Is the game I am playing beatable?

Hi everyone

The rules at a casino I have been playing at are: stand on soft seventeen, double on anything, double after splits, resplit aces.
Six decks are used and the cut varies by dealer form 3/4 decks to 1.5
decks.

As I calculate it from Professional Blackjack this makes for a .38 house advantage

I use the halves counting system, I believe quite accurately.
I have practiced a great deal using Casino Verite software.
My betting structure is $5 on 0 and negative counts, $10 on 1 counts,
20 on 2, 30 on 3, 40 on 4 and 50 on 5 with occassional moves to 65 but that is as high as I go for fear of pushing the casino too far.
I leave the table on about one third of the negative counts below minus five, but it is a small casino and pretty obvious to jump out much more often than that I think.

I have received no heat but am down $800 dollars after 600 hours of play. I know bad streaks happen, and I can't keep losing the majority of my big bets forever but I am just looking for a little guidance. Is this game beatable with the system and betting structure I am playing, and is the unlucky streak I have had over the last few monthes particularly exceptional.

Thanks and I would appreciate any input
David

The conditions you describe are actually far better than average.You didn't say anything about crowd and speed but assuming you get in 100 hands per hour, you should average a win rate of about $20 an hour (no tips!)with a standard deviation of $400.
After 600 hours you should have won $12000.One standard deviaton being roughly $10000, you are behind by 1.3 sd.Surely you have been a bit unlucky but the same thing or worse happens to one guy in 10.

Francis Salmon

To realize your EV, you need to make extremely few errors in
count or strategy. Halves count is difficult to do error free,
for most people, and takes a lot of practice. But 600 hrs should
surely be enough practice -- have you always used halves?
I tried halves for a few tens of hrs, and switched back to hi-lo.
I think my lower error rate and less fatigue with hi-lo more than
make up for the EV I missed, especially because I also emphasized
game conditions more after switching back.

Thanks very much for your response. I knew from just casual observation that I had been incredibly unlucky with my big bets for an extended period of time, but it is good to know that this could occur to about one of ten, I was starting to wonder! Will continue to play and let you know how it goes.

Thanks again
David

I agree that halves is more taxing than high low, but I am pretty confident in my accuracy and I find some satisfaction in playing even a very slighly more accurate system if I am going to put my money on the line. I have been using halves for the whole 600 hours but used hi lo prior to that when I was learning the game at other casinos. You are probably right about the increased errors offsetting the increased accuracy but I think I will stick this out for at least a while longer

Thanks a lot for responding
Will be posting in the future to let anyone who cares know how the battle goes

David