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Blackjack - give me some smarts.
balerbower
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
I'll be having a night at the casino with a close friend of mine. Instead of playing all the different tables, I've decided to just focus my attention on one arena in hopes of more success - that'll be blackjack. Now, of course, I'll be doing all my google "research" beforehand so I can get familiar with house rules, number guessing, tips, tricks and all that.
However, there are a few questions I have that can't be answered by these online articles. Also, I could use some folk wisdom by those out there more familiar with the game.
Here are the questions I have:
1) Are initial bets laid out blind, that is, before you receive your hand, or afterwards?
2) Do most casinos go by the shoe (multiple decks ranging from 4-8) or by singular/double decks?
Any other advice would be much appreciated. Thanks.
However, there are a few questions I have that can't be answered by these online articles. Also, I could use some folk wisdom by those out there more familiar with the game.
Here are the questions I have:
1) Are initial bets laid out blind, that is, before you receive your hand, or afterwards?
2) Do most casinos go by the shoe (multiple decks ranging from 4-8) or by singular/double decks?
Any other advice would be much appreciated. Thanks.
balerbower on
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1) You lay out a bet in order to be dealt in. In certain circumstances you can increase this bet.
2) 90% of the tables I've seen in Reno/Vegas are multi-deck shoe games.
Generally blackjack is played by comparing your hand to the dealers open card. Since he is so incredibly likely to have a 10 in the hole, you just assume that he does, and thus anything from 2-5 means he is very likely to bust out. In those hands you do what you can to increase your stake, by splitting pairs, doubling down, etc. Personally I always double down on 10 and 11 (though not all casinos allow it on 10), and unless the dealer is showing 7 I stay on 13. Always split aces, split 10s if he is showing a 4 or 5 if you are feeling lucky (odds are good he'll bust).
Don't use any sort of system involving betting more money after you've lost. Don't take a cash advance on your credit card. Don't throw good money after bad. Don't get a drink every time the waitress comes around, wait until every other time.
Good luck.
Casinos generally use multiple decks; helps minimize card-counting.
You should play the minimum bet each time, and double that bet whenever you feel 'lucky'. Hopefully you'll profit.
Double down whenever you're dealt a total of 9 to 11 from your two cards, odds are you will hit ~20 and youve increased your bet. yay you.
Always split if you receive same cards, unless they total 10 or 11, in that case you might want to wing it for one more card maybe double down.
These are some simple techniques, ive only played casually, im sure more info will come to light here.
even has a customizable BJ game that'll teach you basic strategy.
You start with the initial bet for blackjack before you see your cards, and the only case when you are increasing it is if you double down or split, and you have to follow the specific rules for those if you do.
This is why people lose way more money than they should playing BJ.
Surrender really only matters if you can do it early, and make sure blackjack pays 3 to 2 or better. When I was in Vegas I did see some one deck tables, but it seemed like on the majority they cut the blackjack pay out to attempt compensate for the advantage of counting.
You aren't talking about my strategy are you? I've actually had pretty good odds with that
Also, another easy game you might want to try is Mini-Baccarat. In this game, cards are drawn for a player and a banker. Whoever has the higher value in cards is the winner. You play by betting which is going to be the winner.
Playing mini-baccarat has a simple strategy, just bet on the bank everytime, as it has the statistical advantage by a little bit.
The casino will take about 5% of your winnings as commission. That's how they make money.
You've just been on the right side of variance. There's no difference between you playing alone against the dealer, or at a full table, what the person next to you does has no impact on your cards in the long run.
Crib sheet to basic strategy from the Wizard. I cannot stress enough to read through the blackjack site and play a dozen hands of blackjack with their game to learn basic strategy.
Also, never take even money (you have blackjack, dealer is showing an Ace, you get paid 1:1 instead of 3:2), it's the same as taking insurance, but I couldn't find where the Wizard wrote about it.
Wrong.
Card counting is a waste of time for most people, but it's statistically sound. If you can do it well enough and have a lot of money behind you to start with (tens of thousands of dollars), you can get a slight edge on the casino and make money over time. The problem is that it's fairly easy to spot and you will get kicked out if you start making money on it.
