There are quite a few progression players that read this site and yes, we believe in the validity of progressions. I agree that progressions work because your bet is higher when the count is high but if you want to read a good book on progressions check out Twenty-First Century Blackjack by Walter Thomason (available via link on blackjack books above). He shows how his progression which is 2x, 3x, 4, 5x works in practice. He also compares his win rate to that of a counter and basic strategy player. If you want a book that will prove there is something to progression blackjack, this is your resource.
I also prefer progressions because your bankroll and betting spread are not as great. I've read that counters need insane bankrolls and the ability to deal with large session losses (as well as the ability to focus all their attention on the cards so they don't miss a red 7 or black Ace). I'm just not that gutsy (or single-minded). I prefer to play blackjack as a social thing, not for the profits. If I ever decide to play for the Benji's, perhaps I'll learn to count but for now I'm quite happy being a progression player :wink: :wink: :wink:

SHREDDER: I say this in the most cautious and friendly way: Your 22 sessions at 4 to 5 hours each total roughly 100 hours and is not a telling sample size! Over that time period, there's a 35% chance that you'd be ahead just flat betting with basic strategy. At 500 hours, your chance to have been winning lucky drops to 18%. At 1000 hours it drops to 10%.
Mathematically, progressions do not work. If you've experienced the contrary, my advice is to proceed with caution - but I honestly don't like your chances from here on out. Keep us posted though - and keep meticulous records. Walter's done well over a fairly long term - which puzzles me.
By the way, progressionists usually increase their bets at a time unrelated to the current count. This has been found to be true.

B J fan, I've read Walter's book. I think the most important thing I took from it is to quit after 4 losses, that alone has saved me a bundle. I also ramped up my progression after reading his book, I was doing the Dahl progression then. I already believed in progression betting before I read it, so it was more of reinforcement of what I was doing anyway. I also agree with Renzey's book and took from that, more table awarness, such as looking at the past several hands and the cards on the table and letting it help me on border line calls to break BS in certain situations. I was untill recently playing BS like a zombie. Along with that I'm trying to practice counting (kiss 1). BTW I played today and won a few bucks and on a few shoes with slower dealers I kept a semi good count for most of the shoe. But I need a ton of practice for fast dealers and loud tables. Without rambling on and on I believe both methods work and you can use some of each training in becoming a better player. Shredder

Interesting posts by all of you... I also feel that both card counting and progressive betting can produce positive outcomes for "serious" recreational players, and that both systems can be employed by the same player at the same time. But most die-hard counters totally discount the potential merits of progressive betting.
There's one argument that I've always questioned: When a progressive bettor claims to be a winner, the counters claim that he hasn't played long enough to verify the value of the system, and has just been "lucky". At the same time, counters will tell other counters that they should be experiencing positive results after about 80,000 hands of play, and that if they are losing at this point it's only because they've been "unlucky." The same is true of studies comparing the results of different betting systems when small samples (5,000 to 50,000 hands) are used. Counters throw out the findings because millions of hands weren't played, yet no counter has ever played enough hands to verify that computer simulations of millions of hands are providing accurate information. Strange....

Remember to view the analysis in the long run on a personal experience level. You make one mistake in counting or you get hammered when the spread goes to 4 or 6 units and you're back to even; whereas, with a progression, it is more forgiving and allows you longer play with a smalletr bankroll. Progressive bettors acknowledge the benifits of counting, whereas counters won't EVER do the same. Maybe because they couldn't sell their books then, huh?

BUGHOUSEMASTER'S BACK..........JACK!!! :twisted: :evil: :twisted:

Renzey, it just seems like you wont give it a chance when so many people have had wonderful results with it.

Dex: What's a "ducking."? Did you mean duckling? Anyone with a vague grasp of english knows how to spell "duckling."
But, thank you for your enlightening post. I'll be sure to give it all the consideration it deserves.

