and the casinos' not needing to heed them.
"The Casino's themselves base their potential for winning on the laws of probability...Sure, the silly bettor will lose anyway, but the Casino's response must be---I don't care how smart you are, in the long run with the L of P on our side, we will win...In this regard, and because of card counting, the game of blackjack makes the casino more vulnerable then any other game."
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Steve, IMO the casino edge is not to do with the long run. I consider it only has to do with a run that is a run of one, which is the shortest run of all. Take roulette. If the casino paid 38 to 1, roulette would not be a gambling game.
As to the long run, a gambler could be, after 20 years, so close to the mean that he staggers with astonishment. But in those 20 years his action will run into the millions. 0.5% of a million is a tidy sum. And if he ends on the negative side of the mean he will have lost a decent sum, the inverse being true if he ends on the positive side. (Would the casinos put their faith in "the long run" if greater than 0.5% of casino gamblers were card counters?). For in reality probability allows for the casinos also to end on the negative side of expectation. Surely this point can be conceded in theory! The house edge is there to stop casinos being wiped out in the short term. But even that does not always work. A gambler can send a casino bust due to deviation, as happened to the Darwin Casino.
The best chance you have is to put your million on one bet during a high count. If you lose, you still have the rest of your life to start again. If you win you are a multi-millionaire. If you play only for the long run you might, perhaps, end up with a few pickings. The casinos are probably more afraid of short term gambling.
Lastly, I would say that the casinos "base" their potential for winning on historical factors, that is, almost without fail, casinos turn a healthy profit. If I were to buy a business I would not care what made the money, I would only care about past performance.
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note to post busters: "pooning" is where someone on roller blades hangs of a motor vehicle (usually a truck) to get a free ride.