Friday the 13th Disaster

[RJT]

If you played the dealer one on one and played 400 hands and average bet of$15.00 ,near max loss, about one chance in 50, would be about $345.00 (if you were very unlucky).
I do not have enough details to come to a conclusion, but the overall story sounds like you were playing against a card mechanic. One who peeks and if the top card will bust him will deal himself the second card. Not that the second card will not bust him but he has a better chance. A counter cannot win against that kind of card mechanic.

1 in 50 chances will happen on average 1 in every 50 times you play. Doesn't mean that you have to be playing against a mechanic for it to happen. Large negative swings happen fairly regularly, whereas crooked dealers are - from what i've seen and ration dictates - rare.

RJT.

 

[CarlB]

How naive for a "senior" member

How naive for a "senior" member. Most shoes games are honest (but not all). Most casinos in Vegas has one or more card mechanic on call to knock out system players i.e. card counters, and beyond. These are the hand held, one and two deck games. My brother worked in security in Vegas and Reno for about five years and has many stories about card mechanics (card cheaters).

Typical profile of a card cheater ( my personal observations ). Expensive suit, expensive jewelry, over manacured hands, and typically a cocky attitude. Any advantage bj player that has not extensively studied card cheating methods and ways of detecting them will most likely some day be butchered and not know why.

Yes I am aware of the large variance in bj, ( lady luck swings both ways ),but very seldom is it beyond the bottom side ( losing side ) of one Standard Deviation. Still one chance in greater than 50, and that figure is very conservative.

 

[RJT]

How naive for a "senior" member.

How patronizing. My ego really stings.

Yes I am aware of the large variance in bj, ( lady luck swings both ways ),but very seldom is it beyond the bottom side ( losing side ) of one Standard Deviation. Still one chance in greater than 50, and that figure is very conservative.

I'm going to do you more credit that you just did me and assume that you realize that one standard deviation is only 66.67% of all results. That means that just over 16% of the time you will be more than one SD above your EV and just as often you will be more than one SD below your EV. As card counters will never manage to drive there EV up high enough in one session to put them any substancial distence from 0 (relative to their unit), you will regularly (somewhere not far under 16% of the time) experience a losing session of more than one SD.
Any large casino has far more to lose out of cheating an advantage player (aka their licence) than they stand to gain. I'm not really all that interested in getting into the "but they do it anyway" conversation as it's one that no-one can prove. But mathematically this losing session is far from impossible.

RJT.

 

[Sonny]

Most casinos in Vegas has one or more card mechanic on call to knock out system players i.e. card counters, and beyond.

Not at the Station casinos. They usually 86 you before it's time for the dealer to take a break! :laugh:

-Sonny-

 

[RJT]

Not at the Station casinos. They usually 86 you before it's time for the dealer to take a break! :laugh:

-Sonny-

LOL, so i've heard.

RJT.

 

[Bojack1]

Unfortunately, it's part of the game. Losing 120 units in a session is easy to do. I've lost 140 units on one hand. You just have to keep playing and not even think about it. Once you master that, you're all set. Dealing with losses is probably the toughest part of the game for novice and intermediate players. The masters are used to it.

140 units in 1 hand! I find that to be quite a feat. As a team of 5 we only bring 150 units for 2 day trip bankroll. And although we have had instances where we take a big session hit, and big trip losses, something like you describe is unheard of. As a rule we even are required to play 2 hands during an advantage if table conditions allow, and still we have never approached a loss like that in 1 round. I am very curious as how do you reason putting that much on the table on 1 hand without it be a case of overbetting or using an unrealistic spread. And what might you use as a trip bankroll to allow such a thing to happen.

 

[EasyRhino]

Well, if you were backcounting a shoe game, but still definining a "unit" as the min bet you'd have if in a play-all situation, then you could have a 16 unit max bet out. Split-split-split, then double all four, and that's a 128 unit bet.

If you were playing two spots, then there would be even more room for an uncomfortable expansion in bet size.

 

[Kaiser]

140 units in 1 hand! I find that to be quite a feat. As a team of 5 we only bring 150 units for 2 day trip bankroll.

??


So if you have a bad beat and lose 6 or 7 10 unit bets, half of the bankroll for your team is gone?

 

[EasyRhino]

Half of what they brought for that trip.

I'm guessing the 150 units for two days is per-player, right?

 

[SystemsTrader]

I think the confusion here is how everybody defines their unit. For my group our unit is not our minimum bet. The most units I have ever placed on one round was 28. It involved splitting two hands into seven hands. As for Bojack's team bringing 150 units, that sounds very similar to what we do!

 

[RJT]

Well, if you were backcounting a shoe game, but still definining a "unit" as the min bet you'd have if in a play-all situation, then you could have a 16 unit max bet out. Split-split-split, then double all four, and that's a 128 unit bet.

If you were playing two spots, then there would be even more room for an uncomfortable expansion in bet size.

Technically that's not really your unit then. By the vast majority of definitions your unit is the amount you would wager per 0.5% advantage. You can go into betting scheduals that are different to the '1 unit per point of the TC (after offset)' but they don't tend to sway that far from this concept. This is not hard and fast and no-one has laid down the 'rule of what a unit is', but it is fairly commenly accepted.
To call the table minimum your unit when you are betting far higher is slightly misleading when you are talking to others. I mean i could be flat betting $500 in a wonging situation on a $25-$1000 table with an expectation (hypothetically) of winning $750/hour - it would be understandably misleading to say i was winning on average 30 units per hour.

