Why the martingale system sucks! (doubling down on losses)

[milewilda]

The problem with personal experiences is that there is a lot of bias, if another member says that it has worked for them I believe them in the sense that I do not think they have suffered catastrophic losses yet, but the math is clear, martingale has been disproved mathematically over and over again as a technique that works as it does not change at all the probabilities of the game, taking this into account the only reasonable explanation for those that argue that it works is that they have simply not used the strategy long enough.

Not greedy enough to suffer the long losing streak, those who got good balance maintaining their time of playing,

Just like what you have said, there's no correct answer always in between. even if there's someone who claimed that the strategy works for them, it doesn't convinced those who suffered big losses, and coming from majorities this system always bring heavy losses to the gamblers who lean on using this system.

Not really that believing much into those persons who do tell that martingale does work for them.They might able to pull out in the right time but for sure
majority of them does know that martingale strategy do sucks and does really generate more losses than wins and they cant really just accept the truth and trying out to be good looking into other gamblers eyes that it does work for them but the truth is that it doesnt really work.It is really varying on how you would really be handling out yourself on using strategies because theres no such thing on this world that gives out guarantee and that should be always be put up on someones mind so that they wont really be that expecting much.

[FatFork]

The problem with personal experiences is that there is a lot of bias, if another member says that it has worked for them I believe them in the sense that I do not think they have suffered catastrophic losses yet, but the math is clear, martingale has been disproved mathematically over and over again as a technique that works as it does not change at all the probabilities of the game, taking this into account the only reasonable explanation for those that argue that it works is that they have simply not used the strategy long enough.

The problem with personal experiences is that people like to show their strengths and hide their weaknesses, which is why they will brag about winning and keep quiet about losing.
That is simply human nature, we like to display our strengths while hiding our weaknesses.

[uneng]

I would like to know from gamblers what they do instead of doubling the bet on loss, since martingale is so horrible. If you don't raise your bet after a loss, you are never going to make any profit from gambling. That is my perception on this matter. For this reason people use martingale, because they want to have a chance to make profit at least on short run.

If there were better ways to gamble, would martingale be so popular?

[Botnake]

I would like to know from gamblers what they do instead of doubling the bet on loss, since martingale is so horrible. If you don't raise your bet after a loss, you are never going to make any profit from gambling. That is my perception on this matter. For this reason people use martingale, because they want to have a chance to make profit at least on short run.

If there were better ways to gamble, would martingale be so popular?

Doubling your bet to recover your losses sometimes works, but it should not be a martingale strategy as you'll not gonna stop betting if until you win or you lose your entire bankroll. Doubling your bet is best applied in games like sports betting, you can see the situation, especially in big games, so you'll never gonna have a long losing streak.

The formula here is simple, don't bet blindly but applied the right bankroll management, doubling your bet, don't use the complete martingale strategy.

[tabas]

I would like to know from gamblers what they do instead of doubling the bet on loss, since martingale is so horrible. If you don't raise your bet after a loss, you are never going to make any profit from gambling. That is my perception on this matter. For this reason people use martingale, because they want to have a chance to make profit at least on short run.

If there were better ways to gamble, would martingale be so popular?

It's popular because many are aware of the strategy but after trying it, everyone has their own story how it helped them and as well gave them a lot of losses.
That's not the only strategy to recover your losses. Like if you loss for the day, you can gamble again tomorrow and recover gradually or just forget about your past losses and focus on the new wins that shall come.

[uneng]

Doubling your bet to recover your losses sometimes works, but it should not be a martingale strategy as you'll not gonna stop betting if until you win or you lose your entire bankroll. Doubling your bet is best applied in games like sports betting, you can see the situation, especially in big games, so you'll never gonna have a long losing streak.

The formula here is simple, don't bet blindly but applied the right bankroll management, doubling your bet, don't use the complete martingale strategy.

It's popular because many are aware of the strategy but after trying it, everyone has their own story how it helped them and as well gave them a lot of losses.
That's not the only strategy to recover your losses. Like if you loss for the day, you can gamble again tomorrow and recover gradually or just forget about your past losses and focus on the new wins that shall come.

Does it mean a half-martingale strategy is the best method to gamble? So you still double your bet on loss, but don't go by the end of your bankroll, always preserving some money in your balance, being possible to come back to play again after some time to recover that initial loss or at least decrease the loss the maximum as possible, through sports betting, for an example.

[Renampun]

...

The Martingale system is one of the best tricks when playing dice...

but this trick will only be effective if you have a large capital, if not then don't try this trick too much. although this trick is not suitable for me, I have practiced this trick and I managed to get out of losing. btw, this is a legendary trick that is often used by dice gamblers.

