Do I stand a chance?

first, your choice of game is horrible. I would search out a better game. If that's all you've got here are some answers.

YOUR SPECIFIED SPREAD/BANK
H17 DAS 4.5 Dealt from 6.0

W/L % = 0.58%
SCORE = $8.88
ROR = 34.16%
Win/100 Hands = $4.95
($5 Unit Size 1-12 Spread Play All One Spot)

Here is a better way to play (still not very profitable)
$3 Unit, Spread 1-12, Wong Out at TC =-1 or less

W/L% = 1.06%
SCORE = $27.65
ROR = 7.4%
Win/100 Hands = $5.31

Play $3 at 0-+1
Bet $12 @ +2
Bet $21 @ +3
Bet $33 @ +4
Bet $36 @ +5
Bet 0 in negative true counts of -1 or worse

That's the best I can do for you. $3K is not much of a bank....but you might get lucky. If you do it will at least get you off of the $3 tables. You might also try the $5 games and wait until TC of +2 to Wong in and just play positive counts...you won't play many hands but your win/100 will be higher.

What's the difference between the "Score" and the "Win per 100 hands" rate?

Why is it a HORRIBLE game? You can't get much out of a six-deck game anyway. And like I said, I'd be seeking out 83% penetration or better.

Also, the casino only has 10 or so tables - is it still possible to wong in?

How can my risk of ruin go from 35% on a $5 table all the way down to 8% on a $3 table? Just because of the difference min. bets make?!

That's the best I can do for you. $3K is not much of a bank....but you might get lucky.

Might get lucky?! Jeeze...I thought I stood at least a decent chance with a few thousand while counting...

So, in a nutshell, if I play the $5 tables I have a 35% chance of losing all my money ($3,000) and a 65% of....what? Succeeding?

As always, replies/help is appreciated...

The reality of a 6D game with 1.5 pen is that you spend almost all of your time simmering at a true count that's insufficient for a bet ramp since you're constantly staring at denominators (number of decks remaining) of 3, 4 or 5.

Chances are, there's little to no heat on your 6d games since it's widely known that any damage a counter can do with pen more than 1.25 is minimal relative to what the casino will make off the counter-balance of 1000 ploppies per week. If you can get better than 12-1 spreads, by all means, do it. Also wong out on negs. as bigplayer suggests... you spend such large amounts of time at a disadvantage to the house that NOT wonging will nickel-and-dime you to death.

So yes, spreading bigger increases your ROR, but it's essential. If you have confidence in your playing ability, you must either increase your bankroll or roll the dice with ROR in my opinion because you'll soon find that counting, calculating, and breathing all that second-hand casino smoke day in and day out is NOT worth minimum wage.

Save the lower spreads and camo for the quality games that it sounds like you need to travel to get to and go boldly where you've never gone before with the 6D junk. The most common deficiency I see with the play of other counters I run accross is that of not spreading big when the advantage is clearly theirs. It's like keeping your weight out over the front of your skis when skiing knee-deep on a double-diamond slope... it makes you feel vulnerable but you have to do it if you want to ski like a pro. Sure, you'll lose a few gut-wrenchers when you jack your $3 bet up to a couple of $100 circles but it's the only way you'll get your average, annual EV up there where you'll be smiling all the way to the bank.

Good luck, bud,

Spok

What's the difference between the "Score" and the "Win per 100 hands" rate?

SCORE is a standardized measurement created by Don Schlesinger and should not be confused with Win/100. SCORE is Win/100 assuming $10,000 bank. It allows comparisons of many different games and rules. (SCORE-Standardized Comparison of Risk and Expectation)

Why is it a HORRIBLE game? You can't get much out of a six-deck game anyway. And like I said, I'd be seeking out 83% penetration or better. The crappy rules combined with mediocre 1.5/6.0 penetration is not a good game. With this rules set you would need at least 1.0 cutoff to make the game decent.

