Would you bank this game?

#1
This is an EMERGENCY. I have found a game in a California card room that allows you to play as the dealer in exchange for a fee. The fee depends on the amount of money wagered.
FEE STRUCTURE: 15-100 = 2 DOLLARS, 101-300, 3 DOLLARS.
RULES OF THE GAME: 2 DECK, BJ PAYS 6 TO 5, DAS, RSA, LS
SIDE BETS: Lucky Lucky and Buster Blackjack
WOULD YOU BANK THIS GAME?
 

Ryemo

Well-Known Member
#2
Do these fees need to be paid per round? Can you explain the fees in a little more detail. And are there side bets? If so, how do fees get structured around that?
 
#3
Badbeat said:
What’s the emergency?
I haven't played in almost a month.
Ryemo said:
Do these fees need to be paid per round? Can you explain the fees in a little more detail. And are there side bets? If so, how do fees get structured around that?
The fee has to be paid every round. There are side bets.
Here's an example of how the fee would work: 2 people at the table, I'm banking. One player bets 50 dollars, the other player bets 50 dollars and decides to put 10 dollars on Lucky Lucky. The fee for that round would be $3 for the banker.
Example 2: One player bets $25 on the main bet, $25 on lucky lucky, $25 on buster blackjack. Second player bets $25 on the main bet. My fee would be $2 dollars. It has to be paid every round.
 

JJP

Well-Known Member
#4
JohnCrover said:
This is an EMERGENCY. I have found a game in a California card room that allows you to play as the dealer in exchange for a fee. The fee depends on the amount of money wagered.
FEE STRUCTURE: 15-100 = 2 DOLLARS, 101-300, 3 DOLLARS.
RULES OF THE GAME: 2 DECK, BJ PAYS 6 TO 5, DAS, RSA, LS
SIDE BETS: Lucky Lucky and Buster Blackjack
WOULD YOU BANK THIS GAME?
How much cash are you bringing to the card room? GWAE had a podcast on a month or two ago and the guest talked about banking BJ and Baccarat at the Commerce Card Room near LA. He said he brought $100k to the cage for chips. In theory, you should clean up. But variance could be huge.

Do you have to wager or can you just bank?
 

Ryemo

Well-Known Member
#7
Ok, I guess the answer is "it depends." How big is the normal action there and how often do people play side bets. If you want to bank this game, you'll need to be pretty well funded in order to do so.

If we assume DD, H17, DAS, DOA, RSA, LS, 6:5 BJ, then House Edge (HE) should = 1.711%
If we assume DD, H17 Buster Blackjack, HE should = 6.51%

So let's say, for the sake of simplicity, 2 players bet $50 each on main BJ bet and $25 each on Buster Side Bet, then your return would be $4.96 ($3.25 in Buster and $1.71 in BJ). Then you would need to subratact the fee of $2, so your net return would be $2.96 per round in EV. But let's say they don't play side bets and each player bets $50 on BJ and nothing on side bets, the, your return would be $1.71 per round. That would be before paying out the $2 fee, so your net return in that case would be -$0.29 per round. So it just depends on the action and what people are betting on.

Go on Wizard of Odds and play around with the numbers.
 

JJP

Well-Known Member
#8
It seems like a catch-22. You need big action in these games to make it worthwhile to bank. But no AP is going to play the card rooms with bad rules. So I guess one just needs degenerates with big bankrolls (apparantly there was no shortage of them in Commerce). But even then, you need a lot of $$ to bank in case of bad variance.
 
#10
You can bank for any amount of money but the fee just gets larger. I was thinking of banking no more than $300 in action to collect mitigate variance, yes the game is h17.
There is no shortage of degenerates. If you have the bank roll you WILL clean house. There was this one guy there one night, had at least 6 beers, he got 88 with a $500 bet out there ( I was banking) dealer had a 6, he ended up staying because he couldn't get more money out of the ATM. That same night he hit soft 19 against a dealer 10 with $400-$600 out there.
The side bets are incredibly popular and they get a lot of action.
 

ZenKinG

Well-Known Member
#11
This could be very profitable if you simply 'backcount' these tables and find a full table where everyone is betting heavy on the side bets. Instead of backcounting cards, youre backcounting people and finding the ones who have no idea what theyre doing or at best average at playing.

Also one shouldnt be going off the House Edge because the average player even off a 3:2 game I would say plays at a 2-3% disadvantage with all the even moneys they take, misplayed hands, improper insurance bets, etc. If you throw in 6:5 into this, were looking at 4-5% disadvantage for the average player.

I feel like banking blackjack in California can be very profitable if one is patient enough and can be useful for someone building a roll.

I do have one question though. What are the restrictions of banking? Is there a set amount of shoes you have to play or can you leave after 1 shoe or even mid-shoe? I say this in case you run into a table with any possible APs
 
Last edited:

JJP

Well-Known Member
#12
JohnCrover said:
You can bank for any amount of money but the fee just gets larger. I was thinking of banking no more than $300 in action to collect mitigate variance, yes the game is h17.
There is no shortage of degenerates. If you have the bank roll you WILL clean house. There was this one guy there one night, had at least 6 beers, he got 88 with a $500 bet out there ( I was banking) dealer had a 6, he ended up staying because he couldn't get more money out of the ATM. That same night he hit soft 19 against a dealer 10 with $400-$600 out there.
The side bets are incredibly popular and they get a lot of action.
Have you considered banking Baccarat or would that be too much risk?

Here's the podcast with a counter who banked in the card rooms last year:

https://www.lasvegasadvisor.com/gambling-with-an-edge/podcast-card-counter-smallcap-3/
 
#13
JJP said:
Have you considered banking Baccarat or would that be too much risk?

Here's the podcast with a counter who banked in the card rooms last year:

https://www.lasvegasadvisor.com/gambling-with-an-edge/podcast-card-counter-smallcap-3/
I have considered banking Baccarat. Especially because of the high house edge on Panda and Dragon side bet, those bets are very popular as well.
ZenKinG said:
This could be very profitable if you simply 'backcount' these tables and find a full table where everyone is betting heavy on the side bets. Instead of backcounting cards, youre backcounting people and finding the ones who have no idea what theyre doing or at best average at playing.

Also one shouldnt be going off the House Edge because the average player even off a 3:2 game I would say plays at a 2-3% disadvantage with all the even moneys they take, misplayed hands, improper insurance bets, etc. If you throw in 6:5 into this, were looking at 4-5% disadvantage for the average player.

I feel like banking blackjack in California can be very profitable if one is patient enough and can be useful for someone building a roll.

I do have one question though. What are the restrictions of banking? Is there a set amount of shoes you have to play or can you leave after 1 shoe or even mid-shoe? I say this in case you run into a table with any possible APs
You can stop banking whenever you want. You have to take turns banking with the player banker though, and any other player at the table who chooses to bank.( over 99% of the time the other players don't bank)
 

JJP

Well-Known Member
#19
Stopped at one card room today and was surprised by the rules. I thought they were all 6-5. A $5 minimum bet table had 3-2 blackjack and even had surrender.
 
Top