Floating Advantage and Wonging

[blackjackstudent]

Hi again! Now I dont want to start any kind of arguments amongst you professional players out there - I want to raise the topic of the floating advantage as mentioned in Don Schlesinger's Book Blackjack Attack.

The floating advantage is really applicable to decks which are dealt to a very high degree of penetration (i.e. 90 % to 95 %).

Say if you are playing a 6 deck game DAS, DOA and H17 with 5.5 to 5.75/6 decks and you have half a deck left before reshuffling occurs. You have been using a modest spread of 1-8 in the shoe - If the count is favourable would you start to use a 1-12 spread? Also assume that you are the only player at the table.

Say early during the shoe, you use a poor spread of 1-4 even if the TC is at 2-3, in the middle of the shoe you use a spread of 1-8 depending on the TC and if the dealer fornutately gives good depth penetration, you use a 1-12 spread or a 1-16 spread.

Is that a consensus shared amongst you professionals?

Another issue is wonging - if you wong in during the early part of the shoe even if the TC = +3, the advantage offered to you wont be as great as if you wong in with one deck remaining and the TC = +3 - please comment on that!

 

[UK-21]

Take a step back and think about your query . . . .

If you had a shoe with five decks left to play, and the RC was +10, the TC would be +2. What does this mean? That there are an extra 10 high cards within the five decks left, giving an AVERAGE of an extra 2 per deck - giving an advantage of around 0.5% across the decks left to play at that point. If you had a theoretical deck that was dealt down to the last card, and one deck was left, with an RC of +10 you'd have an additional 10 high cards in the deck, which would mean there would be 30 tens/aces out of 52 cards left. This would leave you with a massive edge of around 8-10%-ish, possibly more. So, its reasonable to assume that the %age advantage of your pos TC increases as the shoe is dealt out.

Following on, it would then seem advantageous to increase your betting ramp as you get more into the shoe - the second half say. There is a simple counting system that runs along the lines of not increasing bets until the second half of the shoe (can't remember what it is called though).

There will come a point though, where the cutoff card will have an effect. If you're down to the last round to be dealt (90 cards?) and the RC is +9, with the TC being around TC+5, you would have a hefty advantage, but if those additional 9 cards are assumed to be equally distributed across what's left (in the absence of knowing anything different), most will be assumed to be behind the cut card and will not come into play - in which case perhaps you don't have such a great advantage at all? This has been discussed in the past. The consensus was that you still have the advantage, should ignore this possibility and bet accordingly. My view, for what it's worth, is that the floating advantage effect isn't just one way (only increases) but is an up and down curve and it will reach a point where it starts reducing - through the game we assume we have an advantage based on the count info, but there must come a point where we have to accept that on balance of probability that assumption has been wrong (when it's close to the point of the reshuffle and the count is still high).

If the cut card comes out, and the count is still pos it's probably been the case that you've assumed an advantage and bet to it since the count last went pos when it wasn't really there at all. Hence one of the reasons why people still lose big during high counts, even when it's one-on-one against the dealer (I say one, there are others of course).

In the example of playing heads up against the dealer with only four cards in front of the cut card (so only around five, possibly 6 will be dealt out before the reshuffle), even if the RC=+12 at that point, six or seven of those additional high cards will never come into play, so the advantage won't be 12/1.5 = TC+8, but more like 6/1.5 = TC+4 (assuming 1.5 decks are cutoff). If you played your max bet at TC+5 or TC+6, would you place it in this circumstance?

Over to the experts . . .

 

[sagefr0g]

...
...., but if those additional 9 cards are assumed to be equally distributed across what's left (in the absence of knowing anything different), most will be assumed to be behind the cut card and will not come into play - in which case perhaps you don't have such a great advantage at all? This has been discussed in the past. The consensus was that you still have the advantage, should ignore this possibility and bet accordingly.....
. . .

certainly no expert, just i wonder for one thing if maybe not a lot of other things. how is it one if they have an absence of knowing anything other than the number of cards and and the count and that there is a cut card present, again, how is it that one would assume those additional 9 cards are equally distributed across whats left?:whip:
i mean is there some physical reason or some mathematical reason that makes a mixture of things in stuff such as cards with numbers and pictures printed on them to be mixed in some particular way?
in other words if stuff is mixed in a random way or even a quasi random way then are we supposed to assume equal distribution of those things that were mixed?

 

[1357111317]

Hi again! Now I dont want to start any kind of arguments amongst you professional players out there - I want to raise the topic of the floating advantage as mentioned in Don Schlesinger's Book Blackjack Attack.

