Limitations Of Martingale Doubling Strategy

Added: January 21, 2016

Anyone who has ever dreamt of busting the bank in roulette would have heard of the Martingale doubling strategy. In theory, the strategy guarantees that if you have an infinite bankroll and can play an infinite number of spins without any maximum limit on the bet then you will an amount equal to your first bet in a cycle. The discerning player will realize the pitfalls in this statement. There is no such thing as an infinite bankroll and all Australian online casinos impose maximum limits on bets.

First it is necessary to understand how the Martingale doubling strategy works. This roulette strategy can only be used only bets such as red/black and even/odd numbers that pay 1 to 1. You start by placing AU$1 on red. If you win you will be paid AU$2 on an investment of AU$1 and will win AU$1. If you lose then you double the initial bet and wager AU$2 on red. Your total investment is AU$3 and you will be paid AU$4 if red is called and will again win AU$1. This way you keep doubling at each loss till you finally win. Whenever you win your net gain will be equal to your original stake.

While analysing the roulette Martingale doubling strategy it is important to compute the required bankroll for an acceptable level of risk for an AU$1 bet. Assuming that you will be betting on red, the probability of getting three black numbers in a row is 12.5%. This is a high level of risk. If you want reduce the risk of losing to less than 1% you will need a bankroll to cover you for seven losses or eight spins. Starting with AU$1 and doubling for eight spins requires a bankroll of AU$255. This gives you a probability of over 99% of winning AU$1. Presumably you would not want to take all this trouble just to win AU$1. If your target is AU$50, then you start with AU$50 and would need a bankroll of $12,750 and still face a 1% chance of losing it all.

The upper table limit constraints the number of times that you can double and increases the likelihood of loss. Suppose that the maximum table limit is AU$1,000 and you want to win AU$50 at the end of the cycle. With an initial bet of AU$50 you can double only five times. This increases the probability of losing to just over 3%.