out at a bar in Dallas which had three slot machines called “eight-liners.” They’re called that because there are eight paylines on such a machine, three horizontally, three vertically, and two diagonally.

That wasn’t the only gambling available there either. You could also spend $10 to play in the weekly shuffleboard tournament.

And during football season, there were plenty of football pools to join. I had a friend recently who took me to a bar in Denton, Texas. They played Yahtzee there. It costs a buck to play.

If you roll a Yahtzee, though, you win the pot, which is made up of the contributions of the people who’ve played there until then. It’s cool to gamble at your local bar.

2 – Your Local Casino

Most people live near a land-based casino now, but not everyone.

If you do live near a casino, one of the coolest things you can do is really get to know the place. You don’t have to lose a lot of money there to be a regular either.

If you want to impress a date, there’s no surer way than to be a regular at the local casino. One of my friends is a member of the players club at our nearest casino, and he’s accumulated enough points to get free rooms whenever he wants.

Best of all, most casinos have at least one nice restaurant. It doesn’t get much cooler than being a regular at that restaurant and having the staff there know you by name!

3 – Your Workplace

Office pools are practically an American tradition. I don’t recommend being in charge of the office pool if you’re the manager of your department, although, it might work out okay at a smaller company where there are fewer HR issues.

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How does an office pool work? Well, the most common of these is a football pool. I like survivor pools, but a lot of people also enjoy betting on squares.

A survivor pool is easy to run. Everyone puts in their money, I suggest $20 for an average-sized office, and the prize pool goes to the last man standing.

Every week, you pick a team to win a game. It has to be a team you haven’t picked before in this pool, usually. If your team wins, you survive into the next week. If your team loses, you’re knocked out of the pool.

Most of the time, the last person standing when the pool ends is the winner of all the money in the pot. But sometimes, when you get down to the last two or three contenders, they’ll decide to split the pot.

I like this office pool because there’s a skill element to it. You have to be able to pick winners. If you’re not a fan of gambling with a skill element, squares are probably a better bet.

Basically, squares are like a lottery where the winners are chosen based on the scores during an upcoming football game. Whoever runs the pool creates a 10 x 10 grid. You buy a square by putting in your money and writing your name in the square. You can usually buy multiple squares.

Once all the squares have been bought, you randomly determine the numbers (zero through through) on each axis. The person with the square corresponding to the score at the end of each quarter wins 25% of the pot.

Who knew gambling at work could be a fun activity?

4 – Your Home

Another cool place to gamble is ever so humble—your own home.

There are an amazing number of ways you can gamble at home these days. You can host a poker game, for example. That’s been a traditional way of gambling for decades.

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You can have friends over to watch the football game and place friendly wagers with your buddies on the outcome of the game.

In fact, any kind of gambling you might do in a bar can also be done from the comfort of your home. And there’s one other way of gambling from home that might appeal to you—the internet.

No matter what kind of gambling you like to do, you can probably do it on a real money casino website. There are plenty of sites offering any and all of the following gambling activities:

  • Casino games
  • Sports betting
  • Bingo
  • Poker
  • Fantasy sports
  • The lottery
  • Esports betting

There are probably other gambling activities you can participate in online that I’m forgetting to list. Just check if your local jurisdiction has any laws against online gambling.

5 – Vegas, Baby!

Okay, so Las Vegas isn’t going to surprise anyone as a good place to gamble. It’s still one of the coolest gambling destinations in the country!

I suggest getting old-school with your Vegas trip. Take the “cool factor” up a notch or even several by staying in hotels and casinos downtown instead of the Strip.

Eat at some of the older restaurants that are still standing, the ones where the Rat Pack ate. Drink at some of the older bars and lounges.

There’s so much to see and do in Las Vegas that you don’t even need to gamble unless you want to.

6 – Reno

Reno is often called the “Biggest Little City in the World.” It’s also in Nevada, but the vibe there couldn’t be more different from Las Vegas. Everything there is smaller, but the casinos are still there and they offer the same games with the same odds.

You can still find some of the buffets and shows you might find in Vegas, although the shows in Reno tend to include less A-listers. I personally have a soft spot for this place because I learned how to play video poker in Reno.

On top of that, the weather in Reno isn’t as extreme it is in Las Vegas. Summertime temperatures are around the 80s and 90s, and they rarely see the 100s, which is typical for Vegas in the summer.

7 – On a Cruise Ship

Okay, so here’s a caveat about gambling on a cruise ship… The casino games’ odds are often much worse than you’d face in a land-based casino in a major casino destination.

You can expect to find blackjack with a 6:5 payout instead of the standard 3:2 payout. You can also expect to find some of the tightest slot machines you’ll ever see.

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The video poker pay tables are substandard. And you can forget about finding European Roulette, American Roulette is the norm on cruise ships.

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Here’s what most cruise ships do offer, though—Texas holdem.

If you don’t mind playing for lower stakes, the best time you’ll ever have gambling might be at the poker tables on a cruise ship.

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I stay away from the slot machines and video poker games on gambling cruises and stick with the poker games instead. I highly suggest you do, too.

Conclusion

Those are my picks for the seven coolest places to gamble. Thanks for reading!

Do you have other suggestions? If so, please leave your recommendations in the comments.

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