losing runs

I have a simple question I was wondering if someone with experience can answer.
Is it a regular occurence that someone who plays blackjack using simple cheat cards without card counting will lose 8 or 9 times in a row. I play blackjack only infrequently and this has never happened to me, but I was wondering if this happens often to regular players. I assume the dynamics of probability are relatively complex with blackjack, although I assume it is about 50/50 player/dealer(dealer with obviously slight advantage.
I have a system where I could potentially make $1 with every hand dealt and I was specifically wondering if this 8 or 9 loss losing run would come up more frequently than once sequence every 1000 hands.
Thanks

read the sentence just below the title:
Progression systems can be fun, but they do not affect the casino's long-run advantage.

What you are talking about is a progression. Now,if you are truly interested, do yourself a favor, and go to the yellow margin on your left. Click on "BJ Books", and order one or all four of the books in the "Blackjack for Beginners" section.

What's a cheat card?I lose 9 hands in a row all the time.Willi.

7-8 straight losses are not supposed to be that common based on probabilities. I do not have the odds but I know their occurances (straight losses) are not that common. Yet, they do happen and it makes one feel like as if the probability tables are not accurate.

However, the probabilities do not take into account what actually happens in the casinos. The longer one plays, the nearer the occurances will be with the probability tables.

In a casino, the conditions at many tables keep changing. New players come in. Others leave. Even though such changes affect one's hand either negatively or positively, they are more apt to be felt, observed and remembered, especially when they prolong one's losing run. But, when one is winning, no one has time to think of the win in those terms. However, in case of another loss, players say the sequence of the cards changed!

Losing runs occur to regular or irregular(?) players no matter who they are. Regular players are not immune for losing runs and when a dealer is hot, losing runs could go on for many hours interspersed with few wins in between long runs of losses. That happens inspite of the fact that everytime a new shuffle is made, players think it will have to be different because of the probabilities.

I would guess it happens more than once in a 1000-more like 4 times and with doubles and splits and doubles after splits and lions and tigers and bears maybe add one.Willi.

"I was specifically wondering if this 8 or 9 loss losing run would come up more frequently than once sequence every 1000 hands."

Actual numbers vary a little depending on the exact game conditions, but generally accepted approximate numbers for win/loss/push with basic strategy is win 43%, lose 48%, push 9%. (I've taken a little liberty in rounding off)

Using the 48% for the loss number, the odds of losing 8 in a row is about 1 in 355. The odds of losing 9 in a row is about 1 in 739.

We expect to play 100 hands/hr on avg, and a fast heads up shoe game can yield several 100 hands/hr, so we expect to see such losing streaks often. And this is only for a losing streak. If you look at the odds for a non-winning streak (add the pushes to losses), the odds of long streaks w/o winning are much higher.

Try this one for size. Was flat betting $10 a hand. Lost 18 hands in a row, got a push on next hand and then lost 7 more in a row. Why did I keep on playing?? Because I knew that I had to win the next hand. BS

why progressions don't work. They win a relatively small amount most of the time, but when they lose, they lose extremely big wiping out all the past wins and then some.

Any suggestions?

I would recommend KO or Hi-Lo for beginners and recreational players. There are some slightly more powerful, but more difficult systems which are worthwhile only to the more serious, higher stakes players. It is much better to play a weaker system well than a stronger system poorly. One little mistake easily offsets the tiny gain that the stronger system offers.

I stressed "complete" in my post title because learning the actual count is the easy part of counting and only the tip of the iceberg. It is very critical that you learn to spot good games (good pen, favorable rules, no table crowding, etc), and learn about standard deviation, risk of ruin, EV, bet/spread sizing, and bankroll requirements, and how all of these are related. It is also very important to have self discipline, and be able to play like a machine according to the system.

Beginners commonly read one book & learn a count, then hit the casinos with a $100 BR and expectations of winning a fortune. They do not understand ROR and that the game is a long grind, with normal, huge, std dev swings both up and down, and get wiped out. Others simply don't have discipline, and after winning a few sessions in a row they start feeling bullet-proof and over bet instead of following the original plan. Or they lose a few sessions in a row and either chase losses or get scared and quit doubling when they should.

And of course as one moves up to higher stakes, he must learn to recognize heat and to use some cover techniques, and many other finer points of the game.

I lost 14 hands in a row playing a 6D shoe in Reno just last month. All I could do was shake my head in disbelief as even my 'good' (2-cards 20s, double-downs vs dealer's 6, etc.) hands were shot down.

You must be 100% correct.It just shows you how we think in a casino.I'm always thinking like a counter but in this instance that is a mistake.Even though it's a slightly different situation on the message board-it's something to consider,especially dealing with the Pit.How would a counter catch think and non counter cacther.What looks more natural.So many times I've done dumb things when through the eyes of a "civilian." Merci,Willi.P.S.When they pull out those charts,you can really play the gambling fool game.

It looks like you're doing the old Martingale progression, which is inadvisable, but even worse on Blackjack. As your bet increases, you might have to split (what else could you do with a pair of aces), or at least be tempted to double down.

I just ran a series of 5 x 2 hands playing DD w/ Mirage rules, 1000 hands each. Losses of splits and DDns counted as multiple hands. Longest losing streaks were: 9 & 10, 13 & 8, 11 & 12, 9 & 10, and 8 & 10. If you insist on playing this extremely high-risk strategy, try don't pass or pass at craps, or play red or black, or odd or even at single-zero roulette. I just saw 16 "blacks" in a row, and counting, at roulette, BTW.

I've been playing a progressive cover scheme where the table limit is 2-200, betting 2, 4, 10, 20, 40, 80, 160, 200, 200... until I win. I'm currently up about $3000 with only a few occasions where I lost 7 times in a row. In those occasions, I've just bet 200 until I won again and I've been lucky to have one max loss of 8 and 2 losses of 7 out of about 2000 games. As I understand this scheme, it's sort of like a reverse lottery in that if I had a string of bad luck, I'm screwed, however, as long as I don't hit too many 7+ losses I'm ok. The risk of ruin = % chance of losing raised to number of losses. I'm playing Stay on soft 17, double on 9,10,11, No double after split, no surrender, 1 deck, reshuffle after each game. I think my chance of ruin is 0.4989^7 which is about 1/126 of losing $316. I've been making money so far so let me know if I'm just incredibly lucky or if this scheme can be maintained.

I've been making money so far so let me know if I'm just incredibly lucky or if this scheme can be maintained.

You've been lucky. Not incredibly lucky - you haven't been doing it that long. Just lucky. And luck has a way of changing suddenly.

Wait until the first time you get a losing streak of 15 hands or so. It doesn't happen very often, but believe me, it does happen. And it will wipe you out.

You are playing a negative expectation game. Eventually you will lose all your money, and no betting progression in the world will change that fact.

>however, as long as I don't hit too many 7+ losses I'm ok.

OK, sure, but in my post above, I just noted a losing streak of 14 hands, which is not all that unusual. Using your "progression" scheme above, I'd have lost $1716 in 10 minutes.

Also, I wouldn't refer to this progression scheme as "cover," although it probably does succeed in having the PBs ignore you.