Since the expert counters here are so polite, I'll lay it out bluntly: Anyone with a vague grasp of statistics, probability, and blackjack knows that progression betting is inane, not even worthy of debate except for amusement purposes, and that counting (plus correct play) is the only way to turn the odds in the player's favor. Period end of story, ducking.

Dex

OK, Dex. I give up and admit my ignorance. :cry: What do you mean by your sentence with use of word, "ducking"???? Are you assuming that many of the progressionists are going to fly at you for above statement, therefore you are "running" & "ducking" (in advance) as a result?

Crackers, instead of bashing, perhaps you could contribute in a positive way to the question at hand. I understand now that ,at least on computer models, it should not work, but here and with my friends it does seem to work. It also seems to work much like sld007 and Walter say their progresions work as well. So I think we are on to something despite what the computer says. I really don't know if after many, many hours of play if I'll be up or down but now after several hundred hours of play I would have to lose a bundle multiple times to be out money. My post was meant to explore why it seems to work, maybe come up with some theories as to why or if it works, not bash another's style of play. I'll continue to play progression, study counting, and laugh my way to the bank to make my deposit...........Shredder

Sorry Crackers, I was answering dex2003's post........Shredder

To Ray, Shredder and all concerning Progressions: Here's the thing to realize about progressions. If you assume that the distribution of streaks in the physical game conform to mathematical probability, then there's no way for progressions to improve one's overall performance in the game. This part can be easily proven in black and white with plain arithmetic.

Now comes the more hazy question -- do the frequencies of streaks really conform to the math, what with hand shuffled cards, clumped hands in the discard tray and all. For if streaks occur considerably more often, then the same math that shows progressions must fail will show that they must work! This too can be demonstrated in black and white.

To answer that frequency question for sure, you need to know just how often certain size streaks are supposed to occur and measure that against the actual appearance streaks over a large sample size - a tedious chore.

Now, 10,000 hands are not a particularly large sample size, but for my book I counted up all the streaks of 3 consecutive wins that occured in Bob Hubby's tabulation book "Blackjack Tracker", over the course of his first 10,000 hands. Mathematically, you should win exactly 3 hands in a row 263 times over the course of 10,000 hands. Bob Hubby won 3 in a row 267 times in the first 10,000 hands of his tabulation book.
Statistically speaking, if you conducted the same 10,000 hand experiment over again, there would be a mere 2% chance that the second test would produce as many as 300 streaks of 3 in a row.

For those blackjack players who insist that shoe games run streakier than they're supposed to, how many of them can say whether they've had either 260 or 300 streaks of 3 wins win a row over their last 10,000 hands? On what is their contention that shoes run streaky based. And if streaks really do occur more often than the straight mathematical odds predict, why don't the casinos know this, and why do they welcome that vast pool of blackjack players who religiously follow some betting progression, while barring known card counters? Have there been any TV specials reporting how skilled progression players took down Vegas for millions?

I know my presentation sounds biased, but not without reason. It's true that of all the progression players out there, some have had success. Now the question is, "Is there still something the analysts are missing concerning progressions -- or are we merely focusing on a few aberrational results?"

Really, I suppose only time will tell for certain.

Fred, Your analysis is based on what we currently know and I for one
can not disagree with that approach. However, it's been my experience over the years that complex systems seldom agree completely with our technical models and the purpose of my post was to demonstrate that
other possibilities can exist. I can't imagine a discovery process that
would nail this question completely and I'm not at all sure if time alone
will resolve anything. Ray

"Never hitting 16 vs 10 is contrary to "basic" Basic Strategy; normally you should hit. But it's one of the most borderline hands there is. You'll frequently be in situations where not hitting 16 vs 10 IS correct Basic Strategy. If just from the cards out on the table you see more lows than tens have been consumed in that round, you stand rather than hit. And if you're counting, it's not a very high positive number at which you stand rather than hit. (See Fred Renzey's Blackjack Bluebook II, pages 94 and 155.) Crackers, maybe some of your winning stands on 16's were in these situations."

