Question for Vegas veterans. When I am goofing around playing on this site, I double my bets after every lost hand. Even though the bets can get very large for a 7 or 8 hand string of losses, I always come out ahead in the end. Question is, if I am willing to wager up to $1,375 (8 straight losing hands)on a starting bet of $5.00 to win that $5.00, is this strategy ever successful? Despite the low return on each hand, I always seem to come out well ahead. I'm a basic strategy guy, not a major gambler. My primary goal when sitting at a real table is 2 or 3 hours of entertainment for $150-$200. Am I completely nuts to try this in a Casino?
Double betting
- Thread starter noshark
- Start date
The Martingale progression
This is probably the most common of all betting progressions. The 'Double up after each loss' system is also known as the Martingale progression. It guarantees a small profit over each sequence of bets, but only if you have an unlimited bankroll and no max bet limits.
The problem is that those long streaks of losses are inevitable. It's not a matter of if but rather when disaster will strike. Your example of 8 losses happens quite commonly, more often than once every 200 sequences in blackjack.
This month's BJ Insider has more extensive article on this exact topic, written by Eliot Jacobsen, author of The Blackjack Zone:
Betting Systems and the House Edge
This article is freely available.
This is probably the most common of all betting progressions. The 'Double up after each loss' system is also known as the Martingale progression. It guarantees a small profit over each sequence of bets, but only if you have an unlimited bankroll and no max bet limits.
The problem is that those long streaks of losses are inevitable. It's not a matter of if but rather when disaster will strike. Your example of 8 losses happens quite commonly, more often than once every 200 sequences in blackjack.
This month's BJ Insider has more extensive article on this exact topic, written by Eliot Jacobsen, author of The Blackjack Zone:
Betting Systems and the House Edge
This article is freely available.
Martingale
This negative progression you use can pay off for you in the short term. But sooner or later it will kill you. If you are going to use it, I would strongly recommend that you pick a reasonable number of hands to loose in a row and then reset your bet to your minimum and start over (say, 4 hands in a row.)
Every combination I've tried with this method results in some very bad beats. When I set the simulator up to process 1,000 hands, in almost every one there is at least one run of an 11 or 12 hand loss sequence. That sequence may not happen to you in the casino...or it may start happening on your third hand!
Sorry Ken......we must have been responding at the same time :laugh:
This negative progression you use can pay off for you in the short term. But sooner or later it will kill you. If you are going to use it, I would strongly recommend that you pick a reasonable number of hands to loose in a row and then reset your bet to your minimum and start over (say, 4 hands in a row.)
Every combination I've tried with this method results in some very bad beats. When I set the simulator up to process 1,000 hands, in almost every one there is at least one run of an 11 or 12 hand loss sequence. That sequence may not happen to you in the casino...or it may start happening on your third hand!
Sorry Ken......we must have been responding at the same time :laugh:
Progressive betting in practice
I've actually used this in practice so I can offer some real world advice. I used it in Elko Nevada in 1994 to win a large sum of money (I'd prefer not to disclose the exact amount but let's just say it was substantial, in the five figures.) The tables had a limit of $300 and that is indeed the problem. The Casino's aren't stupid, of course. This is why the limits exist; otherwise, I could have a million dollar bankroll and be gauranteed to win.
If you start with a $5 bet and then double, you get to $320 on the 7th hand, but you are limited to the $300. On that 7th hand, you still come out a loser but not by as much. (Vegas had $500 limits on the table I played, which changes things somewhat but can actually be more dangerous.) So the question becomes, how often will you lose 7 hands in a row? Well, actually quit often, or at least often enough for it to be a problem. So here's what I did:
1) you must have a $900 bankroll. There's no other way to do it. By the time you are up to the 7th hand, you have lost $600, plus you need another $300 for double down or split situations, which are crucial to your success
2) You have to know when to quit. You will know within 2-3 hours if you are going to lose, so quit. There is no coming back at this point because once you are down by so much, it becomes almost impossible just to come even again, let alone ahead. This, of course, is the best rule for any gambler.
3) If you follow rule #2, then you are limiting your loses. The key is of course over 10 trips (for example) to simply win so much money the times you do win, that it makes up for the loses. These first three rules are, of course, nothing unique to progressive betting and are pretty much how all blackjack should be played. Just basic smart control of your money. Minimize loses, maximize gains
4) So how do you win with progressive betting? Well no strategy works everytime, but the times it's worked for me, depends crucially on those first 2 hours of play. If you play perfect blackjack (always a requirement) and take advantage of all splits, double downs and so forth and further assume the table is "hot" very early on, then you are winning every 2,3,4 hands and it works for awhile. But the key is getting up early, which is where the double downs and splits come into play. Once you get up early by say $1000, it becomes progressively harder for the casino to knock you down permanently (assuming you are still being smart with your money and your cards.) Once you are up by $2000 or $3000, then you can afford to lose a series of 7 (several times over) and with enough double downs and splits (and blackjacks) you will make more money than you will lose (you hope). This early period is what makes or breaks you (as well as the double downs/splits/blackjacks).
5) Another good gambling rule: I set a floor for myself. When I was up $3000, let's say, my floor was $1500. If I ever dropped below that, I told myself I would quit. I was fortunate that trip and never hit my floor. It remains a question whether or not I would have actually quit. That's a major part of disciplined gambling. And very hard to do in practice. Disciplined gambling is about hard rules that exist for good reason.