Also, the casino only has 10 or so tables - is it still possible to wong in? That is up to you.

How can my risk of ruin go from 35% on a $5 table all the way down to 8% on a $3 table? Just because of the difference min. bets make?! Risk of ruin is not linear. In a 1.5 cut 6D game most of your bets will be at a TC between -1 and +1 where the house still has the edge. By not playing in negative situations you cut your level of risk tremendously.

I thought I stood at least a decent chance with a few thousand while counting... Card Counting is not a license to print money. With a small bankroll you have a good chance of losing it all due to variance.

So, in a nutshell, if I play the $5 tables I have a 35% chance of losing all my money ($3,000) and a 65% of....what? Succeeding?
You have a 65% chance of all other possible results except losing it all over an infinite time period. (this includes mild losses, major losses, breaking even, and yes doubling (or better) your investment. You can reduce your chances of permananently tapping out by not resizing your unit upward if you get lucky. If you get your bankroll up to 12K (a fourfold increase) your level of risk, given your play-all $5 unit, will drop to 1.3% (a 27x decrease for a 4x increase in bank).

From Sanford Wong's book "Professional Blackjack" he says the hourly win rate for the game I've described is $11 - You said it was $5 - That's a pretty significant difference!

I should have looked closer before I spoke that last time. In Stanford's book the benchmark betting spread is of a higher unit than my little reds are. My fault! :)

The benchmark in the book said $100 is bet at TC 4+, $75 at 3+, $50 at 2+, $25 at zero or 1+, and $10 at all negative counts.

...but that still makes that significant of a difference in expected values, huh?

Those numbers are also for a game with 1 deck cut off.
(starting to see the importance of penetration?)

...and penetration in my casino isn't the problem at all...as a matter of fact, I've noticed many dealers there that only cut off half a deck!

I just don't understand how bigplayer could say the rules were a horrible game. I mean, if he thinks 6-deck games are bad all around, then I can understand how he could say it's a horrible game...but the rules for the shoe game in my casino (Besides surrender) are pretty much the best overall rules that are available.

If you were restricted to doubling down on only a certain number, then I could see how it would be more on the horrible side - or if you couldn't double after split...I could see that, also - or if you could not resplit aces...that would be another negative sign of a shoe game. Maybe he was calling it horrible because of just average penetration and he thinks anything 'decent' is better-than-average penetration. If that's the case, I don't really have a problem with my game here then.

However, if the rules for my game are still horrible, how could they possibly be 'better' besides the one and only "dealer hits soft 17" rule in my game. Maybe just that rule alone will keep people away from it - I do realize that it is quite costly to a counter (I believe it was something around the $5/hr. diff. area)

My rules -> Doubling allowed on any first two cards, double after split is allowed, resplit up to 4 hands, one card to aces, can resplit aces, insurance offered, no surrender, naturals tie dealer natural.

Besides no surrender and H17, how could they really be any better?

No six decker can really be called a good game unless you are getting great penetration. The rules you described aren't anything special and H17 in a six-decker is awful. I use a rating method that is a little different than SCORE, but not by much. I rate the game based on a $10K bankroll and a 5% ROR. By way of comparison, here is the rating for some six deckers. The first figure given is the unit size you would need to meet the 5% ROR, the second figure is the per 100 hands played or observed if wonging. A 1-12 spread is assumed, betting one unit a counts of <+2, 2 units at +2, 4 units at +3, 6 units at +4 and 12 units at +5 or higher.

Six Deck, H17, DAS
4/6 penetration - $2.89 - $0.78
4.5/6 penetration - $5.93 - $4.51
5/6 penetration - $8.67 - $12.74
5.5/6 penetration - $11.78 - $30.98

The same game with S17 instead of H17:

4/6 penetration - $5.94 - $3.27
4.5/6 penetration - $8.35 - $8.85
5/6 penetration - $10.60 - $18.87
5.5/6 penetrtion - $13.42 - $39.86

In the poorer penetrated games, you can improve this win rate by increasing your bet to 3 units at +1 and 12 units at +2, but you will have increased your ROR considerably, besides the fact that such a large bet jump might draw attention. As the penetration improves, you can make your increases more slowly.

