BlackJack on Indian Reservations

If you (and I) can keep most our posts as short and concise as DD', bigplayer, PitViper, etc. we will be getting somewhere.

I've still got a long way to go.

Amen, brahdda. You and me both. :)

One thing- without email, and in the absence of any other posts (other than Umm's), it was hard to know if anyone agreed with me in the thread with forking. Even just a no-text "yep" would work.

If ppl wanna try and reinforce the good info, especially when someone's spouting bad info, strength of numbers is always good.

Cheers,

Coop

...it seems to me that the simplest solution is to get some pals, or even just go yourself, and count the cards in a shoe.

And when I say "count the cards", I mean to *truly* count the cards. Say you can find 3 pals to go with. All four of you stand behind a table and backcount during the play.

One guy counts the 2s, 3s, 4s; another guy takes the 5s, 6s, 7s; third guy takes the 8s, 9s, Aces; last guy takes all the ten-point cards.

Granted, you're going to miss the burn card, and you're going to miss whatever is behind the cut card so depending on pen you'll miss a deck or two out of six... but if you do this for, say, 5 or 6 shoes you *should* have enough of a representation to see if the cards are in the proper percentages for how they were played.

The other option, of course, is to go early enough to see them actually checking the cards prior to the first shuffle. I can't imagine a casino that didn't do this, although I'm sure somewhere one exists.

But seeing the dealer bust open the decks of cards, spread them, double-check they're all in there, and then start shuffling them into the shoes is perhaps the most direct method of ensuring that you're playing a reasonably non-fixed game.

Coop

Hopefully, it has been long enough the casino won't be able to ID me.

About two years ago in a Indian casino, I played a 6 deck shoe with 4 1/2 to 3/4 dealt. They were having a bonus pay on all blackjacks. But, there seemed to be a lot of 5's and 6's being played. The table was full with a crowd around the tables waiting to play, so I decided to flat bet the minimum bet and started counting only the fives. After counting the fourth shoe and finding more than 20 5's dealt in each shoe, I started commenting to the dealer and the table in general that there seemed more than the normal number of 5's and 6's in the shoe. A few times I even hit hard 13's and 14's against a dealer's bust hand commenting as I did, "Give me one of those extra 5's".

The pit manager, who I was on good terms and had been around outside the casino, came over and told me If I really thought that, I was welcome to watch them count down the cards when they closed for the night. At closing time, yes some small casinos close their table games during the middle of the week, I was hanging around near the table talking to a couple of people and waiting for them to start closing tables. It became obvious that the table in question was going to be the last one closed. The pit manager quickly left the area and soon a security guard come up and told me and my friends that the casino did not want people around the blackjack pit while it was being closed and we needed to leave the area. I told him the pit manager said we could watch the dealers count down the cards. The security guard said, "Well he isn't here now and it our security procedure that no one is near the tables while they are closing them for the night". Since I did not want to experience back rooming by a tribe that considers itself independent of US laws, I left the area. From a distance I watch as all of the dealers left the pit and the assistant manager counted down the cards at the table in question.

I have never felt comfortable in small casinos since than. What was really weird was that most of the players were so bad, the casino could have put extra ACEs in the deck and they players would still quickly lose their money.

Maybe they thought since they were having a bonus night of paying 2:1 on all blackjacks, it was ok to add some extra five and sixes to keep the house edge the same.

...Bryce Carlson recounts a time when he saw a guy playing single deck double down on a pair of 7s against the dealer's 5, and this while betting the table maximum. (Totally suicidal play, of course; BS says split them first, or just stand and let the dealer bust makes a lot more sense, but this guy doubles down.)

Guy gets the third 7 to make 21 against the dealer's 19 (dealer had a 3 in the hole, hits an ace for the 19.)

The guy basically grabs his stash and gets the hell out of the casino. Pit bosses can't believe what they saw. Phone rings at the pit boss station, PB talks for a minute then comes back to the table and closes it. Shift boss shows up, fans out the deck, they count...

...FIVE sevens in the deck.

Now, obviously there's a lot easier ways to make a lot of money than slipping a few extra 7s into a deck of cards. You'd have to be quick and good but I suppose it could be done, even without the dealer's knowlege.

But it wouldn't surprise me at all to hear an Indian casino is screwing around with its patrons and adding a few extra 5s and 6s into their shoes. And as folks have pointed out, without a state gaming commission to answer to, who's going to call them on it if they get caught?

Coop

the Indians have a free-for-all. If something significant ever goes wrong in Indian territory, about the only thing you can do is to sue the Dept. of Interior and Bureau of Indian Affairs in Federal Court. Hopefully they will feel the heat someday for giving the Indians a right to such freedom and lawlessness.

