"Seven Luck 21" better version of Spanish??

ortango

Well-Known Member
#1
My local casino, Seven Luck is now offering "Seven Luck 21" with $10 min, $300 maximum at one table. It is basically Spanish 21, (all pip tens taken out) and 8d.

In the past I have always avoided variation games because I was too busy trying to learn real BJ to get distracted by them. But from various sources, it is stated that Spanish offers good starting odds for perfect basic strategy, in fact better than regular BJ depending on the rules. The problem is that it is harder to play perfect BS due to the strange bonus payouts, double opportunities and hand makeup.

If any of you play Spanish 21 with any frequency, I would like to know which of these are normal Spanish 21 rules and which are not. Additionally, I would like to know how much edge the player or house has with the following rules in the game they offer, with perfect BS, and which card counting system is recommended for Spanish.
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"SEVEN LUCK 21"

- Players natural 21 beats dealers natural 21 and pays 3 to 2
- Players Hard 21 beats any dealers 21
- Players soft 21 pushes any dealers 21 including natural

- Redouble allowed up to 2 extra times on any hand (for example, player has S13 against dealers 6 and doubles. An A is dealt to make S14, and player can double again. A 2 is dealt to make S16, the player can double one final time to make 4x original bet)

- Pairs may be split up to four times, Double after splits allowed. One card per split Aces.

- Surrender allowed at any point with any number of cards

- Special Payouts, paid immediately:
7-7-7 same suit - 10:1
7-7-7 mixed suit - 3:1
6-7-8 same suit - 3:1
5 card hard 21 - 3:2

Finally, the pamplet says "Dealer stands on Hard 17 and draws to Soft 17". I'm assuming this means they hit Soft 17?

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In the Big Book of Blackjack by Snyder, he writes that perfect BS brings house edge to .4 if dealer stays S17 and .8 if dealer hits. He also writes that the .8 goes up to .4 if redoubling is allowed as in the game above. The wizard of odds site gives various odds to certian Spanish rules. There is no mention in either of how of how the favorable 21 rules, Surrender, and splits and DAS rules affect the edge. Is it possible this game has player edge for perfect BS play? I know the special payouts make negligible difference.

Additionally, Snyder recommends the Red Seven Count, which I guess would make sense to use an unbalanced count (starting at -48 for 8d spanish 21)

My general feeling on this research is that this game offers good odds. Anyone care to elaborate???
 

Dyepaintball12

Well-Known Member
#2
Well I am no expert, and I have been told that "psuedo" blackjack games should be avoided (by Arnold Synder), but this game actually sounds better than playing regular.

However, I could be way off.
 
#3
It does sound very good. A lot of casinos have either redoubling or S17 but I'm not aware of any that have both. The payouts for rare hands are a bit better than in Spanish 21 and that is significant because those payouts reduce the house edge by more than is intuitive.

One thing I don't yet understand is the rule where a player's soft 21 beats a dealer natural. Do they let you play before they check for a dealer's natural? Do they let you surrender before they check for a dealer's natural? If so, you have Early Surrender and that is a very powerful rule even with a Spanish pack.

Counting Spanish 21 is tricky because the EOR of the cards is a little different. If you want to experiment with counts, maybe a level 1 count where aces and 10's are -1 and 2,3,4,5 are +1 would be a good place to start.
 

ortango

Well-Known Member
#4
Automatic Monkey said:
One thing I don't yet understand is the rule where a player's soft 21 beats a dealer natural. Do they let you play before they check for a dealer's natural? Do they let you surrender before they check for a dealer's natural? If so, you have Early Surrender and that is a very powerful rule even with a Spanish pack.
Notice the rules say a players soft 21 pushes a dealers natural, it doesn't beat it.

One weird thing that I forgot to mention, which I'm not sure if is normal or not, is that the dealer only deals himself one card, and proceeds to deal himself the second and following cards AFTER the players have played out their hands. I'm assuming that this is to the players disadvantage, especially if you are doubling down against a blackjack and you don't know it. (is it possible that they take your double bets too, unlike in real BJ? it would make sense that this is the "trick" of the game". I will have to find out). But technically, yes they do do have early surrender because you can surrender before he checks.

Also, insurance pays 5 to 2, and of course there are no tens so I have no idea what the index would have to be for insurance.
 

MGP

Well-Known Member
#6
ortango said:
"SEVEN LUCK 21"

- Players natural 21 beats dealers natural 21 and pays 3 to 2
- Players Hard 21 beats any dealers 21
- Players soft 21 pushes any dealers 21 including natural

- Redouble allowed up to 2 extra times on any hand (for example, player has S13 against dealers 6 and doubles. An A is dealt to make S14, and player can double again. A 2 is dealt to make S16, the player can double one final time to make 4x original bet)

- Pairs may be split up to four times, Double after splits allowed. One card per split Aces.

- Surrender allowed at any point with any number of cards

- Special Payouts, paid immediately:
7-7-7 same suit - 10:1
7-7-7 mixed suit - 3:1
6-7-8 same suit - 3:1
5 card hard 21 - 3:2
The rules for Spanish 21 can be found on the Wizard's site here:
http://wizardofodds.com/spanish21

Some, but not all, of the differences that are negative for the player are:
No 6 card and 7-or-more card 21 payoffs
Soft 21's don't always win
No 678 mixed suit bonus
No DAN

ENHC vs OBO is not a negative in this case since you can surrender 3-or more card hands early and push against BJ with 3-or more card soft 21s if the dealer isn't checking but you can't do either with OBO and the value gained from splitting A's/8's doesn't even come close to making up the difference and it is not "BS" to double against A/10 with these rules even with OBO. In this case the ENHC actually adds about 0.2%.

Before I give my EV I need to give a disclaimer first and say that there aren't any sources out there to check my bonus calculations for ENHC but I believe I am implementing them correctly. My CA generates the same strategies and similar EVs to those that the Wizard gives for Spanish 21 although I know of one typo and I disagree about using an NCard strategy for some of the plays...

With the above rules and ENHC, H17, ES, Split multiple aces, and assuming "Double Down Rescue" (surrrender after double) since you say at any time although I did not include surrender after split aces, and that you meant double until 8x original bet (2^3), I get the following EVs:

TD: -1.400%
CD: -1.137%

This is compared to the Spanish 21 EV with H17, Redoubling, 8 Spanish Decks EV of:

CD: -0.436%

Good luck,
MGP
 
#8
I was just about to make a thread about this same topic.

According to the Wizard of Odds.
http://wizardofodds.com/houseedge

Spanish 21 House Edge
H17 0.76%
S17 0.40%

He doesn't specify how many decks this result is based on, unless I missed something.

Sadly the variant I encounter most often is 6 decks, 6:5 on natural and dealt from a CSM. :whip: Wouldn't touch it with a ten foot barge pole.
 
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