Delaying the Cut Card

[assume_R]

Let's say you are almost at the end of a shoe. You know the cut card is coming soon. But the count is high and you want to play another round at that count. Perhaps if you have a 13v10, you should suck it up and not hit, in the hopes of playing another round. This seems like it could be profitable, but several things must be taken into account:

1. Other players after you and if they will hit (possibly getting the cut card)
2. The number of cards the dealer is going to be hitting to.
3. The EV of your hand. You wouldn't want to be stupid and stand on a 7v10, but if it was a 13v10 it might be worth it.
4. The presumable EV of the next round at the given count.

Thoughts? Is there a rule of thumb to use in this situation? Just common sense? I only ask because there are many times common sense might not give the correct mathematical answer in blackjack

 

[johndoe]

By and large, the EV of playing your hand correctly is a lot higher than the EV from another round before the shuffle.

 

[creeping panther]

Best action

Let's say you are almost at the end of a shoe. You know the cut card is coming soon. But the count is high and you want to play another round at that count. Perhaps if you have a 13v10, you should suck it up and not hit, in the hopes of playing another round. This seems like it could be profitable, but several things must be taken into account:

1. Other players after you and if they will hit (possibly getting the cut card)
2. The number of cards the dealer is going to be hitting to.
3. The EV of your hand. You wouldn't want to be stupid and stand on a 7v10, but if it was a 13v10 it might be worth it.
4. The presumable EV of the next round at the given count.

Thoughts? Is there a rule of thumb to use in this situation? Just common sense? I only ask because there are many times common sense might not give the correct mathematical answer in blackjack

If the count warrants it you should have swung to two hands by that time to pull more cards right near the end,,,just pay attention and you can get to judge this with great accuracy.

CP

 

[21gunsalute]

You stand on 13. The next card out is an 8. That's okay, you accomplished what you set out to do and got one more round. You get a hand of 16 and the dealer has a backdoor BJ. You won the battle but lost the war. The last thing you want to do is play an extra round if you're going to play dumb.

 

[SleightOfHand]

You stand on 13. The next card out is an 8. That's okay, you accomplished what you set out to do and got one more round. You get a hand of 16 and the dealer has a backdoor BJ. You won the battle but lost the war. The last thing you want to do is play an extra round if you're going to play dumb.

No offense, this is a useless post. If you are going to talk about future hands, lets talk about the EV of the various plays. at a TC of +5, standing on 13vX has a loss of EV around 6%. Playing at a TC of +5 has an EV of around 2%. Therefore, if the bets are the same, you would be better off hitting 13. However, this is the simplified answer. Like you said, position is going to be a factor depending on how close to the end of the shoe you are.

 

[Automatic Monkey]

Let's say you are almost at the end of a shoe. You know the cut card is coming soon. But the count is high and you want to play another round at that count. Perhaps if you have a 13v10, you should suck it up and not hit, in the hopes of playing another round. This seems like it could be profitable, but several things must be taken into account:

1. Other players after you and if they will hit (possibly getting the cut card)
2. The number of cards the dealer is going to be hitting to.
3. The EV of your hand. You wouldn't want to be stupid and stand on a 7v10, but if it was a 13v10 it might be worth it.
4. The presumable EV of the next round at the given count.

Thoughts? Is there a rule of thumb to use in this situation? Just common sense? I only ask because there are many times common sense might not give the correct mathematical answer in blackjack

As always, it depends. This comes up a lot on a DD game where refusing a hit (or eating a card) frequently makes a difference in an extra round or not.

But more importantly, the count is a lot more volatile in DD and you easily could have started this penultimate round with a minimum bet, but at the end have a huge positive count to play. In this case it might be worth it to sacrifice some of your advantage on a minimum bet to get a round with a maximum bet. This sometimes will happen in a deeply-dealt shoe game too, but it's not as frequent. So one other very important thing you have to take into consideration is the amount of money on your hand right now.

 

[Dyepaintball12]

No offense, this is a useless post. If you are going to talk about future hands, lets talk about the EV of the various plays. at a TC of +5, standing on 13vX has a loss of EV around 6%. Playing at a TC of +5 has an EV of around 2%. Therefore, if the bets are the same, you would be better off hitting 13. However, this is the simplified answer. Like you said, position is going to be a factor depending on how close to the end of the shoe you are.

You really could have left out "this is a useless post".