[Distinctin]

...

The Martingale system is one of the best tricks when playing dice...

but this trick will only be effective if you have a large capital, if not then don't try this trick too much. although this trick is not suitable for me, I have practiced this trick and I managed to get out of losing. btw, this is a legendary trick that is often used by dice gamblers.

I would not agree with you on that, a trick is only called a trick if it's working, but Martingale will not work in the long run as you don't only need a large capital to make it work, but an unlimited capital which we know is impossible and it's also impossible that betting sites would allow you to exploit them.

The trick here is just to enjoy the game, especially with dice games, you might lose but you'll still become a winner because you are entertained.

[mv1986]

The problem with personal experiences is that there is a lot of bias, if another member says that it has worked for them I believe them in the sense that I do not think they have suffered catastrophic losses yet, but the math is clear, martingale has been disproved mathematically over and over again as a technique that works as it does not change at all the probabilities of the game, taking this into account the only reasonable explanation for those that argue that it works is that they have simply not used the strategy long enough.

Not greedy enough to suffer the long losing streak, those who got good balance maintaining their time of playing,

Just like what you have said, there's no correct answer always in between. even if there's someone who claimed that the strategy works for them, it doesn't convinced those who suffered big losses, and coming from majorities this system always bring heavy losses to the gamblers who lean on using this system.

Not really that believing much into those persons who do tell that martingale does work for them.They might able to pull out in the right time but for sure
majority of them does know that martingale strategy do sucks and does really generate more losses than wins and they cant really just accept the truth and trying out to be good looking into other gamblers eyes that it does work for them but the truth is that it doesnt really work.It is really varying on how you would really be handling out yourself on using strategies because theres no such thing on this world that gives out guarantee and that should be always be put up on someones mind so that they wont really be that expecting much.

I have seen crazy streaks in roulette of one color showing up more than 10 times in a row. It is insane, but from a statistical point of view absolutely possible. The OP explained very well how the mathematics work against you if you look at it from the opposite perspective. How many games do you have to apply the method such that your chance to lose is almost 100%, and there you have it. I admit when I was young and started playing a bit I also tried that out and I learned my lesson with cents, which was good for me. I started with a cent, and then two, and then four, and I was shocked how quickly that escalated to my disadvantage. I always thought the casinos were rigged and then did my research accordingly, and the result was exactly what OP explained. For those who don't want to trust in their belief, just trust in maths!

[tabas]

It's popular because many are aware of the strategy but after trying it, everyone has their own story how it helped them and as well gave them a lot of losses.
That's not the only strategy to recover your losses. Like if you loss for the day, you can gamble again tomorrow and recover gradually or just forget about your past losses and focus on the new wins that shall come.

Does it mean a half-martingale strategy is the best method to gamble? So you still double your bet on loss, but don't go by the end of your bankroll, always preserving some money in your balance, being possible to come back to play again after some time to recover that initial loss or at least decrease the loss the maximum as possible, through sports betting, for an example.

It doesn't mean that whether it's full or half, it's the best method but in reality for some it is the best. But, for many of us it isn't the best. There's no such as best method because it's just our way how we're going to manage our bankrollls as we gamble.
If we're good at it then you may say that it's the best method and strategy.

[KTChampions]

I have seen crazy streaks in roulette of one color showing up more than 10 times in a row. It is insane, but from a statistical point of view absolutely possible. The OP explained very well how the mathematics work against you if you look at it from the opposite perspective. How many games do you have to apply the method such that your chance to lose is almost 100%, and there you have it. I admit when I was young and started playing a bit I also tried that out and I learned my lesson with cents, which was good for me. I started with a cent, and then two, and then four, and I was shocked how quickly that escalated to my disadvantage. I always thought the casinos were rigged and then did my research accordingly, and the result was exactly what OP explained. For those who don't want to trust in their belief, just trust in maths!

10 times in a row is not crazy streak lol  This is a common sequence that you see almost every time you play and place a large number of bets. The real madness is when you play dice (<> 49.5%) and get 40 losing bets in a row. It happened to me, but I tested different strategies and made a huge number of bets, and to see such a sequence, perhaps several hundred thousand bets were made.

[acquafredda]

I have seen crazy streaks in roulette of one color showing up more than 10 times in a row. It is insane, but from a statistical point of view absolutely possible. The OP explained very well how the mathematics work against you if you look at it from the opposite perspective. How many games do you have to apply the method such that your chance to lose is almost 100%, and there you have it. I admit when I was young and started playing a bit I also tried that out and I learned my lesson with cents, which was good for me. I started with a cent, and then two, and then four, and I was shocked how quickly that escalated to my disadvantage. I always thought the casinos were rigged and then did my research accordingly, and the result was exactly what OP explained. For those who don't want to trust in their belief, just trust in maths!

