The Long and Winding Road

[Knox]

I've been off the board for a while but still playing quite a bit.

In late August I reached my peak for the year, up 200 units. I then proceeded to experience a horrid negative variance run, I dropped about 120 units on the remainder of that vegas trip.

My next big trip was Biloxi. Again my luck was horrid.

Then Vicksburg, up about 50 units. Lost it all right away, kept the faith and got it all back by the end of the trip +20 units.

There was some smaller trips mixed in with all of this, but come November it was off to Argosy, where I never win. I was hot there and left with about 30 units, pretty good for the small amount of mixed play on their crowded 6D tables and marginal DD game.

So there I was, back up about 100 units heading into a 4 night trip back to Vegas around the Holidays in December.

Once again, enter the negative variance. I blew through 100 units, then another 80. Down 80 units for the year, bleah.

The thing with that final awful trip was I was getting the conditions and counts I wanted. I could not have asked for better odds. It was just that situation where every time you get a big bet out you lose.

This got me wondering about new money management strategies. More specifically, not pressing my bets up when things are going poorly. Those negative streaks are always going to come, but I certainly could have lessened the damage by not pressing when I just couldn't buy a winning hand.

Another thought I'm kicking around is per session stop loss limits. I'll sit down and lose 40 units in a session without flinching if the conditions and counts warrant it. Maybe I need to cut if off more quickly when things are heading South. I know as well as anyone you can lose 20 straight hands, one each on 20 different tables, but still...

So I am kicking around some things that seem unscientific here, but I've always had a notion that streak betting could somehow be exploitable. Blackjack can be a very streaky game as we all know.

I have several trips coming up at great places to play (Vegas x 2, Biloxi, Tunica). I always get free lodging, food per diem, and mileage or free airfare through my work. My situation could not be more ideal, but another 180 unit loss on a trip would be difficult to stomach (and finance), hence the money management ideas I am kicking around.

I appreciate any comments about the money management topic, even to include the unscientific topic of the science of streak betting. I'm not into voodoo stuff though. Any solid book references would also be great.

I know that some will say "you just have to play through it", but I'm always looking to improve my game. I play mostly quality DD games, almost full KO matrix with some true count enhancements.

[sagefr0g]

sorry to hear about the down results Knox.
i'm with most around here in believing that it just isn't possible to fortell when those downward streaks or upward streaks are going to strike.
you could consider lowering your ROR. i think that would help the severity of your swings.

the thing about setting targets or stop loss, stop win targets is i think it reduces the number of hands you can get in. so it can lower your win rate some. interesting link below:
http://www.blackjackincolor.com/useless1.htm

[EasyRhino]

Knox, out of curiosity, are you playing with a fixed or semi-fixed bankroll? You've been metioning the units that you're "up", but is that on top of a base bankroll of XXX units? Or are you pretty much just using a string of trip bankrolls?

Originally Posted by Knox

This got me wondering about new money management strategies. More specifically, not pressing my bets up when things are going poorly.

Careful, you may not be thinking ploppy thoughts, but you're using ploppy language. There only place where this makes sense is if you're playing at a high enough level at the same places enough to where you need to purchase playing cover to make your bets look like a progression system (increasing only on wins or losses).

But, if you're not raising the bets in a high count when you're in a "bear market", then you're making a mistake, and basically pissing away any advantage to be gained by counting. More emphatically, you're not counting anymore, you're just a flat-betting basic strategy player.

Another thought I'm kicking around is per session stop loss limits.

I like Norm's graph on this one. The cardinal rule is to never leave a table when the count is high (modified by the AutoMonkey Corrolary, leave when the amount of security personnel is higher than the true count).

But, as long as you at least play out the high counts, Then I don't think it will really matter. Setting a stop loss will result in smaller losing sessions, but you'll probably have more of them. (Just like a win target would result in more, smaller, wins).

[Knox]

On bankroll size, I am replenishable but I am willing to accept the ROR associated with 100 units of a max bet of $125, about $12.5-k. So I am well within statistical realm of reason down 80 units. I just had always played on house money before, so the concept of playing from behind is a new and unhappy one.

I agree that you obviously should not walk away from a good count, so you need to have sufficient $ to buy in at that point if necessary. Then if you walk away at the end of the deck you have not lost anything. Also, quitting on negative counts is the best way to go out.

Probably what I will do is get a bit more aggressive with my wong outs, even to the point of absurdity. I'm just not patient enough to wong into 6D games and DD games it is not as important. I also will take any quality lower stakes game I can find, for example I have had nice success with $10-$75 spreads on DD games compared to the roller coaster of $25-$125.

