With all this info...

[shadroch]

With all this advice on card counting, you would think everyone is doing it. I'll bet more players are counting than you think. I would imagine that in every set of table at any given weekend, there are counters.

Just because it is out there,don't think people are aware of it. As an example- last year there was a $25 coupon in the American Casino Guide. This is a book that comes out around November and is good thru the next year. The publisher claims sales well in excess of 500,000 copies.
In March of 2008, I went to use it and the dealer and pitboss had never seen one before. Four months after this coupon is released and 500,000 people have access to it and not a single person had used it on this particular game. It wasn't a match play, it was a coupon for a free $25 chip.

 

[bj bob]

If you're a player who continues to do "fuzzy counting", I'd recommend an abbreviated, but structured count, such as Snyder's "Senior Count",

Was that remark a slight against Fr0gman's age or his amphibian ethnicity? In any case I'm reporting you to both AARP and PETA.! :laugh::laugh:

 

[sagefr0g]

I do wong out, but not as conscientiously as most -- usually at -2TC. And no, I have never tried to develop the ability to "gain a feel for the count". Don't think I could trust it. After the first 500 or 1000 hours of dedicated counting at the tables, I believe it becomes a somewhat automatic tabulation.

If you're a player who continues to do "fuzzy counting", I'd recommend an abbreviated, but structured count, such as Snyder's "Senior Count", (4, 5, 6 vs. Jack, Queen, King) or an unbalanced spin-off of that which is KISS I (4, 5, 6 & black 2 vs. Jack, Queen, King). They keep tabs on only around half the cards, lightening the load of card counting considerably, but still have a 78% & 79% BC. I believe these would serve you much better than "fuzzy counting".

i appreciate the feed back Renzey. i read your book. guess i'm just one to use some of the more qualitative stuff you discussed in your book. like the fuzzy counting stuff i use is maybe similar in nature to how you discuss babies cards in your book (pg 93 chpts 6,7,8 stuff) and the approach for that, but what i do is even more qualitative in nature than even that. i practice a lot with cvbj, so i have logs and can check how my betting correlates with the true count. more times than not i can nail my raised bets in positive counts, sometimes getting the blackjack, double down or insurance bet i'm after. but, i'll be the first to admit i'm sometimes pretty far off base, even sometimes betting up into negative counts while thinking i'm in positive true count territory . no flagrant progression betting for me though, lol. but maybe when i'm erroneously betting into a negative count it's similar. maybe that gets me into the percentages of short term success a progression better can realize, i dunno. guess i've been just lucky to not overly suffer that small percentage of big loss that happens.

i knew about Snyder's senior count stuff. it's too stressful for me, lmao.
for some reason it stress's the hell out of me holding the rc in my memory, especially when so much of it is negative counts.
but i can use hi/lo proficiently, so sometimes i do what i should an knuckle down with it.

i used to use the ace/ten front count. that was a lot of fun, lol. had to swear off that though as the variance was a bit much. lucky for me the variance was mainly on the right side of the bell curve before i started using hi/lo, which has some nasty variance of it's own, lol.

i like the part in your book where you leave us know that "you can always lose", lol, but it's good too to know that we might can win every once and a while as well. anyway i really like the KISS philosphy.

 

[MoneyPlays]

I've tutored players in person, over the phone and via e-mail who have read Bluebook II, and most remain hung up on the Sacred Flow, the Dummy at 3rd Base, Pressing Up on your Wins, Walking away after losing 4 in a row, Quitting when your Ahead, altering Basic Strategy based on the last two cards out of the shoe, etc, -- and they continue to contour the crux of their game along those lines. They augment counting into their game by turning a structured count system into "having a feel for the count", won't practice, don't ever want to lose, and if they do, they say it's not worth it or it doesn't work, and usually go back to their betting progression.

Mr. Renzey, reading your Bluebook II is finally getting me over the voodoo stuff. I always thought the Moron at 1st or 3rd Base was messing up the Flow of the Cards and keeping me from winning a Super Progression Bet and Quitting Winners. I played good BS and usually won a little here and there, but now the game is really making sense to me. Been practicing counting cards for the first time. Always thought counting would be too hard but the KISS II is easy for me to work with. Keep up the good work, some people are listening out there.

Great site here, lots of good info, thanks all. Hope to have one of you catch me counting someday.

 

[EasyRhino]

but i can use hi/lo proficiently, so sometimes i do what i should an knuckle down with it.

For the record Frog, I'd recommend knuckling down more often. The biggest concern to me is that the results would be fundamentally unknowable, so you'd end up with results that are, at best, similar to a super weak count like OPP/Speed Count/Front Count, or worst, worse.

Have you done any long term trials on something like CV to see any kind of betting correlation or accuracy rate?

 

[Finn Dog]

With all this advice on card counting, you would think everyone is doing it.

I think in its simplest element, the majority of people don't have the amount of time or discipline that it takes to first learn and then perfect this craft.

You've got to really want to do this--as bad or more than anything you've ever wanted in your life--and then be willing and able to put in the years of daily practice to be successful...which is a fleeting quality in an instant-gratification society.

 

[Tarzan]

Sizing It Up

FinnDog laid out the whole concept in just a few words! I liked the "instant gratification oriented society" comment--it's TRUE! You tell someone,"You can learn to count cards and make money" and they LIKE IT! You tell someone,"You can train for years, putting in the same kind of time and devotion that you would to attain a PHD and then after that unless you have some very serious money backing you up, you will make about the same sort of income you could make working at McDonalds or the local car wash", they start to like it a lot less.

Like with many things, you only get out of it what you put into it. Hard work and devotion and even then most fail. There is no free ride, there is no easy money. The best thing going for casinos is all the information put out about card counting and putting notions in people's minds that there is some sort of easy money gravy train out there. Most of the passengers fall off onto the tracks of the last car as it's going around the bend!

An unprepared novice counter with some sort of instant gratification in mind is money in the bank for the casinos! Ever watch one of those infomercials? Ever leave the TV on falling asleep in front of it to wake up later and have "Russ Dalbey's cash note business" babbling away about how easy it is to make so much money that it's amazing and they have testimonials and some out of work celebrity advocating it... "Easy as 1, 2,3 and YOU'RE RICH BEYOND YOUR WILDEST DREAMS!" (After watching this very convincing infomercial go look up "infomercial and internet scams" on your computer.) These sorts of things portray riches and instant gratification with virtually no hassle, no work... of course the only people making money are ol' Russ and perhaps his celebrity spokesperson.

There is no free lunch, there is no easy money. Looking at the message board at "My first time in a live casino"(or words to that effect)... the novice counter is evaluating a matter of a few hands with a magnifying glass and saying, "Wait a sec, here! How come I didn't make the big bucks right off the bat and it didn't go like it was supposed to. I think I lost the count. I lost money. I did not achieve instant success." There is no instant gratification for even the BEST prepared and only a tale of woe and misery for the unprepared. Few people have the devotion to go through what it truly takes to be successful and casinos will always rake it in from the vast majority of all people, counting or otherwise. They are not worried about a few books and publications about card counting; As a matter of fact it all works to their advantage!