The floating advantage is really applicable to decks which are dealt to a very high degree of penetration (i.e. 90 % to 95 %).

Say if you are playing a 6 deck game DAS, DOA and H17 with 5.5 to 5.75/6 decks and you have half a deck left before reshuffling occurs. You have been using a modest spread of 1-8 in the shoe - If the count is favourable would you start to use a 1-12 spread? Also assume that you are the only player at the table.

Say early during the shoe, you use a poor spread of 1-4 even if the TC is at 2-3, in the middle of the shoe you use a spread of 1-8 depending on the TC and if the dealer fornutately gives good depth penetration, you use a 1-12 spread or a 1-16 spread.

Is that a consensus shared amongst you professionals?

Another issue is wonging - if you wong in during the early part of the shoe even if the TC = +3, the advantage offered to you wont be as great as if you wong in with one deck remaining and the TC = +3 - please comment on that!

While I think your theory is correct I don't think floating advantages will affect your advantage either way by more than 0.1 or 0.2%. This is assuming my memory serves me correctly. I will try to find the thread that I read this on.

 

[ycming]

certainly no expert, just i wonder for one thing if maybe not a lot of other things. how is it one if they have an absence of knowing anything other than the number of cards and and the count and that there is a cut card present, again, how is it that one would assume those additional 9 cards are equally distributed across whats left?:whip:
i mean is there some physical reason or some mathematical reason that makes a mixture of things in stuff such as cards with numbers and pictures printed on them to be mixed in some particular way?
in other words if stuff is mixed in a random way or even a quasi random way then are we supposed to assume equal distribution of those things that were mixed?

In statistics, you assume it is at random. And with that we have an average!

Ming

 

[Automatic Monkey]

While I think your theory is correct I don't think floating advantages will affect your advantage either way by more than 0.1 or 0.2%. This is assuming my memory serves me correctly. I will try to find the thread that I read this on.

It's better than that, when you get deep in the shoe. If the kinds of rules offered on a good shoe game (S17, DOA, DS, LS) were offered on a SD game it would start out with a significant player edge.

Let's check the strategy calculator on this site- an 8D game with those rules has a 0.39% house edge but a 1D game has a 0.18% player edge. That's 0.57% change from the first to the last deck in a 8D shoe just due to the floating advantage, that's huge! You can see the exact effect of floating advantage by keeping the rules constant and changing the number of decks.

Unfortunately you get almost all of that in the last couple of decks, so unless the pen is outrageously good it won't help you that much.

 

[1357111317]

It's better than that, when you get deep in the shoe. If the kinds of rules offered on a good shoe game (S17, DOA, DS, LS) were offered on a SD game it would start out with a significant player edge.

Let's check the strategy calculator on this site- an 8D game with those rules has a 0.39% house edge but a 1D game has a 0.18% player edge. That's 0.57% change from the first to the last deck in a 8D shoe just due to the floating advantage, that's huge! You can see the exact effect of floating advantage by keeping the rules constant and changing the number of decks.

Unfortunately you get almost all of that in the last couple of decks, so unless the pen is outrageously good it won't help you that much.

I thought a lot of the advantage from having 1 deck over 8 decks comes from the fact that your stratagy decisions are much more accurate due to the effect of card removal. Example 8v6. In a SD game you DD because at least 3 low cards have been removed from the deck. In an 8 deck game removing those 3 cards dont make much of a difference.

 

[Automatic Monkey]

I thought a lot of the advantage from having 1 deck over 8 decks comes from the fact that your stratagy decisions are much more accurate due to the effect of card removal. Example 8v6. In a SD game you DD because at least 3 low cards have been removed from the deck. In an 8 deck game removing those 3 cards dont make much of a difference.

Not all that much, not in terms of floating advantage. DD 8 vs. 6 is close to a toss-up in a SD game, not that big of a deal if you do it or not in a neutral count. The big advantage is still more naturals.

But the improved pay decisions are a reason why SD is so powerful for a counter; index plays are used that rarely ever come up in a shoe game and the count swings so far that they really mean something.

 

[1357111317]

Not all that much, not in terms of floating advantage. DD 8 vs. 6 is close to a toss-up in a SD game, not that big of a deal if you do it or not in a neutral count. The big advantage is still more naturals.

But the improved pay decisions are a reason why SD is so powerful for a counter; index plays are used that rarely ever come up in a shoe game and the count swings so far that they really mean something.

Alright fair enough. Are you saying thought that floating advantages can be up to .5%? And is your reasoning behind this because when there are less cards left you get more naturals?