One cannot rate a game simply by comparing hourly EV. Standard deviation must be considered as well. In poorly penetrated games, the hourly earnings go down, while the SD remains pretty much the same if you use comparable bet spreads. The result is that you must play a smaller unit in bad games if you have a fixed bankroll and want to play to the same risk. This means that you will be playing to far less profit than just the reduced EV that comes from poorer rules. You will note that RSA is not included. That is because the simulation software I use doesn't have that variation. The advantage gained from RSA is so small that it doesn't really affect things much.

The game you have described can be improved by using an exit strategy, as suggested by Big Player. In addition to the ones he described, here is another one for your six deck game of H17, DAS:

Wong out at counts of less than zero, use the same bet spread as described above for all counts of zero or greater:

4/6 - $8.50 - $6.38
4.5/6 - $10.70 - $14.02
5/6 - $12.72 - $26.46
5.5/6 - $15.29 - $50.76

There are a variety of other bet spreads and means of attacking this game. I have described several of them in my upcoming book. I hope this helps.

and I think you're referring to Vegas. There is a HUGE difference between playing the DD game at the Vegas Hilton (where they have a pit boss literally camped at the table) and playing the 6D game at Lancer Lanes in Clarkston Wa. where they could care less whether you have $3 or $100 on the table.

Spok

Wow...wonging out at any counts less than zero really improves the hourly EV significantly...Are those last figures there for my 6-deck H17 game when wonging out at less than zero?

P.S. Just how often would I actually be PLAYING, then? Seems like the count is constantly negative...and wouldn't it look fishy in a 'small casino' some BJ player constantly pacing over the few tables to sit down only a few mins. every hour? Or am I just overly-nervous about the big C on my forehead?

Also, the reason why I'm really trying to bite into this H17 shoe game is because it's the ONLY game of Black Jack I can play right now. All the other casinos I've checked out (And everywhere in Las Vegas of course) require the player to be 21. So, I'm stuck at my local H17 casino game until I'm older :)

Out of curiousity, then, just what kind of EV's would your system spit out using a $3,000 starting bankroll? (Still saving up - but starting to have second thoughts since my ROR may not be worth it...?!)

are you worried about...being put in Griffin or backroomed for going from $5-$30 in one bet jump?

I'm worried about knowing about the game and the mathematics behind it. Is that bad to ask? Getting kicked out of a casino using red chips is the least of my worries - Knowing the game and starting small is what I'm concerned about...Maybe I'm off about the starting small thing, but that's what Wong and others have told me. =P

I don't know about you, but I'm trying to take my money as seriously as I can with this game.

If you use the 1-5 spread discussed earlier in a 35/52 penetrated game, you would earn $14.28 per 100 hands using a $5 unit with the Hi-Lo counting system and the Illustrious 18. Your risk of ruin would be very low, at 0.71%. If you raised it to a $10 unit with a $3,000 bank, your risk of ruin would be 8.42%.

Manny, BJ Attack does a very good job of laying out much of the understanding that you're searching for excellence on. I'm not a big fan of Don's attitude but I think his book is a must-have if you want some illustrations that will jump out at you with Pen, Spread, and back-counting compartive win-rates.

I particularly liked Don's discussion on pages 179 thru 181 where he talks about how different rules affect counters in more VS less magnitude than it affects basic strategy players the way you see it in CBJN's edge column. For example, surrender adds little for a B.S. player but can add over 5 times the edge for a counter in a well-penetrated pack.
Conversely, when a rule changes from S17 to H17, the B.S. player gives up only a little more than the counter does (relatively in-elastic affect of counting).

Spok