I also typically spread to two hands and sometimes increase my max bet up as much as 50%, e.g. 2 x $75 on a $25 min. Since I am not in the mood for more losses, 2 x $60-$65 might help me to reduce any bad streaks in the short-term.

I guess the main thing you have to fight off is the boredom and potential burnout associated with a run of bad luck.

I received a PM about self assessment and I agree, we should always be open to that. I think my play is fine but maybe I need to switch to a high PE system since I play so much DD? Is it really worth it though in terms of EV? Most of the gain in counting comes from bet variation, and KO has a rock solid betting correlation.

[Automatic Monkey]

Originally Posted by Knox

...

I received a PM about self assessment and I agree, we should always be open to that. I think my play is fine but maybe I need to switch to a high PE system since I play so much DD? Is it really worth it though in terms of EV? Most of the gain in counting comes from bet variation, and KO has a rock solid betting correlation.

Let me guess: the PM was from someone who knows someone who has a program which will give you an opportunity to improve your game... for a price.

Really, you need to just accept the variance built into the game. There's a reason we're expected to have 1000+ units available and that's because it's very easy to lose that much and there's nothing you can do about it. It's built right into the game, and no super count, extra indices etc. can change that. It took me a while to accept that, that working harder or smarter or anything else can't help you when your fate is completely linked to the turn of a card. All you can do is make sure you understand the math behind what you are doing, and keep doing it.

[Kasi]

Originally Posted by Knox

...self assessment and I agree, we should always be open to that.

The only thing that strikes me, and who knows if it matters, but you always mention units as if they are the same. Yet it sounds like you play 6D, DD, maybe sometimes wong-out of exactly which games I'm not sure.

Like I guess you're comfortable with the risk of that 25-125 spread being the 1% max bet but sometimes you spread 10-75 and apparently had success with it. I don't even know if that's the same game, but that's not a 1 % max bet. The first is a 500 min unit roll and the second is a 1250 min unit roll. That's not the same either. Not that that means either is necessarily way out of line.

Is that 180 units you're worried about losing 180*10 or 180*25?

Surely, you'll have different unit sizes for some of these games? Won't you change how you bet even in the same DD game if pen gets better or worse? Or maybe you feel heat and decide to switch to a smaller spread for a while - will you change anything?

Have you ever sat down and maybe figured more exactly what's going on for the way you play all/any of the these games you actually play? Do you at least have an idea of win rates and risk?

Do you jump bets alot? Bet bigger off the top? Play indexes? Do DD rules change? Do you lose many trip bankrolls?

It just sounds like a possibility you may be playing at very different risks with different win rates at different times. Doesn't mean any of them are necessarily unreasonable. As long as you have a pretty good idea, great.

I'd start with double-checking the game you play most often and the way(s) you play it.

Just things to maybe at least think about a little bit. If there is any problem, and I'm not saying there is, after all I guess you're only down a little for the year, I doubt if it's with your playing of the cards or knowing the count. If anything, it's changing, or not changing, bets and ramps and ramp points under constantly changing conditions.

So I don't think switching counts would make much of a difference.

Good luck out there.

[EasyRhino]

Originally Posted by Knox

I just had always played on house money before, so the concept of playing from behind is a new and unhappy one.

Yep, it's a drag!

[Knox]

OK, got my 80 unis back here on my latest LV trip so feeling a bit better. As stated on the other thread, going to check the lingerie and potentially weak dealers at Planet Hollywood now. Low stakes planned for the final day as it has been a good trip and I am satisfied. Damn I hated dropping that $4500 last trip though, the counts were great all the while!

PM me if you want a trip report, I'll have some decent tidbits on Vegas.

[zengrifter]

Originally Posted by sagefr0g

you could consider lowering your ROR. i think that would help the severity of your swings.

the thing about setting targets or stop loss, stop win targets is i think it reduces the number of hands you can get in. so it can lower your win rate some. interesting link below:
http://www.blackjackincolor.com/useless1.htm

What Knox described are SMALL swings. Swings are good. zg

[ihate17]

To kind of point out the obvious here: This works if you know you are in a period of negative variance and since you must bet before the cards to the next hand are dealt, you just do not know. So you are simply reducing your spread overall and reducing your win rate, but you know this.

It is one of those human nature problems that effects our ability to beat this game. When that negative variance appears in a high count and we lose several max bet hands, we review and might say, "if I only had not bet as much as I did." This taken far enough will create a cardcounter who easily can become a lifetime loser because he never gets enough money on the felt.

ihate17