Inportant Note
A few months ago, in response to a lot of input, support, and encouragement (a.k.a. "pressure" 😎) from long time supporter, Matthew, we launched a "Discord Server".
Discord basically serves as a "chat room" to allow Players to interact with each other about the app. It's a great place to share screenshots and discuss the app.
I still prefer "Send Feedback" when it comes to addressing bugs because it starts a text message thread and I don't have to pay a lot of attention to yet, another app.
Also, a text conversation is more private (although we are able to take advantage of Direct Messages on Discord).
It's a ton of extra work that does not amuse me, but please be aware of it if you have concerns or want to interact with other RBG Players!
What I appreciate most about it is that it's easy to share screenshots and it's accessible from devices that don't support text messages (like Matthew's iPad).
You can find a link/invitation to the server on the home page if you're interested.
Dice Randomization
Of all the games I’ve added to Riverboat Gambler, Craps (and, later, Crapless Craps) is by far the one of which I am most proud.
It was originally requested by a long-time supporter, Bishop Bryan Oullette, who regularly challenged me to step outside of my comfort zone and add games that were not easy to code.
In all dice games, the die values are 100% random; at least as random as I can make them given the tools at my disposal. I honestly cannot speak to the impact that physics has on two (or three) dice that are rolled on a table.
Does "how" a Shooter holds or stacks the dice before he or she rolls have any influence the outcome? I don’t know. I also cannot reproduce that scenario in this mobile app. If it's possible, I lack those skills.
In each dice game, a process executes and it produces the random values for the dice before the dice start "rolling". Then, a cheesy animation sequence executes to "roll the dice" and ultimately display the values that were randomly generated before the animation sequence started.
After the animation, the real work occurs: RBG evaluates the wagers that were made and resolves those wagers based on the results of the dice.
For the folks "way in the back": this means that there is no relationship to how many wagers, which wagers, or how much you wager. The process is simple: generate random dice values, execute some animation to make the dice "roll", end the animation and ensure the dice display the previously generated values.
Then, the real heavy lifting happens. The rules of the game are applied, winning wagers are paid, losing wager are forfeit, and animation is trigger to move wagers on the board and to apply any wagers that are required by the "Dealer Assist" feature that exists in "Preferences".
Recently, there was a HUGE spike in the number of folks who started downloading Riverboat Gambler to play/practice Craps.
It became the most played game in the app at 13% of the games played on a daily basis.
I NEVER saw THAT coming! It has been beyond humbling!
However, there was also a spike in bad reviews that were specifically about the randomness of the dice. I was literally accused of "rigging the dice to get people to spend money".
I can't lie. Those types of comments really piss me off! 😡
But, given that those folks were "fair enough" to leave constructive criticism, I highly doubt that they were malicious developers who were trying to disparage my brand and drive my rating down (other developers really try to do that! 😂).
On the contrary, I like to believe they were just honest people who were looking for a reliable Craps simulator and they had "concerns".
Whether or not their concerns were prejudiced by their experiences with other apps that lean towards letting Players win was too complex to debate.
As I always have, I felt an obligation to try to make RBG better and to do my best to address those concerns because
Dice Randomization Beta Program
At the end of the day, my options are limited for generating random dice values between 1 and 6. Of course, if someone wants to send me a check for $75K-$150K to contract a cryptographic randomization expert in order to make this free app "perfect", I'll cash the check and find that expert! 😀
In an attempt to address the concerns that were being voiced, I found an alternate option for randomizing dice rolls and I conducted a two-week beta test with 80+ members of the Riverboat Gambler Player Community.
Of those folks, about a dozen actively participate and provided comprehensive results from their testing.
The goal of the beta test was to have Players "roll the dice" and let me know what they thought. Given that the dice were already intended to be random and that the only change was to how two random numbers between 1 and 6 were generated, the results were always going to be subjective.
The real question that needed to be answered was "do the dice 'feel' random".
At the end of the test, I was prepared to replace the legacy algorithm with the newer algorithm from the beta test. However, I decided not to do that. Instead, I created a Preference setting to allow the Player to choose between the routine that has existed since 2019 ("Legacy") and the newer process from 2025.
