The horizontal spread

[Dopple]

Dont even think about it.

I have been thinking alot about the DD game and provided it does not bring in more heat I would think with one or two other players at the table one would be best off spread to at least two spot on all good counts to obtain as many favorable cards for himself as possible.

To take this idea one step further I am toying with the idea of beginning to start spreading to 3 spots at times also. This would be especially a good move when you are very close to the cut card on high counts to extract as much EV from the round as possible.

Is it getting hot in here?

 

[zengrifter]

With one other player there is no real advantage to spreading two hands, or three, except at the very end.

For a statistical analysis see BJA (anyone know what page? 29 I think?). zg

 

[fwb]

I am fairly certain that while playing more hands may not significantly change profit $/hand, it DOES notably increase $/hr because you are moving through more hands per round, thus seeing more shoes/hr.

I believe I saw this in past CVData runs

 

[Renzey]

With one other player there is no real advantage to spreading two hands, or three, except at the very end.

For a statistical analysis see BJA (anyone know what page? 29 I think?). zg

Zee, it's on page 26. It shows that playing heads up, 1 hand is best. With one other player, playing 2 hands becomes just ever-so-minimally better than playing 1. And with 4 players, playing 3 hands becomes just ever-so-minimally better than playing 2 -- but quite a bit better than playing 1. These figures are based on the total number of dollars bet per card used up.

I do see two caveats to this though. These tables assume that the dealer's hand will on average, consume 2.7 cards with all numbers of players. But the more hands at the table, the less often the dealer will win in a "walk". That is, the less likely all players' hands will bust. This was brought up by someone else on this board and I hadn't thought about it before. I think that has to make the dealer's average number of cards-per-hand go down as the number of players decreases. At positive counts, this would swing more benefit towards playing fewer simultaneous hands.

Caveat number 2: Caveat number 1 caused me to run some sims playing heads up with six decks; first betting just 1 box -- and then betting 2. Lo and behold, playing 2 hands eeked out 2% more profit than playing 1. I had some bet changing limitations from round-to-round in place, which to my way of thinking would further favor playing fewer hands. That's because with fewer hands, the count can't change as much from round-to-round, thereby allowing the player to bet more optimally.

I'm still stuck on this. What has anybody else done in this area??

 

[blackjackstudent]

Renzey,

Yes you are correct in stating that the dealer's average number of card will increase as the number of player increases as more hands are played per round. The dealer will only deal his hands provided that the player doesnt bust. With one player playing head on with the dealer, the player will generally slightly less than the dealer because the player can stand on stiffs whereas the dealer cant and the player can choose to divert from basic strategy depending on the count (such as 16 vs 10 at a TC of 1 whereby the player would stand).

However with more than one hand being played (for example 3), the probability that the dealer will play at the round will be higher than if the player was playing head on with the dealer operating one box only.

However you can also consider the co-variance factor between the two hands. I will use two hands for simplicity - generally speaking variance (and thus co-variance) between the hands in BJ is generally lower compared to Spanish 21 for a number of reasons (e.g. A natural 21 in Spanish 21 is paid out immediately and a 21 is automatically paid out).

In summary, I think variance is very important to answer the question. See generally speaking in BJ, if we play with two hands and because variance in BJ is lower than Spanish 21, if one hand win, the other hand tend to win. If one hand loses, the other hand loses as well. We need to really quantify a co-variance co-efficient to determine how valuable variance is to us. However first we need to estimate roughy on average, the % that the player will bust. Yes, the dealer's average bust rate is 28% but the player can vary because some platers will stand on stiffs continually which makes it very hard to quantify.

 

[creeping panther]

Dopp

Dont even think about it.

I have been thinking alot about the DD game and provided it does not bring in more heat I would think with one or two other players at the table one would be best off spread to at least two spot on all good counts to obtain as many favorable cards for himself as possible.

To take this idea one step further I am toying with the idea of beginning to start spreading to 3 spots at times also. This would be especially a good move when you are very close to the cut card on high counts to extract as much EV from the round as possible.

Is it getting hot in here?

If you are a highly skilled player.. playing 2 hands will get you more positive action than 1 and thus more great opportunities, this is true when not playing heads up.

However when playing head-up I will at times swing back and forth from 1 to 2.

I am a big fan of 2 spot play.

CP

 

[ycming]

I am also a fan of 2 spot play. And seems to lose more often with 3 spots ... I know is not mathematically true just past experenices!

Ming

 

[Renzey]

However first we need to estimate roughy on average, the % that the player will bust. Yes, the dealer's average bust rate is 28% but the player can vary because some platers will stand on stiffs continually which makes it very hard to quantify.

It's been published in the blackjack literature that a player using basic strategy will bust 16% of the time. It would follow that playing sub-basic will bust even less often due to the excessive "stands" by most players.

Also remember to consider when analyzing the merits of 1 hand vs. 2, that two-spot wagers of $73 each would be optimal in place of one hand of $100.