Positive martingale

[postmachoguy]

I've always wondered why anyone sane person would want to chase their losses with a martingale. At the same time, I wonder whether a postive martingale might not work.
The automatic doubling when the player wins looks to the casino as though the player is just pushing his luck.
The casino's money is at stake, not the player's.
I'm not sure how this would work with basic strategy, but it seems to me it might work with card count.
There would have to be some money management parameters. There should be a stoploss set and adhered to on the downside, and there should be a bailout limit on the upside.
Does anyone have some insights/input?

[Mikeaber]

I'll let someone else field this one. A progression is a progression is a progression.

[newyorkbear]

A few weeks ago I'd have agreed with that statement,but after some semi-serious experimenting with OSCAR,as described by Arnold Snyder,I'm starting to think they might be on to something. Has anyone tried it?

[Midnite]

Postmachoguy- In general, a postive or negative progression, is about a wash.
Negative Progression= Many small wins and the occassional big loss.
Postive Progression= Many small losses and the occassional big win.

Newyorkbear- I take it you mean Oscar's Grind.
With stop losses, it does better than most.
One of the sharpest players I know (and he has been a counter since the 60's) still uses it, at times.
I have tested it on several thousand hands and it holds up pretty well.

hope this helps......

Midnite

[postmachoguy]

Could you elucidate, please?
Also, folks, I have seen no comment about the doubling acting as camouflage for counting strategies.
Although, I must confess, out here in the land of numerous Indian casinos, where they are still playing single deck, I must wonder at the level of expertise existent.

[Mikeaber]

There seems to be a lot of folks who just won't accept the fact (or choose to ignore it) that a progression ends up with the same house edge as does flat betting. You may sometimes win bigger and other times lose bigger, but if you play them long enough, you end up about where you would have been had you been flat betting. I just don't see the lure of playing progressions when the risk of ruin is potentially so great.

There, I've been lured into another Progression discussion <LOL>

[postmachoguy]

Sorry if I persuaded you to bend your principles.

[Mikeaber]

Originally Posted by postmachoguy

Sorry if I persuaded you to bend your principles.

That's okay Postmachoguy. I detected just a tad of sarcasm in that and I don't blame you for it. I had surgery two weeks ago to correct a shoulder problem and have been eating hydrocodone like candy. I was out of line in jumping in with that kind of statement.

[postmachoguy]

Mike, no sarcasm was intended. And I'm amazed you are able to concentrate enough to concoct any kind of answer if you have just been through surgery.
Hope you heal well and fast.

[Mikeaber]

Okay, here's the deal guys. I was getting cabin fever after being housebound for tow weeks. Verna and I pulled a couple of strings at AmeriStar and got a room at the fully booked hotel (Tony Bennet was performing and it was sold out!) This wasn't one of those trips where we predetermined to go in to break the bank.....each of us just took $200....Verna for the slots where she usually does pretty well, and of course, I was headed for Blackjack.

My objective was to hit the tables, breaking my own rules and trying out a conservative Progression...Dahl's was the progression I chose...in dollars 5 5, 7 7, 10 10, 15 15, 25 25, 35 35, 50 50, etc.

But to work a positive progression, you have to win a hand or two! That wasn't happening for me <LOL> I moved from table to table as I met my threshold for loss and Friday night alone, I played 4 tables ending up the night down $75. I think I got to the $10 step a couple of times but mostly, it was like playing a flat bet game since it was so choppy.

Saturday morning.....same thing. After 6 hours of play, I was down $200. Not because of losing larger bets in the progression...hell, I never won often enough to make it to the larger steps in the progression! With another 4 hours to go before leaving for the 3 hour drive back to Wichita, I called my wife and confessed my "ruin" and told her I was hitting the ATM for another $100 to use to kill time with. She wasn't doing any better than I so I doubled the hit on the ATM. I even lost on the ATM because they withhold $3 for a transaction so I guess the ATM carries a 1.5% house edge!

I gave up on the progression and sat down a a $3 table. In fact, I moved around to three different $3 tables over the course of the next 4 hours. Just nothing good happening. At the end of the 4 hours session, I had maybe $30 left of that final $100 I pulled from the ATM. We were ready to leave and I had a stack of probably 18 or 20 white chips. I just pushed them out in the circle. And Won! I pushed half of them out and won that hand. This went on for 5 hands in a row I guess and when I colored up, I had slightly over $100 in chips.

<<edited>> That didn't make a lot of sense with out this comment: The dealer was coloring my payoffs with red chips so my bets were always my original plus whatever odd whites were part of the payoff.

Just a bad luck run at the casino....a run that would have scarred me sensless had I been betting a negative progression because of the dealer win runs experienced! In a game where you are likely to see a dealer win streak of 7 or 8 hands maybe ONCE, I recall at least three of them during the time I played!

One thing I didn't mention. AmeriStar uses Shuffle Master. On that last shoe (6-deck game) the dealer, an older guy, had trouble stuffing the cards into the shuffling machine and they spilled out on the table. Pit Boss told him to spread the cards to make sure they were all face down, count them and then hand shuffle them. It was the hand shuffled deck that turned the tables for me. Don't know if that was just coincidental or if it was indicative of hand shuffled versus machine shuffled decks. I know I seem to have better luck with hand shuffling.