Of course, it's not a gaurantee (nothing is) but it can work sometimes. I've done it, several times. However, you have to be careful with your money and minimize your loses by quiting (which requires tremendous discipline; being at the table is addictive!) But once I was up by so much on the house, I could weather almost any storm (even without counting cards) and then simply play more aggressively when the table was "hot". You could also couple it with card counting and simply bet minimally when the deck is "cold" and return to progressive betting when the deck turns "hot". You will lose (more trips to the casino) than you will win but you may also win (more money) than you lose. (Of course, I immediately went to Vegas after winning that money and violated my own cardinal rule. I didn't limit my loses and dropped $6000. Ouch! There's a lesson in there somewhere, but it hurts too much for me to ponder it.)
The other thing is I continued this winning streak using the same strategy for two days. I used multiple tables and multiple dealers. And, of course, when the deck is reshuffled the count is set at 0 again and the odds are the same as at any other time, unless the dealer is cheating (it's a gambler's superstition to blame the dealer, since it would illegal to cheat, but I could swear the next time I went to that same casino the pitt boss kept sending in the same ringer every time I turned hot! Or maybe it was just my imagination but I couldn't beat that dealer for anything.) So the question is, why did I continue to win at blackjack, since the odds are constantly reshuffled (at the end of the deck)? I can only explain it by saying that your behaviour changes slightly when you are winning as opposed to when it's your own money. And the progressive gambling strategy DID work, when I hurt a lucky streak very early on. Pure luck might explain winning the lottery or roulette or craps where the odds are constant but in blackjack, where the player has some control over how he plays the cards and how he bets?
I've actually used this in practice so I can offer some real world advice. I used it in Elko Nevada in 1994 to win a large sum of money (I'd prefer not to disclose the exact amount but let's just say it was substantial, in the five figures.) The tables had a limit of $300 and that is indeed the problem. The Casino's aren't stupid, of course. This is why the limits exist; otherwise, I could have a million dollar bankroll and be gauranteed to win.
If you start with a $5 bet and then double, you get to $320 on the 7th hand, but you are limited to the $300. On that 7th hand, you still come out a loser but not by as much. (Vegas had $500 limits on the table I played, which changes things somewhat but can actually be more dangerous.) So the question becomes, how often will you lose 7 hands in a row? Well, actually quit often, or at least often enough for it to be a problem. So here's what I did:
1) you must have a $900 bankroll. There's no other way to do it. By the time you are up to the 7th hand, you have lost $600, plus you need another $300 for double down or split situations, which are crucial to your success
2) You have to know when to quit. You will know within 2-3 hours if you are going to lose, so quit. There is no coming back at this point because once you are down by so much, it becomes almost impossible just to come even again, let alone ahead. This, of course, is the best rule for any gambler.
3) If you follow rule #2, then you are limiting your loses. The key is of course over 10 trips (for example) to simply win so much money the times you do win, that it makes up for the loses. These first three rules are, of course, nothing unique to progressive betting and are pretty much how all blackjack should be played. Just basic smart control of your money. Minimize loses, maximize gains
4) So how do you win with progressive betting? Well no strategy works everytime, but the times it's worked for me, depends crucially on those first 2 hours of play. If you play perfect blackjack (always a requirement) and take advantage of all splits, double downs and so forth and further assume the table is "hot" very early on, then you are winning every 2,3,4 hands and it works for awhile. But the key is getting up early, which is where the double downs and splits come into play. Once you get up early by say $1000, it becomes progressively harder for the casino to knock you down permanently (assuming you are still being smart with your money and your cards.) Once you are up by $2000 or $3000, then you can afford to lose a series of 7 (several times over) and with enough double downs and splits (and blackjacks) you will make more money than you will lose (you hope). This early period is what makes or breaks you (as well as the double downs/splits/blackjacks).
5) Another good gambling rule: I set a floor for myself. When I was up $3000, let's say, my floor was $1500. If I ever dropped below that, I told myself I would quit. I was fortunate that trip and never hit my floor. It remains a question whether or not I would have actually quit. That's a major part of disciplined gambling. And very hard to do in practice. Disciplined gambling is about hard rules that exist for good reason.
Of course, it's not a gaurantee (nothing is) but it can work sometimes. I've done it, several times. However, you have to be careful with your money and minimize your loses by quiting (which requires tremendous discipline; being at the table is addictive!) But once I was up by so much on the house, I could weather almost any storm (even without counting cards) and then simply play more aggressively when the table was "hot". You could also couple it with card counting and simply bet minimally when the deck is "cold" and return to progressive betting when the deck turns "hot". You will lose (more trips to the casino) than you will win but you may also win (more money) than you lose. (Of course, I immediately went to Vegas after winning that money and violated my own cardinal rule. I didn't limit my loses and dropped $6000. Ouch! There's a lesson in there somewhere, but it hurts too much for me to ponder it.)
The other thing is I continued this winning streak using the same strategy for two days. I used multiple tables and multiple dealers. And, of course, when the deck is reshuffled the count is set at 0 again and the odds are the same as at any other time, unless the dealer is cheating (it's a gambler's superstition to blame the dealer, since it would illegal to cheat, but I could swear the next time I went to that same casino the pitt boss kept sending in the same ringer every time I turned hot! Or maybe it was just my imagination but I couldn't beat that dealer for anything.) So the question is, why did I continue to win at blackjack, since the odds are constantly reshuffled (at the end of the deck)? I can only explain it by saying that your behaviour changes slightly when you are winning as opposed to when it's your own money. And the progressive gambling strategy DID work, when I hurt a lucky streak very early on. Pure luck might explain winning the lottery or roulette or craps where the odds are constant but in blackjack, where the player has some control over how he plays the cards and how he bets?
