Does anyone have information on where I can purchase Thorps Ultimate Count?

Does anyone have information on where I can purchase Thorps Ultimate Count? Also Price?

to sell it to you.

I'll just take a bit of time off my billion dollar hedge fund to flog a gambling system for $30. Can't see it.

The method is in the original edition of Beat The Dealer. It is very impractical and Thorp dropped the system subsequently.

It doesn�t exist.

In the original, 1962 edition of Beat the Dealer Ed Thorp presented a set of theoretical point count values that would enable a theoretical player to range their bets theoretically perfectly. This set of values, now sometimes called �tags�, he dubbed the Ultimate Count. There are forty point values per suit, ranging from +11 for a five, to �9 for an ace. He suggested that perhaps a player could size their bets with the Ultimate Count, while forming their departure decisions with the NT/T ratio of the Ten Count. There were no departure indices presented to make it a stand-alone playing strategy. The Ultimate Count was not included in the 1966 edition of the book.

A few interesting things appear when examining the array of values. Half or virtually half of the positive values reside in the four and five; an argument for using more structured counts. A simple count like the Dubner High-Low, presented in the 1966 book, therefore misvalues the cards: the four, five and seven are undervalued; the deuce is overvalued; and trey and six are close to exact. However the High-Low has a betting efficiency of .968 in a game where the dealer stands on A6 (a S17 game) and .972 in a H17 game. The Ultimate Count yields .998 and .996. But the level one High-Low requires essentially just recognition of cards, as opposed to perpetual arithmetic. So much additional effort for so little additional benefit.

I recommend that you read The Theory of Blackjack by the late Peter Griffin for an appreciation of point count system alternatives.

And I recommend that you read Bootlegger�s fine monograph on selecting a count system at http://64.71.133.211/bj_reference/index.cgi?read=10580.

I assume you are familiar with the Ultimate values or tags. If not, a search engine will reveal scores of sites that list them.

I hope this helps you.

Regards,
Igor

original copy floating around one of these places.

I found my hardbound first edition, complete with paper dust jacket and strategy cards in a little blue envelope on the inside back cover, at a used book store for all of $4.50.

This "Ultimate Strategy" is scary. Here are the tags:

A -9
2 +5
3 +6
4 +8
5 +11
6 +6
7 +4
8 0
9 -3
10 -7

Oh, and it also requires that you keep a side count of 10's and a total of all non-ten cards put in play.

Good luck! :-)

Goodwill sounds like an excellent place to start. :}

First online:

amazon.com
yahoo.com
ebay.com

Then try the used book chain---often neglected--halfpricebooks.com, which is a chain of used bookstores that allows you to search the "brick" stores online--they inventory them all!

Then try Powell books in Portland OR--I don't have their url, but they have some interesting shipping details and will send people to search out other sources nationaly, and will even send people out on foot to less organized used bookstores, such as one infamous for disorganization in Duluth MN, and another similar in Atlanta GA, if necessary, for no extra charge.

http://bj21satellite.com/books-software/misc/index.cgi?read=14051

Lots of stuff at dirt cheap prices. Thorp, Uston, Anderson, Allan Wilson and many others.