There are also periods where players seem to win all the hands. Perhaps when you suggest that the players change tables they are a little bit smarter than you think and realize how silly that is. If you are a skilled player then you will probably lose a great deal more money to the fear of being cheated and the precautions you take to avoid it than you would of actually being cheated... similar to the way most players lose a great deal more money to the fear of getting barred than they could possibly ever lose from actual barrings.

Cheating is very rare. The worse cases that I've come across myself were unfair calls by the floor in cases of disputes. I've also been familiar with a couple of peek and deal cases that were targeted against a particular advantage player. But a dealer just standing there cheating all the players at the table out of most of the hands dealt? It just doesn't happen. I believe you've observed some stretches of a dealer being very hot, something that happens quite often.

DD' wrote: "...But a dealer just standing there cheating all the players at the table out of most of the hands dealt? It just doesn't happen. I believe you've observed some stretches of a dealer being very hot, something that happens quite often."

DD', let's assume that the dealer was above-board. Then, in this case, the dealer would be in the stretches of being very hot ["in the zone"].

How would you handle the very hot dealer with the best pen & best rules in town, assuming you had lost 55 top bets (say... totalling $55,000) during the last 4 hours playing alone with the dealer?

Do you keep playing until you get wiped out of your entire triproll? I'm pretty certain that a dealer in the zone could probably take a big chuck out of yours (or anybodyelse's) bankroll before the end of his shift. You get to be a victim of a "zoned" dealer at least once in order to believe that.

Sometimes ago, I received some good responses about flux (see below). Since the flux and the dealer in the zone are interrelated, DD', I like to see your comments about them too.

Your take on the above questions will be greatly appreciated.

Previously I wrote:

Bigplayer wrote: "Flux goes both ways. There is no way to expolit it however since positive and negative flux are all completely random. You don't know that the dealer busted "hand after hand" until after the fact. Hindsite is always 20-20."

Dr. Kenneth T Pittman, Ph.D., CIS wrote "...On more than one ocassion it has been a friendly dealer that has quietly and discreetly let me know that the cards were cold - or, that the shoe currently being dealt from was a "bad shoe" - or, that the players currently seated at the table were a bunch of knuck-heads. --- I can't even begin to count the amount of money that I've saved just by simply having a congenial relationship with the staff and fellow players..."

According to Bigplayer, luck is unpredictable. I assume that a good shoe may turn into a bad one in an instant without warning, and it'll rob you of your entire triproll when pumping your bets to the max during an unpredictable run of cards.

On the other hand, Pittman, a PhD in computer science, implied that luck is predictable. He seemed to state that he saved money when he walked away from hot dealers, and made more money when he played against cold dealers.

I personally don't know what to believe. Is Bigplayer right, or is Dr. Pittman wrong? However, commonsense tells me that vicissitudes of lady luck do exist. With that vicissitudes in mind, I should abandone a table when a "lucky" dealer beat the sh*t out of me, i.e., his 10ace vs my 21, his 20 vs my 19, his 19 vs my 18, his 22 vs my 22, etc... After getting a bloody nose for a while, I'll move definitely to another thin-cut dealer. My retreat in the face of defeat may not be for the badluck reason, but it's surely for the psychological reason. I believe the psycho-war is a part of the game (for me at least).

How would you guys handle killer dealers? After taking a beating, do you still stay on and on with the same dealer to a point where you would underbet during high count situations? Personally, it's psychologically difficult for me to push out those big bets when the dealer becomes the magician who flips his cards to beat me like these: his 10ace vs my 21, his 20 vs my 19, his 19 vs my 18, his 22 vs my 22, etc... So any enlightenment is greatly appreciated.

Then these were great responses from the regulars:

Don't be fooled by Academic titles

Posted By: Francis Salmon
Date: 19 Jan 04, 3:13 am

In Response To: Flux, how do you handle it? (Chloe)

I'm sure your Dr. Pittman didn't get his title for a study on probability theory. Bigplayer is the much better expert in that field.
For behaving in the face of a "hot" dealer, my advice would be to stay on as long as the count is high and certainly not to underbet.You should stay for more shoes if this "magician" has managed to chase other players away so you get in more hands per hour .
When I lose maxbet after maxbet I usually get horribly upset and continue charging like mad as long as I have the edge.Being "stubborn" in these situations is also good for cover purposes. You will look like a compulsive gambler and very often get an invitation for dinner after such a dreadful shoe.
Blackjack is not a game for superstitious or anxious people and cheating can almost always be ruled out.