Nope. On average, it doesn't matter that the other players do.
This thing is alright at teaching you when you should hit/stand/split/whatever, although it's only right for a specific set of rules.
Oh, and don't touch anything that says '6 to 5 blackjack', that's not really blackjack and has a far higher edge for the house.
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Yea, so I see you're one of "those" dudes.
Look, in my experience everyone who plays blackjack for a while goes through this "card counting" phase. Everyone wants to be the winner, everyone wants to beat the house. Nobody wants to be at a disadvantage. Usually, people get over this phase and afterwards they either stop playing blackjack or accept blackjack for what it is and just hope they get lucky every once in a while.
The thing about card counting that makes it so appealing is that without it, blackjack is just a game where if you play it for an infinitely long time you always end up losing money, no matter what. If you haven't lost money yet it's just because you haven't played long enough. Make no mistake, you will lose money, that is a fact and it's a hard one to face.
Just when your stack of chips start getting big and it feels like nobody can stop you from winning you get punished for your hubris, and now you're nobody again; A piece of shit, probably coming out with much less than what you started with (and that's if you're disciplined enough to walk away before it all goes to 0).
So that's where card counting comes in. Yea, we've all seen the movie 21. Maybe even read books about card counting.
But remember this: Card Counting is the biggest lie Casinos have ever sold to people.
You're right that most people can't card count for shit and often end up blowing away more money by attempting to do it. Casinos know this better than anyone, so they love to play up the whole "O MAN DOn't count our cards you might steal all our money!" angle.
So what's your reward for being a super expert card counter?
Well if you're average bet is $100, congratulations, you win an average of $1 for every hand you play.
For those who don't want to do the math, that basically means you're making bullshit money, while at the same time putting yourself at tremendous risk.
See, it's not enough to just count cards. When things are in your favor you HAVE to bet BIG or else you are counting for no reason really. The problem is, it's still perfectly possible that you can lose, and that means you might lose some very big bets indeed. That's why you have to have a lot of money, because when you lose those massive bets you have to win that money back somehow, and the solution to that is simply to bet more money.
Except, a lot of times the casino might not let you try to win back that money. The casino watches for card counters carefully. They aren't going to kick you out while you still have a big ass pile of chips, but the second you blow most of your money a pitboss will probably come over and take you out of the casino. Usually they welcome you to play anything besides blackjack, knowing you'll just lose more money.
What all this translates to is that card counting is a shitload of hard work. You have to concentrate a lot on cards, keep track of the numbers, manage your money, and at the same time keep yourself hidden from pit bosses. On top of that, casinos use strategies such as multiple decks of cards and random reshuffling to make your life even harder.
Since the goal is to actually make money, Card counting is basically like a very shitty job. It isn't fun and the pay isn't great. I don't understand why anyone would do it. You can earn more money a lot easier by just working your regular job.
So because of all this, we can conclude that yes, Card Counting is a waste of time.
However, Blackjack can still be fun to play for the sake of entertainment. Blackjack can be a pretty social game and if you play at a good table with a good dealer and good people time can just fly by.
And, if you're lucky, it's still possible to win big money in very little time in Blackjack, without card counting. I managed to turn $25 into well over a thousand dollars a few times in all my time playing.
When I play, I play with only two betting systems: Flat Betting and Paroli style betting. These are the only two I recommend you use.
Flat betting is simple to understand, just bet the same amount every time on every hand, usually the table minimums. It's not necessary really to increase your bet because every once in a while you'll get those splits and double downs that bring you in some good money. Your money lasts a long time with flat betting.
Paroli Style however is the one that has the most potential for big payouts, and is how I turned that $25 chip into $1000+ dollars. It's a positive progression betting system and it's amazingly simple: Every time you win, just stack your profit on top of the last bet and bet that whole amount. If you manage to win several times in a row, this will cause your profits off a single chip to grow exponentially. It's the power of compound interest.
Winning streaks do happen in blackjack, it's just that they are hard to predict. Occasionally, if you catch one with a paroli style bet, you can earn BIG money.
