when it probably a'int worth it

[sagefr0g]

so i know in Blackjack Attack, Don S writes about back counts and about at what point it might be best to abandon back counting a table and moving on to another table to try and back count.
so it makes me wonder, say you are in a play all mode. six deck or double deck. what ever. thing is wouldn't it a lot of times get to the point where your counting and the count becomes so 'miserable' that any pragmatic hope of the count becoming positive is dashed? such that, at that point if you are in play all mode you could just forget counting that pack and min bet and play basic strategy. save a few brain cells, lol.
i guess what i'm asking is would Schlesinger's chapter 13 stuff discussing Mr. Perfect, WiWo and White Rabbit be applicable to such a ploy?

edit: i dunno something on the lines of for a Z deck pack, say your X decks in and the count is -Y then foughgetaboutit?:cow:

 

[iCountNTrack]

so i know in Blackjack Attack, Don S writes about back counts and about at what point it might be best to abandon back counting a table and moving on to another table to try and back count.
so it makes me wonder, say you are in a play all mode. six deck or double deck. what ever. thing is wouldn't it a lot of times get to the point where your counting and the count becomes so 'miserable' that any pragmatic hope of the count becoming positive is dashed? such that, at that point if you are in play all mode you could just forget counting that pack and min bet and play basic strategy. save a few brain cells, lol.
i guess what i'm asking is would Schlesinger's chapter 13 stuff discussing Mr. Perfect, WiWo and White Rabbit be applicable to such a ploy?

Actually at very negative true counts you can significantly reduce your disadvantage if you use the right indices. http://www.blackjackincolor.com/truecount3.htm

 

[sagefr0g]

Actually at very negative true counts you can significantly reduce your disadvantage if you use the right indices. http://www.blackjackincolor.com/truecount3.htm

right, ok. not really what i'm getting at though. lol, more for like a recreational player, playing all that hates counting down a negative pack, sort of thing.
to where i was wondering if there is some sort of ratio of negative count magnitude to decks left to deal sort of departure from counting sort of thing, like:
i dunno something on the lines of for a Z deck pack, say your X decks in and the count is -Y then foughgetaboutit?

 

[shark]

Are you able to take a bathroom break? That would save brain cells and your lost EV to those highly negative counts.

PS, I've read that chapter too with great interest and basically most of the charts show that as the penetration increases, there is less of a chance it will rebound after say 2 decks have been dealt.

 

[matt21]

say you are in a play all mode. six deck or double deck. what ever. thing is wouldn't it a lot of times get to the point where your counting and the count becomes so 'miserable' that any pragmatic hope of the count becoming positive is dashed? such that, at that point if you are in play all mode you could just forget counting that pack and min bet and play basic strategy. save a few brain cells, lol.

i generally play all (and often heads up so bathroom breaks aint worth it), but i find that i just automatically keep counting and it doesnt seem to take up any additional energy. sometimes it does come back positive right at the end and i place some big bets, but you are right, as you would expect, a lot of the time it doesn't.

to be honest, i would actually find it hard to STOP counting even if i tried.
do you find that the counting actually takes up energy?

 

[sagefr0g]

i generally play all (and often heads up so bathroom breaks aint worth it), but i find that i just automatically keep counting and it doesnt seem to take up any additional energy. sometimes it does come back positive right at the end and i place some big bets, but you are right, as you would expect, a lot of the time it doesn't.

yes, that's a good point imho, how the latter stages of the pack can most often be the juicy part. so, wouldn't want to miss that if possible. just what i think, is that at some point maybe one wouldn't be missing much. sort of like the idea how Don S. tries to determine when it's not worth backcounting some table.

to be honest, i would actually find it hard to STOP counting even if i tried.
do you find that the counting actually takes up energy?

oh yeah to be sure. like i'm sure a heck of a lot of senior citizens are sharp as a tack and all, unfortunately i'm not one of them. thoughts are so slow sometimes i can literally see them dribble by, lmao.
other thing is, just psychologically it drives me nuts counting down a negative pack.

but yes on the bathroom breaks Shark.