Francis Salmon

"Hot" dealers

Posted By: John May
Date: 19 Jan 04, 4:12 am

In Response To: Flux, how do you handle it? (Chloe)

I don't know what the usually lucid Pitman is getting at, but the "hot/cold" dealer phenomena doesn't exist, unless a dealer is cheating. The more you play, the more you win, on average.

Conditions - Conditions - Conditions

Posted By: bfbagain
Date: 19 Jan 04, 7:45 am

In Response To: Flux, how do you handle it? (Chloe)

Positive and negative fluxuations will continue from table to table, dealer to dealer, # of decks dealt to # of decks dealt, and casino to casino.

This is what constitiutes the "streak" phenomena that are session wins and losses, e.g.; 15 wins in a row, 7 losses in a row etc.

Remember, it really is just one long session with breaks that we record. Think of sessions kind of like a baseball season, in that the better teams will have a winning record at the end of the season. This means YOU since you're the better team [as in you have the edge over the casino]. In blackjack, the end of the season only happens if and when you quit playing blackjack forever!

The most important element are your game conditions. Yes there "hot" dealers, as there are "hot" players, players who can't seem to lose, even though you may be. And it's certainly disheartening [only if you question the math and your play] to lose and others are winning, even if it's only the dealer, or lose hand after hand etc.. I admit, this is a learned skill, a painful one, but learned nonetheless.

This, however, IS the game of blackjack, and the only way you WIN is to play where the GAME CONDITIONS INCREASE your eV [mathematically] and that is through the combination of game rules and deck penetration, with deck penetration being more important. [proper bet spread is assumed as well as playing environment]

So, if you're in a 6 deck game with H17, but RSA, DAS, and LS with a dealer who is cutting a deck or less, you STAY and continue to play as opposed to moving to a table with 1.5 decks cut regardless whether you think the dealer is hot or not.

BTW, I find people are more inclined to pose these types of questions or question themselves when their primary games are SD or DD. It matters not, really.

If you find yourself emotionally unable to handle both the losses or the lack of proper betting, i.e.; when a max bet is called for, and you don't push it all out, then your not playing optimally and then you should STOP and not before.

cheers
bfb

Hot dealers

Posted By: Worldtraveler
Date: 19 Jan 04, 12:11 pm

In Response To: Conditions - Conditions - Conditions (bfbagain)

Assuming you come across a "cold" dealer. How can you mathematically take advantage of such a situation? You can't!
A dealer I knew advised me once not to play against her, because she was "hot" that day, having annihilated several players. I told her I liked the challenge, and sat down to play one on one at her table. Spreading $25 to $300, I was winning almost every single hand to finish the show at +$2,000, using heavy cover. She got tons of tips. I used the Ian Anderson method for tipping: I put a red chip on top of my pile for her, and she only gets the winning, not the orignial chip. I only had to replenish that chip a few times.
Ten minutes later, I spotted her alone again, sat down, got another hot shoe, and made another $2,000. The pit boss was shaking his head, advising me to leave, which I did, only to get barred a few weeks later.
I believe in hot shoes, not in hot dealers. I also believe that some positive shoes can kill you and turn out to be ice-cold, but you need to persevere and believe in your advantage: it's the only way to make money. All of us know that we lost most of our money in positive shoes where our bets were at the maximum. Having an advantage is not a guarantee against losses, it's just a statistic, a long term statistic that you have no choice but to believe in.

I keep playing with the hot dealer until I'm wiped out. I've done it many times. This is the best way to get the most money in action in a very favorable situation.

DD' "yes I keep playing with the hot dealer until I'm wiped out. I've done it many times. This is the best way to get the most money in action in a very favorable situation. "

OK, fair enough. You keep playing against a dealer in the zone until you got wiped out. You said you have done that many times.

Let's see if I get this right. If you got your triprolls wiped out many times, you probably needed millions of dallars of actions on table to recoup that losses. For example, say you get wiped out 10 times with $50,000 triproll each. That's $500,000 losses. At a 1.5% edge, you probably need $33,333,333.33 actions on the table to recoup that $500,000 losses! That seems like an impossible task to recoup those big losses during losing streaks.

It doesn't make sense to incur such big losses repeatedly with "zoned" dealers. Why don't we use a sessiontrip-loss-limit whenever we encountered a "zoned" dealer? For example, we could use $5,000 as a sessiontrip loss limit whenever we couldn't win a hand at all (no matters how hard we try to beat the "zoned" dealer!)

There's probably another dealer with the best pen in the house, of whom you probably get a fair chance to beat him with your 1.5% edge. Why get stuck with one "unbeatable" dealer when you have a choice of moving to another dealer with similiar pen?

