Topic: Blackjack Question (Read 1964 times)

Have you seen or heard of dealers that can place all cards in a deck / s ? So low cards first in the shoe and high cards last. Some dealers at casinos are very talented 

i think counting would be better than not counting even if only half the shoe thats 3 decks giving you some sort of an idea of how the shoe is...
I played at an Indian casino once that used an automatic shuffler to give you a fresh deck every deal and I did not do well there....

You can count cards on LIVE dealer casino, but it will not be effective. LIVE dealer burns a card each dealer change and each shoe. LIVE dealer ONLY deals "half" the deck before shuffling. This is to prevent card counters as it takes about half of a deck to get an accurate reading on the remaining shoe. The simple answer in to regular blackjack online is the simple fact that it is randomized each and every hand. Basically its as if each and every single hand is shuffeled and put back in to the deck. You could actually be dealt the same exact hand numerous times in a row exactly the same (although that very rarely happens).

when counting cards from a shoe you simply divide your count by how many decks are left resulting in whats called the true count. less accurate than playing with 1 or 2 decks but towards the end of the shoe you may find the cards in your favor like a lot. I have watched a shoe at the casino until the deck was favorable then threw a black chip into the circle and hit that 20 for a win. I have won the last 5 trips to the casino playing bj...
i have been considering making an excel spreadsheet that would keep count and try out the live online blackjack mwhahaha ... I actually think they might be playing with decks overly rich in low cards.. I hope I am wrong but it seems like it after watching for  awhile... 

When you are playing on the website find the rules. It may be hard to find but it should be there. Maybe on the actual game page under "help" or something.

Decks: how many decks are they using.

Soft 17: possibly written on the table, does the dealer hit when they have a 17 counting an Ace as 11 (it's better if they stay)

Double after split: can you do a double down after you split, probably written on the rules/help page, you can find by yourself by checking to see if there is a double down option after you do a split.

surrender: could be written on the table, definitely in the help rules, look at what options they give you when a hand starts. Surrender means you give up half your bet after looking at your cards and the dealer's up card.

Dealer peek: will the dealer check to make sure they have blackjack every time they have an ace or a 10 up to end the game immediately instead of letting you double/split, do anything.

Edit: just want to put on the record that following the chart will not guarantee success. it will bring down the house edge, but no chart can make you a favorite when you have 16 and the dealer has an ace. The chart gives the best option for all scenarios, but the best option doesn't mean that it is a good option, so don't think that you have cracked the code to blackjack, it is still a -ev game and that means more often than not the house will win.

Some casinos have a share a database of "faces" (They use facial recognition) and well if you are on the database they may ask you to leave. In addition some casinos have smart chips and track your bets, looking for signs of card counting

Nah the one he sent me doesn't have a live dealer. It's just automated.

I started playing a bit and got a bit. I'm going to withdraw now before I lose it

By the way what do I fill in for :

Decks:  1

Soft 17: 

Double After Split: 

Surrender: 

Dealer Peek:

but with online casino when you play with live dealer, you can sign the card exit ? or the dealer change deck shoe every xx minutes?

I have PMed u, you are very nice, I never got referrals before, maybe you will be my first referral. 

About strategy, I strictly follow the link http://wizardofodds.com/games/blackjack/strategy/calculator/  you can get specific strategy after you enter the house rule on that, Wizard of odds is the best gambling instruction site, you can find more here: http://wizardofodds.com/games/  Including all kinds of blackjack variants strategies, rules and so forth, I love this site cause if i don't have it, I wouldn't win money, or at least I could do less faults on BJ.

The casino play with more than a deck of card to prevent people from card counting and they can shuffle their deck whether they suspect people of counting cards. Before you have a chance to gain advantage by counting cards, you would have lose some money due to the casino edge.

From what I think (I'm not sure because I didn't count), a casino can shuffle cards when they like. Every time or every few hands .. anyway it is impossible to count them. Unless we are talking about "neighbor" casino

They should tell you if you ask, or you can look with your eyes. Unless they are using the machine that reshuffles the cards in after every hand you can look and tell the difference between 6 and 8 decks.

Single or double deck blackjack look like completely different games, and if you do find one it will be advertised (but they will also probably only give you 6:5 on blackjack, so it's usually not worth it.)

Knowing the total number of cards isn't that useful, the problem comes from how often they reshuffle. Even if you have a casino that won't/can't kick you out for card counting, they can just reshuffle sooner than normal so you don't have enough time to get/use useful info from card counting.

The movie "Rain man" (with Tom Cruise and Dustin Hoffman) not is more actualizzed for the new casinos with 8 deck shoes 

But every casino write of many deck shoes use? Or is a secret?

Yep, like from every bar and shop that's their property and they can invite there and kick out everyone who they like .. or not.

