unbelievable card counter

I saw on tv, either the discovery or history channel, can't remember which.
However, there was a guy that counted cards, and he was able to keep track of every card play and thier suit. They would quiz him on the last few cards, and he named them every time. According to the show, he is the best card counter in the world.

Don't know how true this is, but I thought it was interesting.

Some people have amazing skills. Former Knick Jerry Lucas memorized the entire NYC phone book on a dare from a reporter. In the middle of an inerview, someone would call out a phone number and he'd identify the owner.

People who play bridge can train themselves to figure out exactly which cards are left and who has which one.

Memorizing each individual card isn't that much more useful than Hi-Lo in terms of blackjack. It's the law of diminishing returns - the simplest systems have the highest yield per effort ratios.

He is the best card counter but the worst blackjack player. Typical illusionist.

If you could memorize every card that had been in play and then do the math to determine the correct odds for each play, you'd have a huge edge over the house I'd think. Card counting helps but for most counts, won't tell you if you're more likely to get a 3 or an 8.

Neither will he. He may well be able to tell you exactly which 17 cards remain, but he can't tell you which order they will come in. Its helpful but not all powerful.

though mathematically, a lot of the cards are VERY similar in advantage, thus using simple tags like +1/-1 or +2?+1/0/-1/-2 is so effective. the other problem, is that the calculation of edge would be impossible for a human mind. and i mean even the smartest mind. think about it. what if all the 5s were gone, or the 4s, or what if six 5s, 3 sevens, and 10 tens remain. i mean you could go on and on and on, each shoe would be different, at each point in the deal. the composition of each round would be different, probably out to 1,000,000 or more hands (for 6D). it would take some serious computing power to even calculate the edge on that.

I would guess that it might even be too difficult to do this for SD. And what I mean is precise calculations, not guessing - or fuzzy counting.

even taking 5 cards out of a SD game (1 burn, 2 for you, 2 for dealer). How many possibilities exist for that round two scenario? quite a few. Go to round three, remove say 12 total cards. How many scenarios? odds of each?

Shadroch is right.

I ran through 500 6D shoes. The edge with recalculating basic strategy for every distribution of cards is -0.42%; the baseline is -0.57%.

Well you can't always tell who has what card because your opponents are trying to deceive you, but you can break down your options into a set of probabilities most likely to make your bid. E.g. "If West has the King of Clubs I'm screwed no matter what, so I will play as if East has it to maximize my score if he does."

It depends. In a deeply dealt SD game knowing all the cards can be very powerful, but that's an extreme and unlikely situation.

Blackjack computers

I have never used a Casey or any other kind of illegal blackjack computer but in theory is this not what they do? They would know every single card remaining and figure the strategy based upon this. This gives them a higher advantage than cardcounting but as stated it does not tell them exactly which card will be next.
Carcounting does not give you index plays based upon there being a large number of 7's or 8's left in the stack, where this guy,knowing every single card could definately do this.

ihate17

Is the guy's name Rain Man by any chance?

Thoughts on Photographic Memory and BJ


I have a friend with an actual "photographic memory".

He can track ALL of the cards played in the precise order that
they appear, BUT, that really does not help as much as you may
think - unless you are playing deeply dealt S.D. or D.D. games
-- because the correct strategy adjustments are completely unknown.

e.g. You have a holding of 16 and are looking to hit your stiff.
If NO 5's have been played but all of the 4's have been dealt
and the dealer shows a FACE do you stand at T.C. = Zero?
How about at -1 or +1?

What if all the 9's are remaining and your pair of Aces are facing
a Dealer Ace and the HiOpt II True Count is -8. At that count,
ordinarily you HIT, but with all of those 9's waiting in the wings,
how low a T.C. do you need to eschew splitting those bullets?
What if all the 9's have been depleted and the T. C. was just -3 ?

I could go on forever with examples of how we are clueless re:
what to do IF we know all of the remaining cards except in
borderline Basic Strategy Departure decisions.

Needless to say, in a shoe game this topic is moot.


I refer the interested reader to the chapter on "Key Card Play"
in David Sklansky's book on Pro Gambling: "Getting the Best Of It."

Yep. "Depth-charging" and the like can benefit a great deal from this, but I don't think those opportunities exist any more.