Tips and Tricks

Hi. I originally started reading Casino Gambling for Dummies out of boredom and the Basic Rules to black jack caught my attention. I was enthralled with the idea that a simple computer simulation came up with all of the best possible moves and then they were put into a simple to understand list. I have never gambled before. In fact, I've never been in a Casino before, but I started looking at this site and at all of the insane math that goes into RoR and other such things and it just blew me away! I am a sophomore in college and, while math isn't my forte, I believe myself determined enough to take on an engineering major. I'll be taking pre-cal next semester and I can barely understand a lick of things like the certainty equivalent or the logs and stuff that have to do with the Kelly Generalization or whatever. But what I do understand is the principle of counting. The fact that more small numbers being played means a likeliness of faces being played. I've enjoyed reading about the Hi-Lo system and have in fact taken to counting down a deck in my spare time. I believe that, in time, I'll be able to understand the logs and other crazy math that is on this site, but after 3 or 4 hours of total practice counting down a deck one card at a time I find myself taking 40 seconds to count the thing down. And that's on a good run! I really enjoy the culture of counters that I have been reading about and all of these equations seriously intrigue me, but I can't seem to wrap my head around this expectation that with practice I will somehow be able to count down a deck in 25 seconds. Is there something that I am missing or is that really possible with practice? I guess I'm just a little discouraged at my inability and at the idea that I have this taste of something that seems so amazing, but it doesn't appear that I have the capacity to do it. So if you have read my life story hear, and if you are still reading, I would really appreciate any tips, or even just a word of encouragement.

Counting is like most other things. The more you do it, including practice, the quicker and more importantly, more accurately you will be able to do so. That said, I personally don't put that much stock in counting down a deck. I think it is overrated. I have never counted down a deck in my life and suspect I wouldn't do so all that quickly. I have always practiced, and still do, by dealing out hands to myself along with computer simulations of games. These methods more closely translate to the actual experience of blackjack play to me.

While trying to analyze counting in as many ways as I could, I see that I was still looking at it as a sequence of steps I should follow to become or do what I wanted to do as opposed to looking at it as something that isn't set in stone. Thank you very much! I'm going to start dealing out hands and see how it goes from there!

I agree with Kewljason. However, be fairly warned that counting cards is not an easy way to riches. There are a few people on this site (which is a fabulous place for newbies to learn) who make a living playing BJ and I'm sure there are others not on this site that do so. However, it is not as easy as portrayed in the movie 21. Learning to count is the easy part. You have to find good games to play, know basic strategy and your counting system perfectly, disguise your winning ways, and a whole lot more (including some luck). Don't play with money you can't afford to lose and treat it as a hobby where you have the potential (but not the guarantee) to make money. Good luck. And don't gamble when you are under age.

Van Gogh,

First, Welcome to BJ21.com! This website is a treasure-trove of good BJ information.

I suspect you are holding the deck face-down and flipping the cards face-up one-by-one. That is actually quite time-consuming.

Instead, hold the deck face-up and push the cards one-by-one (from the exposed side of the deck: that is, the side closest to your eyes) into your other hand: this method is much faster than the previous method.

Later, you can gain even more speed by looking at more than one card at a time, since often two cards will cancel one another. For example, if the first two cards are a 5 and an X ("X" means any 10 or face) instead of counting the 5 at +1, then counting the X as -1, and ending at 0, you can instead look at the 5 & X simultaneously and realize that these two cards together don't change the running count.

Hope this helps!

Dog Hand

I play basic strategy hi-Lo from SW's book same name. I practice counting using 2 card turn then some 3 card at the same time.
I do have a couple questions though-- What do you do to overcome the elderly lady sitting at next position, who won't stop, and your at 3rd. in a game you just can't leave?
Also how do you get by casino noise?

I do have a couple questions though-- What do you do to overcome the elderly lady sitting at next position, who won't stop, and your at 3rd. in a game you just can't leave?

She won't stop doing what? It's generally best to ignore other players, unless there is a possibility of running them off to get a heads-up game.

Also how do you get by casino noise?

Ignore it, too. But if the noise distracts you, try earplugs. With experience, noise ceases to be an issue.