10 times in a row is not crazy streak lol  This is a common sequence that you see almost every time you play and place a large number of bets. The real madness is when you play dice (<> 49.5%) and get 40 losing bets in a row. It happened to me, but I tested different strategies and made a huge number of bets, and to see such a sequence, perhaps several hundred thousand bets were made.

25 losses in a row at 49.5, I guess make it to the world record series! That was my worst result ever with martingale and I thank God I was using play money on crypto-games only to have som fun to test a variation in the strategy (when switching low/high, what to do after 5 reds in a row etc.)
Never underestimate the power of randomness, it will always and I mean, always, surprise you. Mostly for the bad, almost never for the good.

[john_nautica]

I have seen crazy streaks in roulette of one color showing up more than 10 times in a row. It is insane, but from a statistical point of view absolutely possible. The OP explained very well how the mathematics work against you if you look at it from the opposite perspective. How many games do you have to apply the method such that your chance to lose is almost 100%, and there you have it. I admit when I was young and started playing a bit I also tried that out and I learned my lesson with cents, which was good for me. I started with a cent, and then two, and then four, and I was shocked how quickly that escalated to my disadvantage. I always thought the casinos were rigged and then did my research accordingly, and the result was exactly what OP explained. For those who don't want to trust in their belief, just trust in maths!

10 times in a row is not crazy streak lol  This is a common sequence that you see almost every time you play and place a large number of bets. The real madness is when you play dice (<> 49.5%) and get 40 losing bets in a row. It happened to me, but I tested different strategies and made a huge number of bets, and to see such a sequence, perhaps several hundred thousand bets were made.

25 losses in a row at 49.5, I guess make it to the world record series! That was my worst result ever with martingale and I thank God I was using play money on crypto-games only to have som fun to test a variation in the strategy (when switching low/high, what to do after 5 reds in a row etc.)
Never underestimate the power of randomness, it will always and I mean, always, surprise you. Mostly for the bad, almost never for the good.

In theory it could work, however many people forget that a roulette table has no memory and so you could in fact take black or red, or even/odd, randomly every time. A ball can go wrong 10 times in a row, then you have to bet a lot in round 11 to win it back. That's really not logical at all. 25 losses in a row, it could be possible, that is about 25 losses losing a coin toss, yeah hard bad luck

[shield132]

IMO the martingale strategy sacks because it's not for players on a budget and it never works and if the casino  has set a limit on total amount that can be wagered in a single round , this strategy isn't any good.

Some gamblers who used that strategy said that it works for them but it's a fact that the majority who tried it can say that it's not an ideal strategy for us.
But for some, it works for them, they're on the budget and it's true that you need a certain amount of bigger budget for committing this strategy.

So, you say that there is a guy that comes with 100 bitcoin, starts with the lowest amount and doubles on every loss. Finally, because of his high budget, he is able to take the wins and have a nice day at Ibiza during the whole summer. Cmon, if someone wins, that's because of luck! You can't beat mathematics with your budget, 1% house edge means that you have a disadvantage and in long term, the casino is guaranteed to profit!

I would like to know from gamblers what they do instead of doubling the bet on loss, since martingale is so horrible. If you don't raise your bet after a loss, you are never going to make any profit from gambling. That is my perception on this matter. For this reason people use martingale, because they want to have a chance to make profit at least on short run.

If there were better ways to gamble, would martingale be so popular?

And who said that you should profit from gambling? Every casino warns you to play for fun, not for profit. If you want to profit, then go work, do something.
Why is martingale popular? It's the simplest strategy that comes close to the humans minds. People think: When I lose, the chance of win next time increases, so let's double and get the loss back + some profit. Simple and easy, right?

[KTChampions]

10 times in a row is not crazy streak lol  This is a common sequence that you see almost every time you play and place a large number of bets. The real madness is when you play dice (<> 49.5%) and get 40 losing bets in a row. It happened to me, but I tested different strategies and made a huge number of bets, and to see such a sequence, perhaps several hundred thousand bets were made.

25 losses in a row at 49.5, I guess make it to the world record series! That was my worst result ever with martingale and I thank God I was using play money on crypto-games only to have som fun to test a variation in the strategy (when switching low/high, what to do after 5 reds in a row etc.)
Never underestimate the power of randomness, it will always and I mean, always, surprise you. Mostly for the bad, almost never for the good.

