Question on splitting faces.
- Thread starter mattmd
- Start date
I was playing with some locals in Primm on a $3 table. These people were amazing. They wouldn't split pairs against low cards, they would hit 12s against low cards, and they wouldn't double on anything against an 8, 9, 10, or Ace.
I was kindof shocked that people who don't even follow basic strategy, would be so angry at me when I was the only person on the table who knew how to play. One guy didn't even know the proper hand signals. Everything I did caused mumbling between them, or snide remarks. At one point, even the dealer reprimanded me for splitting tens against a five. Finally on the last hand of a shoe I spread to three hands, which caused a lot of comments before the dealer even dealt the cards. I ended up with 20, 17, 20 against the dealer's low card. Dealer hit to twenty, and it was all my fault. At that point everyone got up and left the table, leaving me alone. I ended up winning $510 that night spreading $3 - 2 X 40. I wish those bastards had been there when I cashed out. I had gotten occasional comments from other players before, but this place took me off guard. I just stayed quiet and played my game.
I was kindof shocked that people who don't even follow basic strategy, would be so angry at me when I was the only person on the table who knew how to play. One guy didn't even know the proper hand signals. Everything I did caused mumbling between them, or snide remarks. At one point, even the dealer reprimanded me for splitting tens against a five. Finally on the last hand of a shoe I spread to three hands, which caused a lot of comments before the dealer even dealt the cards. I ended up with 20, 17, 20 against the dealer's low card. Dealer hit to twenty, and it was all my fault. At that point everyone got up and left the table, leaving me alone. I ended up winning $510 that night spreading $3 - 2 X 40. I wish those bastards had been there when I cashed out. I had gotten occasional comments from other players before, but this place took me off guard. I just stayed quiet and played my game.
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The amount of ignorance over basic strategy is outstanding.
In australia I ALWAYS get bad looks when I hit 12 against a 2 or 3. I always get the 'your crazy' comments when I double 11 against a 10 or split 8's against an ace. Amazingly I split ten's against a 6 when the deck was rich and no one even cared. I saw players splitting tens all day!
In australia I ALWAYS get bad looks when I hit 12 against a 2 or 3. I always get the 'your crazy' comments when I double 11 against a 10 or split 8's against an ace. Amazingly I split ten's against a 6 when the deck was rich and no one even cared. I saw players splitting tens all day!
Yeah, the splitting of 8's against the 10 or ace always gets some muttering it seems. I had my wife split her 8's against the dealer 10 and one old guy found it necessary to share his wisdom of not doing that. When he muttered "he'll learn" and the dealer agreed I let them know that splitting 8's and aces is "simple basic strategy". Didn't much sink in though, since when my wife won one of the hands and lost the other, then she "got lucky".
But another dealer actually commented "a nice double down chance" on my soft 18 against her 6. Go figure.
But another dealer actually commented "a nice double down chance" on my soft 18 against her 6. Go figure.
Two ways of looking at things
On a board like this, especially when someone is asking for help, I will always try to help them with basic strategy and perhaps an explaination to go along with it.
On a blackjack table, I love and appreciate every single player who does not know, does not want to know, and has absolutely no clue about basic strategy. To me, this ignorant player is more important to the game than the casino, the pit or the dealer. He is the only reason that I can still make money at blackjack. If the bad player were to disappear tomorrow, the rules of all blackjack games would change completely. I play games where the house edge is between .19%-40% approx, but these casinos are making between 2-3% or higher on these games because of bad play. Just imagine how bad the rules of blackjack would become if everyone played basic strategy perfectly. You would probably have a choice of games:
Even money blackjack
Blackjack pays 3/2 but dealer wins pushes
Learn to love that guy who throws his money at the casino and realise that without him, you could never play winning blackjack.
ihate17
On a board like this, especially when someone is asking for help, I will always try to help them with basic strategy and perhaps an explaination to go along with it.
On a blackjack table, I love and appreciate every single player who does not know, does not want to know, and has absolutely no clue about basic strategy. To me, this ignorant player is more important to the game than the casino, the pit or the dealer. He is the only reason that I can still make money at blackjack. If the bad player were to disappear tomorrow, the rules of all blackjack games would change completely. I play games where the house edge is between .19%-40% approx, but these casinos are making between 2-3% or higher on these games because of bad play. Just imagine how bad the rules of blackjack would become if everyone played basic strategy perfectly. You would probably have a choice of games:
Even money blackjack
Blackjack pays 3/2 but dealer wins pushes
Learn to love that guy who throws his money at the casino and realise that without him, you could never play winning blackjack.
ihate17
Scott, it doesn't take that many consistantly bad plays to kick the house edge up to 6%. I have a chart that shows "cost of error" based on $100,000 played. The worst is "always taking insurance". According to that chart, it will cost you $279. But this only covers the common errors. What about the player who "playes like the dealer"? Or he who never will take a card when it might bust him? Those who never double down or split? There are a lot of this type player in the casinos. Maybe 6% is a bit high for a single player. But if the table is made up of 3 or 4 players who each are playing at a 2% disadvantage because of errors...what does that do to the casino's expectations?
Yep....God Bless 'em.
Yep....God Bless 'em.