Your take on the above question will be greatly appreciated.

It doesn't make sense to incur such big losses repeatedly with "zoned" dealers. Why don't we use a sessiontrip-loss-limit whenever we encountered a "zoned" dealer?

Chloe,

I believe you missed DD's point: he does use a loss limit. As long as he's playing a good (read: sufficiently positive EV) game, he continues to put the money on the baize. When he runs out of money, he quits.

Dog Hand

Unless I quit early to avoid CTR (10K buyin) I will be willing to lose everything I bring. The most I've lost is about 60K in a day. I am only going to leave if I feel there is a better opportunity waiting for me elsewhere. If this dealer is dealing fast and giving me a great game there is no better place to lose my money. I might as well lose it all right here. Why waste time? What ever winning streak this dealer has is every bit as likely to continue with a new dealer at a different table.

Our goal is to get as much money in action as possible under the best conditions we can as fast as we can. Losing offers the best opportunity to do this as you are often getting less heat from the pit, and often they are loving it and willing to let you sit there forever. Remember, you will lose the most money at the best games. If you get up and run in these situations you will lower your long term win rate. Volatility, whether positive or negative, indicates that you are getting betting opportunities. Whether you happen to win when you get them is a matter of luck which is beyond your control.

DD', thanks for your replies. In the LONG RUN, we all agree that the player's edge (win/loss probability) will always come out ahead regardless of dealers/tables hopping.

However, one might call me unscientific, but I feel it's commonsense for a player to quit when he knows he can not beat his opponent in a SHORT RUN. WHY throw away your hard earned profits at an unbeatable dealer in the zone?

Here is a scenario in hoops that'll back up my point of view. A reasonbly prudent free thrower will not take on his unbeatable opponent who has been in a shooter's zone.

Pretend that you & your friend are basketball fanatics. Let's say you are a 91% free thrower, and your friend 90%. Furthermore, let's say your friend has been in the shooter's zone at the foul line. For the past hour, he has made 10 of 10 consistently. Now your friend challenges you to a free throw contest. Each of you shoots 10 free throws per game. The loser will pays the winner $100. You agree. Let the game begin.

Your "zoned" friend kicks your ass 10 times consecutively despite your 1% edge. Now you're $1,000 in the hole, and your friend's still in the shooter's zone. Unless you're crazy, you would probably quit for the day. You would probably want to recoup your money next time when your friend gets a "normal" day, and you would have a better chance to see your 1% edge materialized.

The bottom line: In a short run, the 1 or 2% edges don't mean a damn thing when facing an opponent who's in a zone, as illustrated by the above free throw scenario. DD', since you can sustain $60,000 loss to a "zoned" dealer, MORE POWER TO YOU! I say it's more power to you because, with a 1.5% edge, you need to gamble $4,000,000 in order to recoup the $60,000 loss. That kind of gambling is mind-boggling, and that'll probably give the acute myacardial infarction to some gamblers sooner or later.

Best regards with all due respect to you, DD'.

You are attempting to read things into simple random patterns. Dealers have winning an losing streaks all the time. One dealer won 15 out of 19 hands from me once. Does that mean the dealer was hot? Nope...the dealer had NOTHING to do with it. It was pure randomness at work. The same thing could have happened at Casino War or in coin tossing or in Rock-Paper-Scissors. Gosh darn...my buddy beat me 5 times in a row with his Paper wrapping my Rock....he's hot...I'd better look for another buddy to play Rock-Paper-Scissors with.

Do you realize how stupid your "Zone" theory is? Dealers play to a fixed set of rules...there is no skill involved. Dealers cannot get into a "Zone". Players with skills like basketball players, some argue craps shooters, football quarterbacks, and horseshoe tossers can get into a zone...blackjack dealers cannot!!!

Finally, remember, the long run is really just a string of connected short runs. The majority of short runs will be fairly reflective of the long run. The long run in blackjack, especially when you're a strong player, while fairly long, is not as long as you think. For most games the long run is only a few hundred hours of play...sometimes even less.

playing fast shoe games betting black chips can be accomplished in less than 100 hours of play.

Shooting free throws is a pysical skill and is not random. Past performance is not a perfect indicator and can be improved upon. A performance zone may be something real and not just luck.

You might want to consider giving up gambling for a while until you do some further study. You don't grasp the basics, things you should know before you even learn to count.

You entire bj career could be like watching a movie on a VCR. By stopping and changing tables, etc, you are only hitting the pause button. The tape contiues exactly where you left off, even if a different actor is playing the part of dealer. It may please you to stop things when things aren't going well and slow them down. But I prefer to hit the fast forward button and get past them as quickly as possible.

