ABSTRACT
Before a carnival game can reach the casino floor, it must be approved by gaming officials. In this chapter, the authors examine some of the calculations that these mathematicians are called on to make and see how these numbers allow room for game designers to adjust parameters to improve an initial game design. Casino baccarat culture allows players to track the outcome of each game dealt from a shoe and look for patterns in an effort to guide their wagering. In addition to being nontransitive, the dice used in Casino Merry-Go-Round and the available wagers were carefully chosen so that no ties were possible. The house advantage doesn’t tell the entire story of a carnival game, though. Another significant statistic is the variance of a random variable, which measures the deviation of the data from the mean or expected value.