 

[itrack]

CVdata

CVdata makes it really easy to see how your advantage changes at different counts throughout a shoe. In a 6 deck game I simmed recently, DAS, H17, LS, NRSA, the difference was just over .3% for true counts after only 1 deck, and true counts at 5 decks.
I ran my sims using the Zen count, and came to the conclusion that a +1 count at the very end of the shoe is about the same advantage as a +2 count at the beginning of a shoe. Therefore, I would say I should be placing a +2 count sized bet even if the count is only +1 at the very end of the shoe.
However, if I ran my sims using a system like Hi-lo, I don't think that this would work, because the difference between a +1 and +2 Hi-lo count is a lot more than a +1 and +2 zen count.

 

[UK-21]

Bearing in mind the floating advantage effect, SD BJ has got to hold a greater advantage for the card counter than playing shoe games, no arguements there.

If there you have an RC of +9 with three decks of a shoe still to play, we say that the TC=+3. But this is an assumed average per deck arrived at from a calculation - with the important aspect being it is an assumed advantage and not a concrete one (if you were to take the next 52 cards and examine them it is highly unlikely that there would be 23 10s and As there (the 20 expected from a deck plus the additional 3 we are assuming).

With SD BJ with only 1 deck, or less in play, we don't need to make an assumption - if the running count goes to +3, then there are three extra high cards left to come out, and even if only 50% of the cards are dealt there's still a greater chance of those putting an appearance in than with a shoe game where a deck and a half are cut out of play. I think the big advantage is the difference in the cut card effect - in SD you are playing with less cards than most shoe games will have cut out of play, and this leaves any advantage from additional high cards left to play being more tangible than assumed (we don't need to make any "assumptions" as the TC conversion calc is simply to divide by one).

The next profound question of course, is how much of this difference will offset the disadvantage of the 6-5 payout rule? If the floating advantage effect is worth an additional 0.5% for a counter playing single deck, and index plays have greater value, does this leave the game beatable with a reasonable (and not extreme) spread? Most discussions around SD 6:5 fall back on the OTT HE of 1.45%, but if one is counting and accepts that the floating advantage effect is more advantageous than in shoe games, positive swings will happen more frequently and to a greater extreme, index plays have greater effect and it's possible to play with a greater spread, the OTT HE becomes almost irrelevent. What discussions should focus on is the net effect of all of the above for the basis of making comparisons.

I've said in the past I don't think SD 6:5 games are much more disadvantageous than shoe games with crappy rulesets, if at all. Having given this some thought as a result of this thread, I'm still to be convinced that's not the case. If you were comparing a H17, NDAS shoe game without surrender, and a SD 6:5 game S17 DAS with LS, would that swing it?

Somewhat of a theoretical question for me, as we don't have SD BJ or 6:5 in the UK.

 

[Automatic Monkey]

Alright fair enough. Are you saying thought that floating advantages can be up to .5%? And is your reasoning behind this because when there are less cards left you get more naturals?

That's the big one. In a SD game, when you've received a 10 on your first card, the second card is an ace 4/53 times, instead of 32/415 times in an 8D shoe and that's enough to do it. There are a few more subtle reasons, like when you've received two low cards that total 11, 16/50 cards will be 10's, and so on. There's also the negative effect of fewer splits available for the player, but all summed the FA is a pretty good deal for the player. One more reason to seek out good pen.

 

[London Colin]

I think we may not all be working to the same definition of 'the floating advantage', based on the responses so far.

Chapter 6 of BJA3 goes into lengthy detail, and can be somehwat confusing. There's a summary that I find much easier to grasp in chapter 13 of 'The Theory of Blacjack'. (In the section entitled 'Digression: The count of zero')

The point, as I understand it, is that the advantage associated with a particular true count is not in fact constant, but varies as you go deeper into the deck.

I don't see any logic in comparing, say, single-deck BS advantage with the advantage available with 1 deck of a shoe left. The house edge at that point remains, on average, unchanged (excluding the gains which a counter can make through strategy variations). The revelation of the floating advantage is that if the count at that point is known to be zero, the house edge will in fact have been reduced and (possibly completely overcome), even for a basic strategist, rather than being the same as it was for the first hand (when the count was also zero).

Conversely, very negative true counts at that point will have a higher house edge than the equivalent counts earlier in the shoe, and very high true counts will also have a lower player advantage than their earlier equivalents, keeping the overall house edge constant.

 

[blackjackstudent]

newb99,

In most US casinos (well most LV casinos), single decks are not dealt to the cut card but there is usually a fix number of rounds. In double deck games, cards are dealt until the cut card but for single deck this might not be the case. Therefore, even if you know that the running count is very high, theoretically, you could spread to two or three boxes but then the dealer will initiate reshuffling instead of dealing the round out.

