side-counting aces and splitting aces in ENHC shoes

i've heard that side-counting aces doesn't help much in shoe games. i'm wondering if it's worth side-counting aces in ENHC games where one is severely punished for doubling 11 against 10 (which, according to Wong, should only be done at +4. i assume side-counts also help making insurance decisions (or is that a faulty assumption?).

does anybody have numbers on the advantage of side-counting aces in ENHC 5 deck games? i use hi-lo, by the way.

also...how much am i giving up if i split Aces against an Ace in ENHC rules? where i play, i'm allowed to insure my split aces, but i only get one card per ace(and no resplits). according to Wong, i should hit the Ace-Ace pair against Ace. i find this play hard to make (i'm not used to ENHC) and i wonder how important this play is.

thanks
toecheeze

Because you really wouldn't like to split or double where dealer BJ takes all,as is the case in ENHC. I believe you weren't considering standing. H.

i've heard that side-counting aces doesn't help much in shoe games.

That's not true although it's harder than in SD.

Sincerely,
Cacarulo

I think what you mean is that you still have to count the aces with an ace neutral count? In that case, I agree that it is important to properly adjust the count for betting purposes, even with shoes. When using Hi-Lo, (ace included count) adding an ace side count gives a meaningful benefit in single deck, because it is a strategy issue. With shoes however, I don't think side counting aces with Hi-Lo gives anything meaningful.

With shoes however, I don't think side counting aces with Hi-Lo gives anything meaningful.

Wrong. It's not a matter of thinking but sims. I have a post on GC (theory) which shows that the gain is pretty important.

Sincerely,
Cacarulo

Could you provide a little detail on what the strategy gain would be in shoes side counting aces with Hi-Lo? I agree that sims should provide a good answer, but I am wondering if we are on the same page here. The only thing side counting aces with Hi-Lo can possibly do is help out with insurance and a small amount with other close strategy decisions. Even in single deck, its not huge. In a six deck shoe, the importance of strategy and insurance drops off dramatically, so it is not logical that this side count could be worth near as much as in single deck.

Adding an ace side count to Hi-Lo actually results is a fairly large gain in playing efficiency (knowing when to vary from basic strategy).

For playing hands when 1/3 of a single deck (17 cards) have been seen, Hi-Lo alone has a PE of 51.3%; while Hi-Lo with an ace side count has a PE of 65.3%. This is a ~14% absolute PE gain and a 27% increase in the Hi-Lo PE. This side count gain is about twice as large as that available from adding the best side count (7's) to a 2-level count such as AOII.

Surprisingly, adding an ace side count for Hi-lo has essentially no effect on the count's betting efficiency (96.8% vs 97.0%). Not surprisingly, the insurance efficiency improves from 76% to 89% when adding a side ace count.

For multi-deck games I would expect PE to account for ~ one-third of one's advantage under typical casino playing conditions. PE is still a factor in multi-deck games since the larger bet spread used amplifies the PE gain of better playing systems. Variations from basic strategy are often made for hands with high counts (large bets). Also doubling would occur more often and increase the amount in play.

Assuming that PE accounts for 33% of the overall edge in a multi-deck game with a 1% advantage, a Hi-Lo player who adds an ace side count to make adjustments to Hi-Lo playing indices would theoretically increase the advantage to ~1.09% (0.27*0.33+1). The actual gain seen would be less than this, since making adjustments to playing indices based on side counts are much more difficult to implement and the PE portion of the advantage may be less than 33%.

So even in this ideal situation for adding a side count, the max gain possible from adding a side count is less than 10%. Using the top 10-15 playing adjustments would result in about a 5% gain in overall advantage. If anyone is interested in this, I can calculate a prioritized list of plays.

Hope this helps.

wc21

Why do you say there's an increase in BE (96.8 to 97.0)? Did you mean BE or BC?

Sincerely,
Cacarulo

Why do you say there's an increase in BE (96.8 to 97.0)? Did you mean BE or BC?

Sincerely,

Cacarulo
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Yes BE's listed are actually the BC's.

Thanks!!

wc21

BC should be the same. How do you get 96.8 and then 97.0?

Thanks.

Sincerely,
Cacarulo

Hi-lo values aces and tens the same; I think there is a small difference in the importance of them for betting purposes. For example the '71 Revere APC (BC=1.00) values Aces as -4 and tens as -3. Because of this, I would expect the betting correlation for Hi-Lo + an Ace count to be a little higher than for Hi-lo alone.

The difference is very small (96.8 vs 97). In linear algebra terms, that seems to indicate that the part of the Ace count that is orthogonal to the Hi-lo has only a very small projection (correlation) onto the ideal betting vector. The small difference shows that Aces must be very well balanced for betting purposes in the Hi-Lo count.

Another possibility would be in excel round off errors; I used a Gram-Schmidt orthogonalization formula to calculate orthogonal vectors; for similar vectors this requires the subtraction of nearly equal numbers which can amplify errors.

Thanks,

wc21

The increase in percent advantage you indicate for side counting aces in the multi-deck scenario you give makes sense. Could you also provide a comparison for a single deck scenario? Thanks!

Using the MC formula you will get 0.970335 for Hi-Lo + Ace. This formula gives the Ace a non-integer value of -1.22. In other words we have:

Hi-Lo       : 0.968543

Hi-Lo + Ace : 0.970335

-1.22 1 1 1 1 1 0 0 0 -1