While I don't have independent data to support the original random number generator, I feel they are both more than adequate for the purposes of a casino simulator. So, I leave the choice up to you - the Player.
I invested a great deal of time doing my best to have the dice independently validated. That was time that I could have used to enhance RBG by adding new games and new, cool features.
I cannot over emphasize that this is the best/most I can do. I will not do it again. It took a lot of work to coordinate and conduct the beta test and the folks who participated were unselfish in evaluating the newer algorithm. They were not compensated. They did it purely out of goodwill.
If, after all of this work, someone stills feels they are being taken advantage of, I can only wish them "Good Luck" in dealing with their paranoia and their persecution complex.
I'm committed to providing an excellent app; not being a mental health counselor. 😉
Evaluating the Beta Test
The table below shows what one should reasonably expect, over time, the results of two, six-sided dice to produce:
| Value | Probabilty | |
| 2 | 2.78% | |
| 3 | 5.56% | |
| 4 | 8.33% | |
| 5 | 11.11% | |
| 6 | 13.89% | |
| 7 | 16.67% | |
| 8 | 13.89% | |
| 9 | 11.11% | |
| 10 | 8.33% | |
| 11 | 5.56% | |
| 12 | 2.78% |
Both Craps & Crapless Crap include a feature that tracks the history of ALL ROLLS (across ALL sessions) and uses those results to generate a histogram of those rolls. This histogram can be accessed from the "Roll History" option on the game menu by tapping the chart icon in the top right corner of the Roll History screen. The histogram will only be generated after at least 200 rolls have been completed.
The expectation with the histogram is that, over time, the results will display a perfect Bell Curve where 7, the most common roll of two dice (with a probability of 16.67%), will be the middle/peak of the curve.
The histogram was designed so that the graph bars are colored to denote deviations of 1%, 2%, 5%, and more than 5% of the expected outcomes for each potential roll value.
Results
The histogram images below are from some of the Players who participated in the Beta Test. It would take way too long and require too much work to try to publish ALL results.
My apologies to the folks who helped to evaluate the new routine but don't see their results here. It's a lot of work to move screenshots from my phone to the website and update this HTML page.
I did not apply a lot of rigor to the testers. I simply asked that they periodically submit screenshots of their histograms AND to let me know if they "felt" the results were not random.
My results, listed first, contain the greatest number of screenshots because I have the ability to run an automated Test Harness that simply rolls the dice continuously and leverages the Dealer Assist feature to handle wagering.
My screenshots were not scheduled. They were simply captured each time I decided to run another series or I realized a volume of rolls had completed.
| Danny's Results |
 |
| 358 rolls |
 |
| 818 rolls |
 |
| 988 rolls |
 |
| 1171 rolls |
 |
| 1929 rolls |
 |
| 2362 rolls |
 |
| 2523 rolls |
 |
| 2663 rolls |
 |
| 3512 rolls |
 |
| 4556 rolls |
 |
| 4759 rolls |
| Alex's Results |
 |
| 358 rolls |
 |
| 695 rolls |
| Bruce's Results |
 |
| 200 rolls |
 |
| 305 rolls |
 |
| 400 rolls |
| Joe's Results |
 |
| 257 rolls |
 |
| 273 rolls |
 |
| 305 rolls |
 |
| 344 rolls |
 |
| 520 rolls |
 |
| 883 rolls |
| Cindi's Results |
 |
| 352 rolls |
 |
| 582 rolls |
 |
| 807 rolls |
 |
| 925 rolls |
 |
| 968 rolls |
Honestly, if someone has read this far into this page, has reviewed these results, and still believes that "Danny is trying to screw me", they need to "swipe left".
They are not a match for Riverboat Gambler.
My philosophy is simple: I love working with Players who appreciate the hard work that goes into this app. Paranoid folks need to "move on".
I do not exist to provide you with hours of free entertainment when you will never be entertained nor satisfied. Your best bet is to write your own app. 🤷