The iron cross craps bet is a popular strategy amongst players because it makes the bettor win money on every roll that isn’t a losing 7.
That sounds good, doesn’t it?
Everyone likes having chips given to them by the dealer on almost every roll. They do seem to add up over time. But not as fast as you would think with the iron cross. More on that later.
The Iron Cross Craps strategy can be played by making full-sized bets on 5, 6 and 8 while betting a half-sized bet on field, so that you get paid on every hit that isn’t a 7.
This combination of bets covers all the numbers except the losing 7. The 5, 6 & 8 are covered by the place bets and the 2, 3, 4, 9, 10, 11 and 12 are all covered by the field bet. (A few players don’t place the 5, opting instead to hop the 5’s for a few dollars each and every roll to get their normal win amount when a 5 rolls.)
Only the losing 7 and the losing field bet can cost you money. Of course, you can only win one of your bets on any roll, while the 7 rolling takes down all four of your bets.
The losing field bet costs you money by shrinking your win amounts on 5, 6 or 8 place bets by an amount equal to the size of the field bet and that loss must be figured in to get your net win when those numbers roll.
The Iron Cross Strategy Bets Explained
Below, you will learn everything about the three bets you need to make to successfully play the Iron Cross.
Place 5 bets
Place 5 bets are made by giving your chips to the dealer and saying, “Place 5”, and it pays $7 to each $5 bet when won.
Place 5 wins every time a 5 rolls until the hand ends with a losing 7. The house advantage on place 5 bets is 4.0%.
Place 6 & place 8 bets
Place 6 and place 8 bets are made by giving your chips to the dealer and saying, “Place 6 & 8”, and those bets pay $7 to each $6 bet when won.
They win every time a 6 or 8 rolls and you have your bet on that number until a 7 ends the hand. The house advantage on place 6 and place 8 bets is 1.54%.
Field bets
You make your own field bet by putting your chips on the large space marked “Field” behind the don’t pass line.
Field bets win when a 2, 3, 4, 9, 10, 11 or 12 rolls. Field bets lose when 5, 6, 7 or 8 rolls. There are 20 ways to lose a field bet vs. 16 ways to win a field bet. The casino’s advantage on a field bet is 2.78% when the 2 pays double and the 12 pays triple.
Field bets pay even money most of the time when won. If the seldom-rolled 2 rolls it pays double. If the seldom-rolled 12 rolls it pays triple in most casinos. Some casinos pay double on both 2 and 12.
It takes about six iron cross wins just to cover the costs of those bets and those wins have to be won before you can start winning chips that will actually get to stay in your rack when you win them.
Each iron cross hit before all the bets are paid just reduces the amount you will lose when the 7 rolls, if it rolls before your bets are paid for.
If you are willing to regress your bet amounts by fifty percent after the first couple of hits, you can get your bets paid quicker and your overall risks reduced. That comes at the cost of winning less on every hit after that regression, though. But it is a thought you might want to consider.
You will also soon discover that having that half-sized bet on the field bet makes your place bets on 5, 6 & 8, which are some of the most-often rolled numbers in craps, pay less than they would have paid if you were just place betting them without the field bet.
That is because when you win on the 5, 6 or 8, you also lose your field bet. And that half-sized field bet amount must be replaced from your rack to continue playing the craps iron cross.
The 5, 6 or 8 end up only putting about half as many chips in your rack when they win as they would if you had the same amounts on place bet without having added the field bet.
Iron Cross Example
You make:
a $30 place 5;
$36 place 6;
$36 place 8 bets
$18 on the field.
Your total bet is $120.
When a place bet 5, 6 or 8 rolls, you win $42 for that hit, but your $18 field bet is swept away and must be replaced from your rack.
Your net win on any of those place bets would be $42 won minus the swept away $18 field bet, for a net win of only $24.
When your field bet wins, you get paid nothing on your place bets, while you receive $18 for your field bet win. Some casinos pay triple on the 12 and double on the 2, so you could win $18, $36 or $54 depending which field number rolled.
I would make a $378 iron cross bet, consisting of $95 on place 5, $114 on place 6, $114 place 8 and $60 field.
That bet wins $66 on 5 rolling, $73 on 6 or 8 rolling and $60 on non-2 and non-12 field hits. A hit on 2 would pay $120. A hit on 12 would pay $180.
So, how does the iron cross bet stack up against other possible ways I might want to bet when it comes to winning money?
You need to know that in order to intelligently weigh just how good of a bet it is to make.
The answer may shock you. The iron cross bet finished dead last to all 18 other possible bets listed below that I might make, with an average net win per toss of $11.36, while my top finishing bet had an average net win per toss of $15.73.
This information was derived using my craps spreadsheet I created over 6 years that always flat-bets, with no raises or regressions, with bets always being as close as I could get them to $376 bet for each different bet, with bets always working on come out rolls.
The results for all the different bets are figured over the same exact 2,000 logged practice rolls to give them all an equal chance of coming out on top.
The value you see for each different bet, as the average net win per every roll, is the value that my top dice set for that bet earned.
The iron cross bet seems to be a good bet, especially to new players upon learning that they can win money on every roll of the dice that isn’t a 7.
But, that losing field bet waters down the winnings on the more-frequently hit and better-paying place 5, place 6, and place 8 wins to the point that it simply isn’t nearly as good a bet as it first appears to be.
There are 18 better-paying bets listed above that have better payout odds and would probably win you more money in the long term. Feel free to try them all in demo mode craps on Chipy before investing in real money.
But, if you happen to like constantly being handed chips by the dealer on every roll that isn’t a 7, it still might be the bet you enjoy making the most. Just don’t expect to always come out ahead betting the iron cross.
It may just fit the bill if you are playing craps more for entertainment than to try to win most of the time. But, if you're serious about the game, and maybe you want to play craps in Vegas one day, make sure you check out our Academy guides to learn more.
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Bill Collins
Professional Craps Player
About Bill Collins
Author of the craps novel, "Vegas Fever";
20+ years of successful craps experience, consistently winning since 2003;
Professional writer of Craps guides, with numerous articles published;
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