Well, if there are 3 players at a table playing at a 2% disadvantage, the casino still only makes 2% of the bets, not 6%. But I see your point, I see a lot of players that probably play bad enough to reach the 6% mark. But the majority are "semi-smart" players. They know MOST of BS, but make a few mistakes here and there. They are probably the average 2% disadvantage players. I really dont know for sure.
To be honest, from what I've seen I'm kinda surprised my casino is making much money off of blackjack. I'm just a BS player myself but I'd say the majority of people I play with play BS 95% correctly, and those who deviate usually deviate on almost coin-flip calls anyway (although I guess I do see a lot of insurance / even money takers). In fact, of all my 84 hours playing I think I've only sat with a couple of people who had absolutely no clue as to what they're doing.
yea thats been my observation also Gobbly for the most part. i've seen some really wild players but for the most part the other players tend towards decent basic strategy. many of them waiver a bit though, and making matters worse for themselves so many of them tend to over bet extremley. that combination really helps the house above and beyond the overall edge they have from the get go. additionally it is apparent that many players have an insufficient bankroll so they bust out with no hope of recouping even if they had a clue as to what they were doing.
best regards,
mr fr0g
best regards,
mr fr0g
I do not think that anyone but the casinos can state a percentage such as we are talking about. To do so, would require netting the amount wagered over a period of time and comparring that to the profit/loss of the table. After a significant amount of time, they could then state that for this particular set of table rules, the profit for this table is 6%.
But to say that we can win x% from this table because we have one player playing at a 6% disadvantage, one player playing at a .65% disadvantage and another playing at a 3% advantage would be meaningless. No way to add those percentages together without knowing how much each player was betting.
One thing is for sure though...the more "bad" players a casino can entice to sit at their table and the more they can get them to bet, the better the profits on that table are going to be!
I was playing a couple of years ago at Plaza. I was just making straight basic strategy plays and flat betting the minimum $5 on the double deck game (dealer stands on hard 17's there). I was about half drunk at the time and got into an argument with a know-it-all who said that there was not a basic strategy card printed that would tell a player to hit a soft 18 against a dealer face card. I ended up betting him $25 I think, that he was wrong and he took me up on it. I hopped up, went to the gift shop and bought a card and tossed it to him as I collected my $25. When he tried to hand it back to me, I just told him to keep it, he obviously needed it more than I did! He got mad and left.
Well, there was a nice looking lady sitting next to me during all this betting minimums and obviously not having a clue as to what she was doing. On first base, there was a guy betting from $500 to the $2000 table max on each hand and playing rather badly and losing. He got up, handed the girl a stack of 40 or 50 green chips and told her he was going to the high limit table (I think there is one quarter minimum table at Plaza). He told her that if she had any questions, just ask the guy in the black hat sitting next to her (that was me). Point is, that guy betting the high bets raised the expectations in bottom line for the casino magnitudes.
I conclude that it is the AMOUNT of the bet that the casinos are going to be most worried about. For the losing player betting large...they are estatic to see them sit down. For the AP playing with minimum bets, they aren't too concerned...at least that's my opinion. Rub their noses into the fact and they will take action based on "the principal" of the matter. But if the AP is betting large, they will take action pretty much as soon as they start suspecting they are APs. It's all in the money.
Okay, I've been taking hydrocodone....makes me ramble <LOL>
But to say that we can win x% from this table because we have one player playing at a 6% disadvantage, one player playing at a .65% disadvantage and another playing at a 3% advantage would be meaningless. No way to add those percentages together without knowing how much each player was betting.
One thing is for sure though...the more "bad" players a casino can entice to sit at their table and the more they can get them to bet, the better the profits on that table are going to be!
I was playing a couple of years ago at Plaza. I was just making straight basic strategy plays and flat betting the minimum $5 on the double deck game (dealer stands on hard 17's there). I was about half drunk at the time and got into an argument with a know-it-all who said that there was not a basic strategy card printed that would tell a player to hit a soft 18 against a dealer face card. I ended up betting him $25 I think, that he was wrong and he took me up on it. I hopped up, went to the gift shop and bought a card and tossed it to him as I collected my $25. When he tried to hand it back to me, I just told him to keep it, he obviously needed it more than I did! He got mad and left.
Well, there was a nice looking lady sitting next to me during all this betting minimums and obviously not having a clue as to what she was doing. On first base, there was a guy betting from $500 to the $2000 table max on each hand and playing rather badly and losing. He got up, handed the girl a stack of 40 or 50 green chips and told her he was going to the high limit table (I think there is one quarter minimum table at Plaza). He told her that if she had any questions, just ask the guy in the black hat sitting next to her (that was me). Point is, that guy betting the high bets raised the expectations in bottom line for the casino magnitudes.
I conclude that it is the AMOUNT of the bet that the casinos are going to be most worried about. For the losing player betting large...they are estatic to see them sit down. For the AP playing with minimum bets, they aren't too concerned...at least that's my opinion. Rub their noses into the fact and they will take action based on "the principal" of the matter. But if the AP is betting large, they will take action pretty much as soon as they start suspecting they are APs. It's all in the money.
Okay, I've been taking hydrocodone....makes me ramble <LOL>