Hi Van Gogh

When you are counting negative numbers, don't think minus 1, minus 2, etc. Use m instead - thinking m1, m2 etc. or some such convention. If you don't like "m" use what ever you like. On the plus side, don't think plus 1, plus 2, etc. - just think 1, 2, etc. It will speed up your counting significantly.

I think you should continue to practice counting down the deck (using Dog Hand's recommendations) as you want the count to be so natural to you that you almost don't think about it. Counting down the deck or multiple decks one card or multiple cards at a time over and over and over will go a long way to help you do that.

Worry about accuracy at first. The speed will come in time.

Wow! You have all been really awesome and helpful with useful information for a beginner! I don't really plan on making a living this way or even "getting rich." I just found the math and the act extremely intriguing. Besides, the nearest casino is something like a 3 hour drive and I don't have an expendable income. Some friends and I were thinking about going sometime for fun, but the most any of us (with an exception or two) could scrape up is about a hundred bucks of gambling money a piece. Even being experienced it seems like I couldn't really do much with that. But I will continue to practice and to play with friends and we'll just have to see how far into this I get. I will hopefully have internet often enough to keep in touch on this forum. It's and the people are amazing! Thank you guys.

You write quite well for a college sophomore. Good punctuation and grammer. Your tone seems to match your age but I would have pegged you for older based on your writing. Additionally, you like the math of 21. Maybe, these two things will impact what you study in college.

There is a lot more math to the game if you choose to learn it, in lieu of just trusting and using it. IOW, you can learn how the clock is made or you can just trust what others have calculated and printed and use it as you wish.

But, math might be a huge factor in your future career. From what I understand, it will open more career doors for you. Also, business analytics (not sure if that's the right term) is greatly needed. Jobs are available and unfilled. Not just actuaries but the ability to tell a CEO/CFO how to analyze their market place and where to spend marketing dollars.

That said, you can also learn to count faster using Dog's method and pushing out even more cards. Work up to three, then four at a time. You will still get some cancelling out, but you will also get some +4 and -4 situations. You will count 3 or 4 cards in the same time you have been counting 1. Go for accuracy as previously advised.

Furthermore, you can look at several cards at once like you would a photo or picture. As the lyric goes, "Every picture tells a story don't it?". You'll move from adding and subtracting to "recognizing". In an instant, you'll know that 3 or 6 cards on a layout equal "0" or "2" etc...

This needs to happen with the value of your hands as well if you want to keep up with a fast dealer and a chaotic environment. Sometimes you need to know the dealer broke without actually adding up his hand total. You may have other distractions or need to reset the count in your mind, so simply knowing the dealer has 18 or "too many" is faster than adding up the hand, to 23 for example.

The most important math for you to learn about 21 right now as a newbie is: (1) required bankroll for a given income goal/EV
(2) risk of ruin (4) impact of expenses (5) variance. Hopefully, this will give you a realistic picture of how little advantage even a professional gains on the house. And, hopefully this will keep you realistic, un-addicted and focused on the truly important things in your life.

You may be better off learning poker and playing for peanuts with your buds. No expenses if you play in the dorm, future income potential might be good if you become good, no risk of crashing on a late drive back from the casino "3 hours away".

Good luck, read the right material, take some "easy" college math/stats classes (not the hard core professor unless you plan to major in it), study etc.....

"You write quite well for a college sophomore. Good punctuation and grammer."

Ahem! Good spelling, too? :-)

Don

I actually wouldn't consider myself to be a very good writer, but I do appreciate the compliments. My mother was a newspaper editor, so I had a wee bit of reinforcement on the grammar and punctuation front. I am also grateful for the "5" tips. ;) But seriously, I still need to study those things fiercely, considering that I've mostly just been working mastering basic strategy for multi-deck games and trying to come up with ways to remember different rule variances. The actual counting and true count part seems like the easy part. RoR, variance, bankrolls for EVs; This is all the stuff that I need to really concentrate on and study after I'm comfortable with basic strategy. That stuff is where the math gets really interesting. Does the "Blackjack School" link have all of that information in it?