How did they come up with these perecentages?

#1
Hello everyone

I am new to the forums, so I appologize if this question has been answered before. I tried using the search, but I couldn't find exactly what I was looking for.

A friend and I were discussing the situation where you have hard 11, and the dealer is showing 10. Most strategests will say that you Double Down in this situation.

The reasoning behind this I thought was summed up well here: (Dead link: http://www.fringe.com/games/blackjack/10calls.php) (just scroll down to the '11 vs. Dealer's 10' section)

In the explination, the author says 'You'll lose 44 percent of the time if you hit, and 46 percent of the time if you double'.

Does anyone know how they came up with these percentages? The websites I've come across never really give a good explination as to how these were calcualted.

Thanks,
Ryan
 

UK-21

Well-Known Member
#2
I'm intrigued by what you've written above. Sure you've got it right? Whether you hit your eleven, or double down, will make no difference on whether you win or lose the hand - the next card is the next card, and the cards don't change the order they're queued in based on your playing decision?

What does change is your win expectation, ££s/$$s wise. If you double down on this hand, over the longer term (lets say 500,000 hands plus) you'll win more money than you lose, compared to if you just hit - so EV (expected value) wise the maths say it's better to double down.

Out of curiousity, I've consulted my (6 deck) expectation table, and it shows that over the longer term doubling will increase your EV by 6p/c in the £/$ - that's off the top of a new shoe playing basic strategy. If you count cards, this will increase as the count goes up, and the probabilities of pulling a ten card to your eleven increase.

As a side note, in the UK doubling down is a -EV play as the dealer isn't able to check for a natural before the players make their decisions (due to no hole card being dealt).

Does this help?
 

shadroch

Well-Known Member
#3
Doubling a hand restricts you to one card. Just hitting it allows you more freedom. If you double an 11 and draw an Ace thru five, you are stuck and need the dealer to bust. Draw the same cards on a hit and you have the option to hit again.
 
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