RJT.

 

[Sonny]

I mean i could be flat betting $500 in a wonging situation on a $25-$1000 table with an expectation (hypothetically) of winning $750/hour - it would be understandably misleading to say i was winning on average 30 units per hour.

But technically your minimum bet is $500, not $25. So if you consider $500 to be your unit size then your EV is 1.5 unts/hour. I think most people think in terms of minimum bets as their unit. It gets a little confusing when people start talking about betting half-units and such, but everyone has their way that seems to work for them.

-Sonny-

 

[RJT]

But technically your minimum bet is $500, not $25. So if you consider $500 to be your unit size then your EV is 1.5 unts/hour. I think most people think in terms of minimum bets as their unit. It gets a little confusing when people start talking about betting half-units and such, but everyone has their way that seems to work for them.

-Sonny-

I agree, but what was being suggested is that the reason AM had 140 units out on the table because he was considering table minimums his unit (at this point i'll add that it was not AM that suggested this) and i feel that considering table minimums a unit is either an under funded way to play (if the minimum bet is your unit, you should find a lower minimum) or it's mis-representing how much you are acutally betting. I completely agree with what you're suggesting. Personally, i would consider my unit to be the amount that i would bet at 0.5% advantage, i would bet at most half my unit at neutral and negative counts but preferably a quarter of my unit.
I cannot imagine a situation where i would have 140 units out on one hand.

RJT.

 

[sagefr0g]

Personally, i would consider my unit to be the amount that i would bet at 0.5% advantage, i would bet at most half my unit at neutral and negative counts but preferably a quarter of my unit.
RJT.

interesting point there RJT. just learned something here, now i believe i'll be able to better understand the optimal betting schemes suggested by cvcx sims.

 

[RJT]

I think the confusion here is how everybody defines their unit. For my group our unit is not our minimum bet. The most units I have ever placed on one round was 28. It involved splitting two hands into seven hands. As for Bojack's team bringing 150 units, that sounds very similar to what we do!

Out of interest ST, does your team play of their own bankroll, or do you have outside investment?

RJT.

 

[nightspirit]

Personally, i would consider my unit to be the amount that i would bet at 0.5% advantage, i would bet at most half my unit at neutral and negative counts but preferably a quarter of my unit.
I cannot imagine a situation where i would have 140 units out on one hand.

RJT.

Now I'am a little confused. Assuming my bet at TC=+1 is $25, at TC>=+5 I would play 2 hands of 6 units thus $300. My spread is 1-12. When the TC drops below zero I would play $5.
I can´t imagine to get away with a spread from 1-60 without raising any suspicion by the pit. The spread sounds smart but I think I would endanger my longevity in this casino.

 

[RJT]

Now I'am a little confused. Assuming my bet at TC=+1 is $25, at TC>=+5 I would play 2 hands of 6 units thus $300. My spread is 1-12. When the TC drops below zero I would play $5.
I can´t imagine to get away with a spread from 1-60 without raising any suspicion by the pit. The spread sounds smart but I think I would endanger my longevity in this casino.

In your situation, if i was playing all of the shoe (which isn't great, but sometimes is unavoidable) i think i'd want a slightly larger spread than 1-12, but wouldn't risk anywhere near 1-60, maybe 1-15. So i would probably play at a $5 table and bet $5 on any -ve or neutral count, TC=+1 $25, TC=+3 $50 and TC=>+5 i would bet $75 (or 2 hands of $60). Now that's assuming that your bankroll, after having worked through what level of Kelly you want to play at, can handle a unit of $25 and is possibly not the optimal bet progression - i'd need to take a look into that.
If however you feel that $450 is an acceptable level of risk and should be your maximum bet ($300 on 2 hands would mean that you should be playing $450 on 1 hand) at a TC of +5, then your unit should be $90 at a TC of +1 and anything below +1 you should be betting $25. This is again not optimized, and before i would play any game, i'd want to look at Arnold Snyders 'Beat the 1/2/4/6/8 Deck Game' book or runs some sims to see exactly how much i should be betting on a unit.
Your bankroll should be set from your maximum bet down, and the spread should be customized to what you feel that you can get away with. That said, your unit would still be that amount you'd be prepared to lay out at a count of +1.

RJT.

 

[nightspirit]

thanks RJT. I missunderstood that. Well-illustrated by you

 

[RJT]

thanks RJT. I missunderstood that. Well-illustrated by you

No problem mate

RJT.

 

[CarlB]

We are losing the meaning of the original post

We are losing the meaning of the original post. She said she lost on friday the 13th. She had been counting for three weeks and did not make a mistake. The dealer would get 20 or 21, most of the time.

Confession time: I played for two hours on friday the 13th and lost 12.00 playing at a $3 to $10 table. ( limited gambling in Colorado ).

Once again here are some of the reasons this could happen:

1. Variance in bj.

2. Three weeks of practices is not enough at counting. The MIT bj team picked some of the brightest of the bright, yet it took most of the members 720 hr of practice to pass the "check-out". It took me over 1000 hrs of practice with modern software to become good at counting.

3. If it was 1D or 2D delt out of the hand she could have been going against a cheating dealer. ( a card mechanic ). Slight of hand is no proof in court unless it was photographed and submitted in court which in not likely.