Not even close to record  
In terms of mathematics, in order to get such a series, you should do on average 2^(25+1) - 2 = 67108862 bets.
I calculated the probability for my streak (40) and it turned out that in order to get it I had to make more than 2 trillion bets  

[aioc]

The problem with personal experiences is that there is a lot of bias, if another member says that it has worked for them I believe them in the sense that I do not think they have suffered catastrophic losses yet, but the math is clear, martingale has been disproved mathematically over and over again as a technique that works as it does not change at all the probabilities of the game, taking this into account the only reasonable explanation for those that argue that it works is that they have simply not used the strategy long enough.

Another reason why they are not yet experiencing this is, they have a big wager that can cover a long roll and they know when to stop, the worse thing is to get caught by the house edge, you could be lucky when you are starting out because the house edge id not caught you yet but when they do even if you can cover 20 rolls you will eventually lose.

[ethereumhunter]

I would like to know from gamblers what they do instead of doubling the bet on loss, since martingale is so horrible. If you don't raise your bet after a loss, you are never going to make any profit from gambling. That is my perception on this matter. For this reason people use martingale, because they want to have a chance to make profit at least on short run.

If there were better ways to gamble, would martingale be so popular?

And who said that you should profit from gambling? Every casino warns you to play for fun, not for profit. If you want to profit, then go work, do something.
Why is martingale popular? It's the simplest strategy that comes close to the humans minds. People think: When I lose, the chance of win next time increases, so let's double and get the loss back + some profit. Simple and easy, right?

It is hard to profit from gambling because all of that will depend on luck and the skills that we have. People are playing gambling using the easiest thing or strategy that is no need many things to prepare. Most people who gamble do not want to learn too many details. If you are reason to play gambling because you enjoy the game, you do not have to raise the bet just to chase the win, but you only click the roll button and let the number show.

[mv1986]

I have seen crazy streaks in roulette of one color showing up more than 10 times in a row. It is insane, but from a statistical point of view absolutely possible. The OP explained very well how the mathematics work against you if you look at it from the opposite perspective. How many games do you have to apply the method such that your chance to lose is almost 100%, and there you have it. I admit when I was young and started playing a bit I also tried that out and I learned my lesson with cents, which was good for me. I started with a cent, and then two, and then four, and I was shocked how quickly that escalated to my disadvantage. I always thought the casinos were rigged and then did my research accordingly, and the result was exactly what OP explained. For those who don't want to trust in their belief, just trust in maths!

10 times in a row is not crazy streak lol  This is a common sequence that you see almost every time you play and place a large number of bets. The real madness is when you play dice (<> 49.5%) and get 40 losing bets in a row. It happened to me, but I tested different strategies and made a huge number of bets, and to see such a sequence, perhaps several hundred thousand bets were made.

Yes yes I concur with you absolutely! I just wanted to demonstrate that for someone who has no experience or is reluctant to accept maths or too dumb to understand it, a streak of 10 in a row of something seems so out of reach for them that they are the ones going to lose exactly because the think the martingale system MUST BE bullet proof.

I've never played dice a lot, but I feel you, trust me! These nights at the poker table and so on. I'm surprised I have never smashed a keyboard. I must be a calm guy! Haha!

[tabas]

IMO the martingale strategy sacks because it's not for players on a budget and it never works and if the casino  has set a limit on total amount that can be wagered in a single round , this strategy isn't any good.

Some gamblers who used that strategy said that it works for them but it's a fact that the majority who tried it can say that it's not an ideal strategy for us.
But for some, it works for them, they're on the budget and it's true that you need a certain amount of bigger budget for committing this strategy.

So, you say that there is a guy that comes with 100 bitcoin, starts with the lowest amount and doubles on every loss. Finally, because of his high budget, he is able to take the wins and have a nice day at Ibiza during the whole summer. Cmon, if someone wins, that's because of luck! You can't beat mathematics with your budget, 1% house edge means that you have a disadvantage and in long term, the casino is guaranteed to profit!

As I've said for others, they're saying that it works for them but not for me and for you and for the others too. I agree that the casino in the long term will always be the winner.
That's why house edge has been set and even it's just 1%, that's already a huge thing to profit with by the casino.

[STT]

the easiest thing or strategy

Path of least resistance this is known as, its the average determiner for many things especially outcomes and probability analysis.  The only way really to beat the odds is to do the hard work or take the long road in method to achieve a result thats not expected ie. a win for the operator is the usual outcome to expect normally.

Martingale is popular for its simplicity to comprehend, pass on as an urban legend and also execution is quite simple.   If we have a quite effective method its not likely absolute in its logic but a series of wins and losses that gives a net result that is a possible profit.   Its very hard to beat a house advantage, the best chance is vs other players in some shape or form and just know the game better.  Obviously there is poker for a direct game or sports betting is a bit more indirect and probably a few other games, I recommend all of those choices vs another attempt to make this 'system' work.