MoneyMaker said:

Ok I was playing the game here and it said "don't risk busting when the dealer shows 6 or below. Stand and hope he bursts"

I don't understand this. I had an 8 and 5 which is only 13, he had 4. I clicked hit and that came up. Could someone please explain. : )

thanks

You had 13. Out of the 13 cards you can draw, 6 of them will bust you and make you lose instantly. 6/13 is almost 50%. When the dealer has a 6 up, that's the worst up-card he can have, as 4 of 13 times his down card will be a 10. And with a 16 total, he must hit.

Basic strategy comes from billions of rounds of simulation, where you get the same two cards over and over, the dealer gets the same up card over and over, and then the simulation runs those hands over and over, dealing different cards hand by hand, and trying each of the possible playing decisions you can make (hit/stand/double/surrender). After it finishes, it shows the expected win/loss for each playing decision, and basic strategy gives the option with the best outcome for you.

Trust me, BS is correct, although playing BS perfectly still will not lete you beat the house.

MoneyMaker said:

if it won't let me beat the house how do people make money.. sorry if I sound rude but i still don't understand how I could sit on only 13.. if he had a 4 then if he gets a 10 or anything I loose. If he gets a 9 and hits again I loose. the only way I could win is if he like gets a a really really bad combo...

There are only two ways to make money in a casino;

(1) work for them;

(2) learn some sort of advantage play technique(s) that turn the edge to your favor. Card counting is an oft-discussed real option, as are other things such as shuffle-tracking and so forth.

Basic strategy _minimizes_ the house edge over you, but minimize does not mean "eliminate"...

shadow_priest_x said:

Stainless. . .

We both know that even for BS players good nights can come quite often and with a bit of luck it's not hard to make money without counting in any given evening.

With that said, I think what she wants is a decent explanation regarding why it is advisable to stand on 13 against a 4 up.

The simple explanation is: Because you have no idea what the dealer has under that 4 card up. The bottom line is that millions and millions of hands have been played in which it's been proven that you will win more/lose less by standing on 13 against a 4. The truth is that having a 13 against ANYTHING is not very good. It's not a winning hand. If you stand, all too often the dealer will draw to a made hand. If you hit, all too often you will bust out. But if you have 13 and the dealer has a 4 up, you want to stand and hope to God that he busts, which he will do 40% of the time. In the end, even if your 13 is against a 6 up (the worst up card for the dealer), you will thank your lucky stars if you win.

For a more detailed and mathematical explanation, someone else will have to chime in.

Do you really care how you do in one playing session, vs how you do over _all_ your playing sessions? If so, why? Would you be happy to buy a stock, and see it go up the first day, and then down every day after that? The idea of "winning sessions" is simply irrelevant. Otherwise one might be happy when he wins a single hand, even though he just lost (or will lose) 8 in a row...

As far as the rest of that goes, it has already been said (by myself and many others) many times here... BS has been _proven_ to be the best playing decision, when only considering the cards in your hand and the dealer's hand. There are composition-dependent BS plays that vary, because the cards in other hands affect the odds of what will happen in your hand. Counting takes this to the extreme since you then keep up with the status of the remaining undealt cards and use that information to influence your playing and betting decisions.

If you want to understand the simulation process for the 13 vs 6, take a single deck of cards, and deal yourself two cards that add up to 13, and give the dealer a single 6. Now for the fun...

play your hand normally by hitting, then deal the dealer's card and play out his hand. Record the result.

shuffle, keeping the starting 3 cards out of the deck, and now play your hand by standing and then finishing the dealer's play. record the result.

Shuffle, and now play your hand by doubling and record the result.

Repeat the above a couple of billion times, and then total up the results to see which playing strategy won the most money.

You are not done yet. Now deal yourself two _different_ cards that total to 13, and repeat the above. And continue to do that until you have tried all combinations of cards totalling to 13. Add up the results and see which won the most, hit, stand or double (and surrender if LS is available in the game you play). Isn't it logical to choose the playing strategy that either wins the most, or loses the least? Or you can go to the wizardofodds web site and look at appendix I which gives the expected value for each triplet of cards (two for you, one up for the dealer) so that you can see what you expect to win or lose. For 13 vs 6, you will find:

-0.1537 for stand on 13 vs 6
-0.2356 for hitting 13 vs 6
-0.4713 for doubling (not surprising, almost twice the loss as hitting)
-0.5000 for surrendering when LS is available.

Note that 13 vs 6 is a _losing_ hand. But which strategy to employ? The one that loses the least. Which is to stand by a significant margin...