Index plays are very important in single and double deck games but less so in shoe games unless the shoe game has a 90% penetration where index play becomes pivotal towards the very end of the shoe. Ive seen running count in 8 deck shoe games go down to -26 and up + 30. I've seen 16 vs 10 where the RC is -20 and yet on htting another picture card appears. Obviously for shoe games we can continue to wong out but for pitch games we cannot afford to wong out all the time without attracting heat. Index plays are diluted out in shoe games because of multiple decks. Thats not to say that Ilustrious 18 is not of any value.

SIngle deck games rarely offer more than 70% pen - thats why i think the floating advantage only becomes more of an issue in shoe games that is dealt to at least 90% penetration. Some new dealers will give 90% penetration but this is rare.

 

[jack.jackson]

It's better than that, when you get deep in the shoe. If the kinds of rules offered on a good shoe game (S17, DOA, DS, LS) were offered on a SD game it would start out with a significant player edge.

Let's check the strategy calculator on this site- an 8D game with those rules has a 0.39% house edge but a 1D game has a 0.18% player edge. That's 0.57% change from the first to the last deck in a 8D shoe just due to the floating advantage, that's huge! You can see the exact effect of floating advantage by keeping the rules constant and changing the number of decks.

Unfortunately you get almost all of that in the last couple of decks, so unless the pen is outrageously good it won't help you that much.

I also believe theres another 'FA' thats also rarely mentioned(if at all). For example, your pointing out out 2-different games here, and although I agree with you entirely, with your(floating)advantage being better with 1-deck remaining in a 8-deck shoe, opposed to off-the-top; its not quite this good. I would much rather, play the first hand, off the top of a single deck, vs the first hand(off-the-top), of an 8-deck shoe, w/1-deck remaining. Dont know what it is, but for some reason, its just not the same.I know the difference is small, but I believe the TC theorm is mistakehn.

 

[UK-21]

newb99,

In most US casinos (well most LV casinos), single decks are not dealt to the cut card . . . this is rare.

All points accepted. As I said my diatribe was theoretical and other factors such as inconsistent shuffle points and anti-counting measures will certainly affect things. The point I was making, although perhaps not very clearly having re-read my post, is that the more cards there are in play the less the advantage of each additional ten or ace that may be left to be played. In theory, there must be a point where there are so many decks in play that the assumption of a player advantage at TC+2 (assuming hi-lo) would be incorrect. Would any AP play a game with a 16 deck shoe? I doubt it for precisely this reason.

 

[Automatic Monkey]

I also believe theres another 'FA' thats also rarely mentioned(if at all). For example, your pointing out out 2-different games here, and although I agree with you entirely, with your(floating)advantage being better with 1-deck remaining in a 8-deck shoe, opposed to off-the-top; its not quite this good. I would much rather, play the first hand, off the top of a single deck, vs the first hand(off-the-top), of an 8-deck shoe, w/1-deck remaining. Dont know what it is, but for some reason, its just not the same.I know the difference is small, but I believe the TC theorm is mistakehn.

The comparison is only valid if the last deck of the 8D shoe is exactly at a neutral count. If you don't have the count information, the last deck of the 8D shoe is just like the first deck. But if it is neutral, it's exactly like the first hand a single deck, because it is a single deck.

 

[London Colin]

But if it is neutral, it's exactly like the first hand a single deck, because it is a single deck.

That's not the case. Again, if you have a copy of TOB, check out the section I referenced previously.

 

[Grisly Dreams]

But if it is neutral, it's exactly like the first hand a single deck, because it is a single deck.

Yeah, that's not right. If the count is neutral, it has the same COUNT as a single deck, but what happened to the uncounted ranks? Are they still in there? Who knows? Your count doesn't count them. If it's a level 2 count, there is also the question of whether the count is coming from the more- or less-valued ranks.

 

[Automatic Monkey]

Yeah, that's not right. If the count is neutral, it has the same COUNT as a single deck, but what happened to the uncounted ranks? Are they still in there? Who knows? Your count doesn't count them. If it's a level 2 count, there is also the question of whether the count is coming from the more- or less-valued ranks.

Whoa, wait, you're butting up against the limitations of counting now. A High-Low player will declare a shoe to be neutral while a Halves or Zen player sees it quite differently, and both will be correct, and both will have equal justification for placing a bet or making a play based on this information. Kind of paradoxical, I know. But even in ordinary situations the count will result in you making the wrong bet or wrong decision relative to a computer that runs a CA after every card and always makes they right decision. That's life when you're counting. No reason to not apply the FA or TCT in a situation where it applies.