So if you start with a $25 chip, the amount of money you bet each time goes like this
$25 --> $50 --> $100 --> $200 --> $400 --> $800 --> $1600 --> $3200
So in this case, if you had won 7 times in a row, you would end up with 3200 dollars. By comparison, to do that with flat betting, you would have to win 128 $25 bets to get 3200 dollars
Of course the reality is that winning 7 times in a row is quite difficult and rather rare. So it's more likely you will lose your money before making it that far. However, winning 2 or 3 times in a row is certainly possible, but again, you are always more likely to just lose your money. I rarely chase after a long streak though. I'm happy if I get 3 wins in a row and usually stop at there.
The good thing is though, that if you do lose your money you've really only lost that initial investment of $25 from your bankroll. Sure, the money you are winning along the way is technically yours, but I prefer not to think of it that way. I see this more as a bet on whether or not I will win "X" hands in a row, a bet that I often lose, but for very little risk.
Don't get sucked into it though, I don't recommend using this system ALL the time because its tendency to lose will eat into your bankroll very easily, so use it only when you feel a win streak coming on. This system also poses some dilemmas too if you end up getting a double down or a split hand in the middle of your win streak.
EDIT: Oh whoops you said it's a waste of time, not that it doesn't work. In that case yeah, no shit.
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2)Blackjack hands go by very fast in comparison to some other table games. Even though the odds aren't that bad, you can run through money very quickly.
3)Table limits tend to be lower on weeknights.
4)In my experience, single deck shoes are only available if you are willing to play $100 or more a hand.
5)Sign up for a player's card first thing and have your play rated.
Glad someone else mentioned this and just so there's no confusion of whether it's table left, or dealer's left -- basically, you want to avoid being the person at the table who is dealt cards last.
The reason for this is that the last box has a small amount of influence over the probability of the dealer getting certain cards -- for instance, if there have been no tens showing up until your turn, and it would be beneficial for the table were the dealer not to get a ten (if say, they're on 11), you might be expected to try and 'draw the ten out' as it becomes increasingly likely that the next card will be a ten.
Obviously, the cards are random and there's no real way to genuinely influence the cards in this way but this is just my experience -- the more you play, the more you start to get a feel for the 'rhythm' of the cards and the expected etiquette of the game.
If you're playing on a low stakes table, it's rare such things will be an issue and hopefully there will be a real comraderie of the players at the table and likely the dealer too. A table like that is the best way to learn the game and have an enjoyable time.
When I first started playing, I was with a more experienced friend and rather than play my own hand, I just bet on his box -- now, I don't think this is something you can do in every casino -- but for me that was a good way to be introduced to the game, as my friend was able to explain why he would choose to hit/stick in certain situations.
Good luck and have fun!
Uh no, I explained why Card counting is a waste of time for anyone. Which was not what you said.
But my advice for gambling in general that has worked for me is to set aside a certain gambling budget and write it off as a loss. Think of it as an entertainment expense. Then, when you're playing with that money, any decent winnings you get, you put aside and don't bet. Then, after your "budget" is gone, any winnings you have are now money that you didn't have before, and can spend on things like souvenirs or can take home to spend.
1. I would avoid sitting at the last spot even if you do know basic strategy. In general, if you cause the table to lose even if you do play correctly, others may feel your play was wrong if they don't know basic strategy.
2. I found the low stakes table at the casinos I went to, to be the worst. That's where you have random people walking by, blowing $50 in one go. If that's the case, partner with a buddy and play at a $10 table $5 tables available, or $20 if there's only $10, etc. It also depends on when you go, weekends are where you find the stupid/crazy, if it's a weekday, it's a lot less hectic.
Tipping: I'm sure everyone has their own rules, but I feel like you SHOULD tip if you've been on a good run with a dealer (winning 8/10, 15/20, etc). Yes, it'll eat away at your winnings, reduces your edge, but those people are working, and hopefully providing a fun time for you. If you just want to play blackjack and earn money/comps, play at those video blackjack games. You rack up more points, won't have to worry about tipping, and you won't feel pressured.
If by some chance you've blanked, or are not sure what to do, it's better to ask the dealer, and he/she will tell you what the book would do. The casinos don't want people around you giving you bad advice and costing you money.