 

[k_c]

so i know in Blackjack Attack, Don S writes about back counts and about at what point it might be best to abandon back counting a table and moving on to another table to try and back count.
so it makes me wonder, say you are in a play all mode. six deck or double deck. what ever. thing is wouldn't it a lot of times get to the point where your counting and the count becomes so 'miserable' that any pragmatic hope of the count becoming positive is dashed? such that, at that point if you are in play all mode you could just forget counting that pack and min bet and play basic strategy. save a few brain cells, lol.
i guess what i'm asking is would Schlesinger's chapter 13 stuff discussing Mr. Perfect, WiWo and White Rabbit be applicable to such a ploy?

edit: i dunno something on the lines of for a Z deck pack, say your X decks in and the count is -Y then foughgetaboutit?:cow:

Most of the times I have played blackjack, it was play-all. When I first started playing I spread like I was supposed to. I had some good wins and also some bad losses doing this.

I stopped playing for quite awhile until one day I had the opportunity to enter a pro-am bowling tournament at Sam's Town in Henderson near Vegas. I had been dabbling in analyzing blackjack on a very old computer that was just the next step up from a calculator. My main focus was on the bowling tourney but I was gonna play some blackjack too but decided to spread like a steaming hot bowl of chicken noodle soup.

Anyway I won the bowling tourney and they paid $1000 cash and seemed to point me in the direction of the casino, but I also had a pretty good win at blackjack so it was a very good trip.

Since then I have made several trips to Vegas using various counting strategies, playing all, and using a chicken spread since I didn't have much of a bankroll. I can't say I made a lot of money and I was probably lucky but I did OK. I did a lot of camping out sometimes playing maybe 24 hours straight just to see what happened. I got the feeling the pit knew I was counting but I was spreading so little that they thought I must be crazy.

Blackjack can be a crazy game. Counts can tank in a hurry, particurlarly if you're playing double deck. But when the count tanks that means high cards are coming out. The thing is you can't take advantage of this because it can't be predicted as being probable beforehand. I think my biggest winning streak ever came on a series of tanked counts. I was down some but I kept winning and winning with a min bet out. I won enough to recoup money I had lost over several hours in just a short time betting min. Wouldn't you know that when the count finally became good enough to raise my bet, I lost.

My last trip I wonged using a model I came up with. Nobody ever mentions this, but I think a wonger needs to be in better physical condition than a play-all person.

When it probably ain't worth it? When do you abandon play all and get out of Dodge? I prefer to use intuition and common sense based upon what I have learned and living with the consequences.

Continuing on with my rambling, in my opinion the best encapsulation of gambling at blackjack is offered by Sonny, "It's not the size of your bankroll, it's how you leverage it!"
:grin:

 

[sagefr0g]

....

When it probably ain't worth it? When do you abandon play all and get out of Dodge? I prefer to use intuition and common sense based upon what I have learned and living with the consequences.

...

bowling huh? $1000! lol, that's a pretty good story.
and yeah blackjack is sure a crazy experience sort of thing. like where you win big flat betting a tanked count and lose a bunch on the juicy count.:whip:
so but yeah, thinking about it i pretty much came to the same conclusion. some intuition and common sense based and knowledge and experience sort of thing, a good determining factor as to when to not waste the effort counting and just flat bet if playing all.
then again it would be interesting to know if X decks in a Z size pack with a Y size count can tell you if it's a good time to foughetaboutcounting. :fish::fish::fish::fish:

 

[Tarzan]

Flip Flopped Frustration

You mentioned something of amusement, of interest that we have all seen and lived to play and reflect on later. That weird scene in which you and neutral to negative in a play all situation and betting small and winning, winning, WINNING just about every hand. Then the count gets "juicy" and you pump it up to lose, lose LOSE just about every hand.

This event can throw you way off and be totally mind boggling! It's done it to me enough times! It can happen... any ol' crazy thing can happen. You have to realize that a mere few percentage points means exactly that, I guess. Things can go contrary to what you would expect and it can be frustrating.