BJ Aptitude Quiz Question

Just a little test quiz. Would first like to have a few novices try answering the quiz first. Let's see how this turns out. SB

Prior to placing an original bet into the circle, the count will certainly be a major factor in the determination of the proper bet size. Given such, what will be the quality of "bet size" accuracy when placing an initial bet into the circle in the first base position (first player to receive cards)?

A. Best
B. Worst
C. The same as any other position.
D. Second best. Third base is most accurate when the count is a factor for bet sizing.

I don�t know that the phrase quality of �bet size� accuracy is that clear. I think I know what you are driving at. Here is a suggested restatement:

Given the hypothetical situation that you are �required� to play a fixed or Basic Strategy and not vary your play (or insurance decisions) with the count, what is the best seat to sit it. Consider sitting at first base . Is it:

A. Best
B. Worst
C. The same as any other position.
D. Second best.

Now for a better questions:

There are some advantages to sitting at first base. Identify them.

I am happy to answer this question on Green Chip; I am not sure if I will answer it here.

First base is best if you have a slopy dealer for seeing what the second card is in the pack because it's going to be your first. Also, your eyes are not so noticable to the pit.

3B is best for deeper pen before making play decisions.

Mid field is best for blocking out other players and being able to spread more often to two or three hands for shoe end play.

Okay here is my understanding. If for example the TC is +5 at the end of a round. The first base should have high cards. Now, I would think that as the cards come out the TC will tend to go down more often than up. The TC staying the same is not really clear to me even with depletion of the cards since the tendency should be always to go to neutral. Thus, the 3rd base will be dealt for example at TC +4. Again, this is just guessing.

...TC is +5 at the end of a round. The first base should have high cards.

Assuming you mean that 1B should get high cards more so than the rest of the table on the next round. This is not true. Everyone including the dealer are now about to play with the remainder of a pack that is respective of a +5TC. You must realize that there are still small cards randomly mixed throughout this remaining +5TC pack and not necessessarily will 1B or any other position have any better chance of receiving the aces and faces.

Once the TC gets to whatever it happens to get to, on average it will remain there to the end. However, as the RC returns toward zero, the TC will, on average, remain. There are others on this board that should be able to shead more light on the subject and explain the math of how this happens.

The TC should stay the same. Think about this. You have a +4 count, which means you have 4 extra tens, distributed uniformly (in theory) over the remaining decks to be played. The TC is calculated:

TC = RC / decks_remaining.

and for this discussion we have been using exact TC, which means using decks_remaining to the exact card.

SO, for the current round, suppose we have 26 cards left, with a RC of +3. Since there is exactly 1/2 deck left (26/52 cards) we get a TC = 3 / .5 = 6.0

Now we play a round, and say both the dealer and you get an 8/9 for a push.

TC = 3 (RC unchanged) / 22/52 = 3 / .423 = +7. TC just went up.

That's the issue here.

The idea is that the RC tends toward zero (it obviously must get to zero eventually) but the TC tends to remain the same over the course of the deck/shoe.

if you play shoe games, where the decks remaining never goes below 1.0, this is not hard to grasp. Where you need to get out the duct tape is when you start playing SD/DD where decks remaining drops below 1.0 frequently, and that makes the math look very strange, even though it is correct.

For example, in a SD game with 1/4 deck remaining, a single 10 coming out drops the RC by 1, but the TC by 4, which seems odd.