 

[SleightOfHand]

You really could have left out "this is a useless post".

Usually I am not one to insult other's posts, but I truly felt that the post was disgustingly awful.

 

[Dyepaintball12]

Usually I am not one to insult other's posts, but I truly felt that the post was disgustingly awful.

"However, this is the simplified answer. Like you said, position is going to be a factor depending on how close to the end of the shoe you are."

If you're saying there are exceptions when this may be used then the question was not awful.

 

[SleightOfHand]

"However, this is the simplified answer. Like you said, position is going to be a factor depending on how close to the end of the shoe you are."

If you're saying there are exceptions when this may be used then the question was not awful.

The question is fine. I was talking about the quoted response to the question

 

[Dyepaintball12]

Whoa my bad! Didn't read carefully enough! :grin:

 

[assume_R]

Thanks for the responses everyone.

As always, it depends...it might be worth it to sacrifice some of your advantage on a minimum bet to get a round with a maximum bet....So one other very important thing you have to take into consideration is the amount of money on your hand right now.

Seems like I forgot to include the amount of money on the table for a hand I'm incorrectly considering standing on. So looks like this could all come down to a judgement call.

And as CP said, if I can manage it, playing 2 hands towards the end of the shoe might be extra useful to extract more money when the cut card is very near.

It's tough to know how much of an ev I'm giving up for the current round versus playing an additional round.

I'm worried about my ability to judge whether it's worth it to stand on certain hands versus playing another round, if I know the cut card is coming within the next few cards.

 

[Renzey]

As CP said, if I can manage it, playing 2 hands towards the end of the shoe might be extra useful to extract more money when the cut card is very near. .

If your careful observation of where the cut card was placed tells you this upcoming round is likely to be the last one (at a positive count), spread to 3 hands of 60% each (when there's room). But color up and leave that table during the shuffle.

 

[KimLee]

This topic was addressed with calculations here.

http://www.blackjackinfo.com/bb/showthread.php?p=185206#post185206

 

[21gunsalute]

The question is fine. I was talking about the quoted response to the question

You agreed with me and then called my post "disgustingly awful." Please explain.

 

[SleightOfHand]

You agreed with me and then called my post "disgustingly awful." Please explain.

The "As you said..." was meant for the OP. The only part relevant to your post was my first sentence. I apologize for not being clear.

 

[21gunsalute]

The "As you said..." was meant for the OP. The only part relevant to your post was my first sentence. I apologize for not being clear.

Fair enough. I probably should have stated that I was just creating a hypothetical situation. Obviously anything could happen.

 

[Blue Efficacy]

You stand on 13. The next card out is an 8. That's okay, you accomplished what you set out to do and got one more round. You get a hand of 16 and the dealer has a backdoor BJ. You won the battle but lost the war. The last thing you want to do is play an extra round if you're going to play dumb.

How often are you going to get that 8, though?

13 vs. 10 is entering surrender territory at strong counts. Most of the time you're screwed. I don't think making an error in a strongly -EV situation in hopes of getting another round at a juicy count is that foolish. You just happened to selectively name the worst case scenario.

Useless post, indeed!

 

[Ferretnparrot]

The value of preserving one card will, based upon an unknown number of cards prior to the cut card, have the effect of creating an extra hand one time for X atempts where X is the average number of cards consumed each round.

Since the number of cards consumed each round varies by the number of players at the table, this needs to be accounted for.

The value of the card would be the instantanious player advantage by count divided by X

The value of the card is very low when the table is full, but at high counts It is a couple percent, which is large enough to possibly offset the value of index plays when you are playing heads up.

This wouldnt be true when there is a full table because the value of the card is less.

So here I am again, presenting this concept that we shoudl modify indexes for heads up play. And that the number of players at the table can have an effect on out edge over the game shoudl we take advantage of it.

 

[21gunsalute]

How often are you going to get that 8, though?

13 vs. 10 is entering surrender territory at strong counts. Most of the time you're screwed. I don't think making an error in a strongly -EV situation in hopes of getting another round at a juicy count is that foolish. You just happened to selectively name the worst case scenario.

Useless post, indeed!

Which part of hypothetical situation do you not understand? This entire thread is nothing but "what ifs". SleightofHand gives a little insight on the EV of this move in post #5. Surrendering the hand may well be an option except surrender is non-existent in this part of the country where I play.