knock-out blackjack, improving the count?

[james3880]

on page 166, i believe, ko states that the players advantage is greater near the beginning of a pack, than at the middle, and even less near the end of the pack.
i remember reading somewhere that you can easily adjust for this problem, but i can not find that information now.
does anyone know of a way to make some adjustments to the count or to the betting for this problem?

 

[Mimosine]

on page 166, i believe, ko states that the players advantage is greater near the beginning of a pack, than at the middle, and even less near the end of the pack.
i remember reading somewhere that you can easily adjust for this problem, but i can not find that information now.
does anyone know of a way to make some adjustments to the count or to the betting for this problem?

you are misunderstanding the point.

after 1 deck has been dealt from a 6D shoe, an RC of -8 (IRC = -24) means that you will have a true count of roughly +1 if after two decks the RC = -6 then you still have your +1 advantage. if after 3 decks the RC = -4 the same holds. If you average this out over 6 decks, -4 is the count at which, on average you have an advantage of +1. if 4 decks are gone and the RC = -4 then you no longer have a +1 advantage, it now decreases.

BUT at an RC of +4, no matter where you are in the shoe, you know that your edge is TC = +4.

the only use this information is good for is deciding when to wong in, or to increase bets after one or two decks. other than that if you're concerned about this you should be using hi/lo or ReKO/TrueKO or some balanced counting system.

also, can we move this to the card counting forum?

 

[james3880]

you are misunderstanding the point.

after 1 deck has been dealt from a 6D shoe, an RC of -8 (IRC = -24) means that you will have a true count of roughly +1 if after two decks the RC = -6 then you still have your +1 advantage. if after 3 decks the RC = -4 the same holds. If you average this out over 6 decks, -4 is the count at which, on average you have an advantage of +1. if 4 decks are gone and the RC = -4 then you no longer have a +1 advantage, it now decreases.

BUT at an RC of +4, no matter where you are in the shoe, you know that your edge is TC = +4.

the only use this information is good for is deciding when to wong in, or to increase bets after one or two decks. other than that if you're concerned about this you should be using hi/lo or ReKO/TrueKO or some balanced counting system.

also, can we move this to the card counting forum?

ok with me to move this to counting, i don't know how to at this point...

i can see how you would think that i was missing the point of page 166.

however, my real question was in the fact that i have found that placing big bets near the end of an 8 deck pack was killing my bankroll on verite'. i went back and reread the book, and found the "count discrepency" problem on page 166. i had read that there were easy ways to deal with this. your conversion advice has helped.

being a fan of simplicity and ko, i have found that if i just alter my bets at half pack, and say 65% pack, i do much better than following the original ko plan. but, your advice on tko and cko has also helped.

i will look at all of this information, and try to find an easy way to adjust the bet.

i am not looking for extreme accuracy, since i am a ko fan, but, i don't like losing most of what i have won in a pack because of the inaccuracy of the count after half pack or more.

thanks! james.

 

[james3880]

you are misunderstanding the point.

after 1 deck has been dealt from a 6D shoe, an RC of -8 (IRC = -24) means that you will have a true count of roughly +1 if after two decks the RC = -6 then you still have your +1 advantage. if after 3 decks the RC = -4 the same holds. If you average this out over 6 decks, -4 is the count at which, on average you have an advantage of +1. if 4 decks are gone and the RC = -4 then you no longer have a +1 advantage, it now decreases.

BUT at an RC of +4, no matter where you are in the shoe, you know that your edge is TC = +4.

the only use this information is good for is deciding when to wong in, or to increase bets after one or two decks. other than that if you're concerned about this you should be using hi/lo or ReKO/TrueKO or some balanced counting system.

also, can we move this to the card counting forum?

i'm not finding much on TrueKO/TKO, can you steer me in that direction?

 

[Mimosine]

i'm not finding much on TrueKO/TKO, can you steer me in that direction?

i can't really.

to sum up my point, the beauty of KO is that it performs on par with HI/LO as written. There is scant evidence to suggest that trying to alter your betting schedule based on deck estimation will make your game stronger. A few games on CV bj aren't a substitution for 1,000,000,000 hand simulations.

if you're going to alter your bets, realize that +4 is always +4. -4 is a strong count early and a weak count late in the shoe especially past 3 decks. but if you have a count over +4 anywhere in the deck you have a significant advantage and you should be max betting, regardless of how deep you are. this is the point i think is most important. Search here and google for "ReKO" and "TKO" and there is a "ColorKO" which might give you some info.

like i said, the only think i added to KO in my studies were the wong in points i described to you. -8, -6, -4 for 1 deck, 2 decks, and 3 decks dealt. all equal TC of roughly +1 (or the key count, when you first have the advantage).

 

[callipygian]

I would question the value of a "true count KO", as the true count can't really be estimated with an unbalanced system. The whole point of KO is that you don't have to do a true count.

Doing a true count with KO is like buying a used car because it's cheaper, and then putting in so much money to repair it that you could have bought a new car for the same price.

 

[21forme]

I would question the value of a "true count KO", as the true count can't really be estimated with an unbalanced system. The whole point of KO is that you don't have to do a true count.

Doing a true count with KO is like buying a used car because it's cheaper, and then putting in so much money to repair it that you could have bought a new car for the same price.

Of course an unbalanced count can be true counted. Look at Walker's Sp21 count - it's unbalanced HiLo.

I true counted KO for a couple of years and it worked fine. Only reason I switched to HiLo was so I'd have the same tags for both BJ and Sp21.

 

[k_c]

I would question the value of a "true count KO", as the true count can't really be estimated with an unbalanced system. The whole point of KO is that you don't have to do a true count.

Doing a true count with KO is like buying a used car because it's cheaper, and then putting in so much money to repair it that you could have bought a new car for the same price.

Any counting system can be true counted if the initial running count is chosen such that when all cards have been dealt then running count = 0. In the case of KO if IRC = (-4 * decks) then it can be true counted the same as Hi-Lo. In Hi-Lo neutral TC = 0. In TKO neutral TC = -4.

What makes a count unbalanced is choosing IRC such that running count does not equal 0 when all cards are dealt.

 

[callipygian]

Of course an unbalanced count can be true counted.

Any counting system can be true counted

Does this method actually work equal to or better than a standard balanced count such as Hi-Lo?

 

[k_c]

Does this method actually work equal to or better than a standard balanced count such as Hi-Lo?

In my estimation the main difference between Hi-Lo and true counted KO is that the removal of a 7 in TKO increases running count by 1 whereas in Hi-Lo running count is unchanged when a 7 is removed. In other words TKO treats a 7 as a full fledged low card. Well theoretically it is....if you play optimally. But if you play normal basic strategy maybe with some indices it's not a full fledged low card.

6 decks, S17, DA2, No resplit any pair, NDAS - just as an example

[u]Full shoe[/u]                  [u]Remove 24 7s[/u]              [u]Remove 24 low 5 (2-5), 4 6s[/u]
Optimal play: -.5788%      Optimal play: +1.353%     Optimal play: +1.530%
Basic strategy: -.5874%    Basic strategy: +.5170%   Basic strategy: +1.3206%

So for a basic strategy player removing 24 7s increases EV by about 1.10% as compared to about 1.91% for removing 24 low cards other than 7. So a 7 is actually closer to half of a low card. As far as the 7 is concerned, it's over-valued in TKO and under-valued in Hi-Lo.

If you could play optimally, TKO would be better. If you play more normally I would expect they would be pretty much equal.