Their reason is that they are losing. You don't need to break a rule to get kicked out. They can't kick you out because you are in a protected class, but they can kick you out for ANY other reason, including "they don't like you."

Nice! let me look around the website. Thanks for all your help. If there is a referral link, you can PM that to me. Also do you have any strategies you go with? Or do you just use your gut feeling?

Single deck BJ, I played over 1k hands on betsoft single hand BJ, I am still up to 3 btc like that, should be fair game, or I can't win so much. The house edge should be less than 0.4%

Thanks! Now with all the information, out of all possible bitcoin casino games, which one would have the highest chance of winning? (Even if chances are winning are just a slim bit higher) Would it be Blackjack?

Now biggest casinos use reshuffle machine every hand, so counting cards in this kind of casinos won't work anymore, some gurus made enough money from counting cards many years ago, but they can't do it now, unless they play in casinos don't reshuffle every hand.

And online BJ reshuffles every hand too, it is harder to beat the house now, although BJ has lowest house edge compared to other games, what we need to win is luck, and follow strategy book, you can find it on wizardofodds.com 

Yes, that's why they normally use more than one deck. Otherwise if you got a 9 of hearts, you know the chance of another card also being a 9 was 25% reduced. Actually under a lot of common rule variations if casinos only used a single deck (even reshuffling on each hand) it would be possible to play +EV. But with multiple decks, the information gain you get from seeing each card becomes absolutely tiny.

I mean if you're playing with more than one deck, wouldn't the chance of getting 9 of hearts and 9 of hearts again be possible?

Yes you mean picture cards ? Of course that's why you sometimes get a good run of cards for dealers and players.

Oh I didn't know they use 6-8 packs of different cards. If they did, wouldn't the same card have a chance of appearing more than once?

of course for online blackjack you dont have any clue what is going on unless its a live online game.

but as far as casinos its seems it would be impossible.   even if they weren't always shuffled.  I mean counting 1 deck seems hard enough and must be done with a group now imagine 8 decks.



But I mean maybe some one out there is able to but would seem pretty crazy to think they could keep it up.

It would be simple if for instance the cards weren't shuffled every hand which is what most sites do and you don't know if they're using 6 or 8 packs of cards.

Agreed. That method was like used in Vegas decades ago. It should be flawed and the method won't work today because of the decks used by casinos.

How could counting cards work if most casinos use 8 deck shoes.  counting cards is a thing of the past.

Card counting is usually done in teams and I don't think there is a set rule that prevents it but it is frowned upon by the Floor Casinos and if they found you counting cards then they ban you from playing there forever, this is the official punishment, others unofficial punishments might include other things. It gives players unfair advantage and which is why it is considered cheating and hence Casinos don't allow card counters.

You can give it a shot in online casinos but it won't work, if it did a lot of people would have done it by now and had gotten rich.

Really? I thought if you just followed the rules, they wouldn't have a reason to kick you.

Also maybe it's not dependent on your bet size. It could just be letting you know when you should hit or stay.

it's not cheating, but casinos do not have to accept your bet if they don't want to, and they won't want to if they know that you can count cards successfully.

You can try online but it just won't work. They reshuffle after every hand so the amount of information you can pick up on one hand is nowhere near enough to impact your decision making on that hand, and it can't impact your bet size because you have to make your bet before you see any cards.

Hmm I was wondering why you couldn't do it online. I really don't find any part of this as cheating as it's just based on your memory and your own mathematics.

Also I watched the Ocean's Trilogy which made me watch Bringing Down the House a couple of hours ago .

That is why people count cards. If you know what cards have been dealt, you know what cards are left in the shoe and can adjust your bet size and/or strategy appropriately.

It is not as easy as you would think, there is lots to remember, most casinos will burn the first card (and another on the dealer change), they do not go all the way through the shoe so you have less time to take advantage of the information if you can remember it, most casinos can kick you out if they feel like it, and you being able to beat them at blackjack is one of their favorite reasons.

Edit: read "bringing down the house" or watch the movie 21 for a slightly fictionalized version of the MIT blackjack team's adventures in Vegas.

Edit 2: don't try this online because most online casinos reshuffle the entire 6/8 deck shoe after every hand because they can.

I was watching this video on youtube and it brought up a good point. Say you are gambling in a Las Vegas casino. The odds on most game a placed so that the odds of you winning are slightly lower than the house.

So, for example in roulette. If you roll a 36 on the first turn, it does not affect your second roll. Just because you got a 36 first turn doesn't make your odds lower to get a 36 on the second turn, it's the same.

This is the same for the game craps. If you roll a 7 on a roll, it has no affect on the outcome of the second roll.

But how about Blackjack?

You can count the cards that have appeared from the other players and the house and you can use that to your advantage on whether to bet or not.

Thoughts?