The amount of time between one hand and the next, or one shoe and the next, and the location at which it is being played, or the dealer who is pulling the cards, has absolutely no effect on your short or long term probabilities. In the real world, you will win less money with your behavior both long and short term. This is because the situations you are most fearful of will arise most frequently at your best opportunities.

Example: you are losing too quickly at a deeply dealt handheld with good rules, heads up, and a fast dealer. So you go to a crowded eight deck game where you can sit for hours with little to nothing happening. This is an exaggerated example but what you are doing will have the same effect on a lesser scale.

There is absolutely nothing you can do to influence your results. Play your system. That's your job. You have no control. You are only playing to see what destiny has decided to give you, not to make anything happen. Your fate is out of your hands.

> Whether you happen to win ... is a matter of luck which is beyond your control.

> You are only playing to see what destiny has decided to give you, not to make anything happen. Your fate is out of your hands.

Two comments from your last posts blew me away. Not that I don't fully agree with them but that they would come from someone who has played as many hands/hours as you.

I have posted liberally in the past, on other venues, that BJ play is a ... gamble; that if seeing yourself as a gambler is disturbing to you, you aren't being honest with yourself; and that the risk of total loss is always lurking, if only by some small small margin. I maintain that of all of us -no matter how good our game is -of the total pool of players, someone .. someone is going to lose. For good.

Routinely those post are met with derision .. the basic party line going something like this .. "no, if I play with an expected mathmatical advantage, long enough, I will come out the end a net winner."

Curious. Any thoughts?

throughout long periods of bad luck the chances are heavily in your favor to come out ahead. But your chance of success is never 100% no matter how long you play. It only converges assymptotically on certainty, never gets there.

When we play to a small risk of ruin it means that we are giving ourself the opportunity to endure more losing bets while waiting for our luck to turn better. The more room you give yourself the better your chances. But stopping at random points because things are not going well has no effect on your ultimate success or failure. It only affects the amount of time it will take you to get to another point on the slope.

even well run businesses, require a certain amount of good luck to succeed where others who are equally as well run may fail. Advantage Player is a business...some are well capitalized and have good luck...some aren't and all combinations.

Microsoft, for example, was a shell of a company...under capitalized...but got lucky (or made their own luck) by talking IBM into licensing MS-DOS/PC-DOS for their new IBM Personal Computers. Had IBM simply written its own software or demanded to buy MS-DOS Microsoft, in all probablility, would be a small boutique software company right now.

Finally, even well run businesses can fail...just as some counters will be so far to the left of the Bell-Curve that they never recover from a bad losing streak. However, I'd put the failure rate of a moderately well financed blackjack player up against the failure rate of a new small business almost anyday.

WHY throw away your hard earned profits at an unbeatable dealer in the zone?

Because there's no such thing.

Yes, it SEEMS like there is. Given enough repetition, you're going to wind up seeing times when the dealer just can't seem to lose. He shows 5- and has a 5 hole card and draws an ace. He hits 16 time and again with 3s, 4s, 5s.

But a careful study of statistics shows us that overall, there truly is no such thing as a "dealer in the zone". There's only random distribution, which means sometimes you win 50 out of 55 hands, and sometimes you LOSE 50 out of 55 hands.

Believe it or not, this has even been proven with basketball players. Any hoops fan *thinks* he's seen times when a guy couldn't miss. Jordan, on fire and putting up 45 or 55 points. Wilt the Stilt, making everything he throws up there.

But the fact is that studies have shown that for basketball players, what really matters is their overall shooting percentage. Making one shot doesn't increase their odds of making the NEXT shot; a 65% shooter will hit, on average, 65% of his shots.

For each game where the guy is "in the zone" and can't miss, he's probably going to have a game where he's stone-cold and can't buy a bucket.

Blackjack is even less human-influenced, in a way, than shooting a basketball. At least a shooter can change WHERE he's shooting from, moving to where he's a higher percentage shooter (instead of lobbing up threes, he can take shorter jump shots) and therefore increase his odds of hitting the net.

But BJ? No, the dealer can't somehow lick his hands and move the shoe in a little tighter and somehow change HIS odds.

There is no such thing as a dealer "in the zone". There's only random distribution.

Coop

This reminds me of a situation a few years ago, the nasdaq was kicking ass, I tripled my investment, my friend said that he was in it for the long haul, he and my mother lost their asses, still trying to recup their losses even though they did exactly what the stock brokers told them. I just dont agree that you should stay if the return on your investment is not coming even though you are doing everything right according to the books or the authorities...