chexplay said:For you wiz's out there:
If my first card is dealt an ace, what is my win percentage on that hand? In other words, how valuable is that ace to me? What are my odds to win that hand?
(Assume DD, S17, DAS, DOA)
stainless steel rat said:I don't have Griffin's book where I am right now, but I believe if your first card is an Ace, you have a 51% advantage right off the top...
michael990 said:do you mean a 51% chance to win the hand, which is actually a 1% advantage? Or do you mean a 51% higher chance of winning the hand than
the house does? which would actually be about a 75% chance of winning the hand. (75 minus 25 = 50)
NYB said:I'm assuming this is why the"first card is an ace" promos are just about extinct these days.
Bojack1 said:SSR I must say you have explained the percentage of landing the ace quite well. But you seem to be confusing the cut card placement method with ace sequencing. When I speak of steering an ace, or any card for that matter, its done after the shuffle is done. Some casinos do not cover the bottom card of the shoe so when they roll them you can clearly see what it is. If its an ace you can than cut a deck off the back, the dealer then moves that what you just cut to the front, and you count down the amount of cards you cut to know what hand the ace will land in. Again this is not easy. You must practice cutting 52 cards and than know if you are off by a couple by how many. That part of it is actually not that hard. On average if you have good eyesight in about 8 hours of practice you should be very accurate. The difficult part comes in playing the hands in such a way that you actually steer the ace to the hand that you expect it. This usually means playing multiple hands, and on the key hand maybe surrounding your big bet with some smaller ones in case you were off on your cut count you still land the ace and not the dealer. Like I've said before there is a lot to it, and requires alot of practice. I do go more in depth about it in the "A.C. really isn't that bad" thread and also in the thread "Nice Trip". This is not shuffletracking or ace sequencing this just cutting a known card into play and counting backwards. If you want my take on shuffletracking than read the thread "More than counting".
I also talk about in those other threads how to practice spotting the bottom card of the shoe even if they do cover it. Again all of this is opportunistic, but when the chance arises if played correctly, can really change the game for you.
Bojack1 said:Golfnut101, You can find the "A.C. really isn't that bad" thread back in February's posts. Also the thread "Nice Trip" back in late March's posts also gets into an actual trip where we used this method.
Chexplay, My team and I have been successfully using this method for more than 10 years now. Along with this we have incorporated other advanced techniques such as shuffletracking which also has been highly successful. Our methods are not widely used by a lot of advantage players. Even the MIT teams back in the 90's were split between using these methods along with counting, or just counting using team play. Its my personal opinion most people get the wrong idea about shuffletracking. They think that you are looking for a particular card or that the group of cards that you are tracking can't be diluted by other random cards by being plugged or shuffled. That is completely false. What most people don't seem to get is that if you track a strong enough packet of 1/2 a deck or less, using the right math you can figure out how strong the track is after dilution, if its still worth using, and how much to actually bet with it. And if used correctly the betting style of shuffletracking looks nothing like that of a conventional counter. Even some seasoned counters have not been able to pick up on whats going on because on the surface it looks nothing like they learned how to play. Not only is it lucrative its the perfect cover. I go more in depth on this in the "More than counting thread". If any of this interests you you'll find all of what I'm talking about there.
Bojack1 said:That type of shuffletrack is exactly the type that is becoming almost impossible to use. If you wait to see whats left in the unused cards those cards are normally nowadays broken up into 3 or 4 sections and plugged into the discards. That makes it a highly inefficient way to track anything. Besides its mostly guesswork as to where in the cards that you haven't seen are the ones you want. Basically my whole deal is to use the cards you've already counted, and make sure its in a tight group of no more than 1/2 a deck. With this method when you become proficient you can even track more than one section at a time. But as long as you're following a smaller group of cards its much harder for a discard plug to interfere and it still can be very strong getting diluted by even a 2 pass shuffle. Again I hate to beat a dead horse but I've talked about this extensively in previous posts. It is a more difficult way to shuffletrack because you really need to mentally mark the cards in the discard tray where they are. But if you know deck sizing for true count conversions than this type of tracking is no different. And it takes a little bit of math to figure out what your bet will be. But for the most part if used correctly the weakest track you'll use will be a true count of 4, and commomnly you'll see true counts of between 6 and 10, truly advantageous cards to say the least. And I swear to you, it can be used with almost all shuffles.
Bojack1 said:SSR what you're talking about is somewhat true and needs a little more concentration and skill. First I will concede that some type of shuffles will be harder to track than others. If thats the case the simple solution is avoid them and find an easier one. Just like you shouldn't play blackjack games that have bad rules, its the same thing. But if you feel you must than you must really examine the track you have and know at what point its strongest. For instance if you're tracking say a -10 in 1/2 a deck but you know it was -8 in a 1/4 and than went to -10 in that last quarter before rising, than forget about the last quarter and use the -8 in 1/4 deck. Its stronger and extremely hard to disrupt and not as likely to be affected by stripping techniques. You need to physically practice shuffletracking to really grasp whats happening. When you actually practice the shuffle you will be tracking you will be able to see the characteristics of distribution and realize things aren't always as random as they appear.
My suggestion to all who want to practice this is, take 26 cards and make a high negative track out of them, say -12 or -13. Than color one edge with a dark marker making sure they stand out clearly when stacked in the shoe. Use the same amount of decks of the shuffle you wish to track, and keeping the marked cards together place them anywhere in the shoe. Now perform the shuffle exactly like the casino, watching the marked cards as you do. You will usually see they don't get split as random as you might think, unless they get split in a pick. This is especially true with sloppy dealers that don't riffle well and tend to have 4 to 5 card clumps. After you've examined the results of a few shuffles, do it again this time turning the cards so you can't see the markings. When you're done with the shuffle see if you can cut them into play, and if you can figure out what percentage if any is no longer useful.
I will admit, especially to the beginner you should really look for the easiest shuffle done by the not so meticulous dealers. Also like I stated earlier, the smaller amount of cards in your track the better. When you get real good tracking 12 cards of -8 wont be a problem. Remember 1/2 a deck is the absolute most you want to try to track. As you get better you will see it gets easy to trim down.
And I haven't even mentioned the positive nrs (non random shuffle) track yet. Its easier but usually not as strong. But basically all you're doing is instead of cutting high card into play, you're cutting low cards out.
Bojack1 said:Hey Stainless, with counting skills like that I think you should try the BP checkout offered by MIT Mike Aponte. He gives seminars around the country and nobody has yet to pass it. If you do, you get a free seminar, which usually goes for $700, and you get serious consideration for placement on a pretty elite team. Now I'm sure you're probably not interested in playing on a team, but passing the checkout would be quite an achievement as no so called "civilian" has yet to do it. The drills you do for fun are pretty much exactly whats needed to pass the checkout. What do you say? I think you could have some fun with it.
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