Desert, last night was, for me, a very unusual session. I cannot remember ever seeing the dealer bust so many times in a Digital Blackjack session and I have been playing these "machines" for about 4 years now on a regular basis. The dealer "bust" trend lasted for shoe after shoe and I was frankly amazed. And, even though the casino touts it as "live" dealer play, it is nothing like what I call REAL BJ where the "live" dealer actually handles and shuffles the cards. To some, my experience might not be a very good sampling- ie only 4 years of play. But as Ray said, this thing we call "standard deviation" may have something to do with it? And, as you point out, "basic" BASIC STRATEGY (that which Neil has successfully taught me on this site :P ) is not the whole story.
Maybe there is need for one more BJ book called "BEYOND BASIC STRATEGY" (has someone already written it?) where the only thing discussed would be the deviations from the norm? And a reminder to all, that BS or Progression or Counting or whatever is only a PART of the complexity of the game?

Renzey's "Beyond Basic Strategy" has been an eye opener for me. I KNEW that sometimes plays like hitting 16 v 10 would never work, but never knew the reasons why. He explains that the mathematical computations for the basic strategy for this hand (and 6 others ) are so close that there will be times that standing will be mathematically correct. Can't wait to try these new strategies.

Fred: We both agree that progressions won't work unless manually-dealt play produces longer and/or more frequent "strings" of consecutive wins than is predicted by simulation. We also agree that this is has not been proven to be true, which is why casinos welcome progressive bettors.
But, it's also true that blackjack was a beatable game before card counting was proven to be effective, and that card counters weren't banned from play until published research proved that their system could beat the casinos in the long run.... which answers your question as to why progressive bettors aren't banned from play. Until someone plays 10 million hands of manually-dealt blackjack -- and proves that progressive betting is superior to flat betting -- it's unlikely that a progressive bettor will have to worry about being banned from play.
The fact that casinos don't ban progressive bettors is not necessarily based upon whether they win or not.

Walter, progression players do get barred. This just happened to a guy I work with. He plays a pure progression (no counting) and he was barred from Harrah's (in Kansas)

In the early years of air travel, my father always took a gun with him on the airplane. He figured that the odds would be astronomical against TWO passengers independently smuggling a gun on board, and this made him feel safe from hi-jackers.

dex: I believe that testimonials can be meaningful if they are based on results over a long period of time.
Before becoming a positive progressive player, I played "inspirational" and "basic strategy -- flat bet" blackjack for over 25 years, and never had a winning year. I've been a progressive bettor for the last 5 years, and have yet to have a losing year.

DEX 2003: As much as I doubt the validity of betting progressions, I know Walter Thomason personally and I'm 99% confident that he is a consciensious and honest man. That leaves us with options 1, 2 and 4, for what it's worth.

Dex: There's another possibility that you've failed to list. There's a natural (not supernatural) anomoly which occurs in manually-dealt blackjack games which produces different results than are predicted by mathametical theory and computer simulation. A slight difference in the frequency and duration of clusters of winning hands could produce results more favorable than traditional theory would predict.
It's your right to reject this possibility if you choose to, but it's not your right to exclude it from consideration.

Walter Thompson, one thing that always struck me as ironic about card counting, is that a series of bad cards is coming out, driving the count up, so you make larger and larger bets as you get all these bad cards. To get up to a count of +5, you need a whole lot of bad cards to come out. This would imply to me that a negative progression should offer an advantage, i.e. increase your bet after a loss, decrease after a win. I've never bothered to model this theory, but my suspicion is that one cannot take advantage of this trend, because the probabilities change so little: an advantage swing from say -1.5% at a TC of -1 to an advantage of +1.5% at a TC of +5, would hardly have an effect on any progression, and is probably the biggest swing you'll see in a 4 hour session. (I'm talking a shoe game here) One idea is to play two hands (or more if you can get away with it), so the variance of results would be reduced. Make your progression based on the sum of the multiple hands. I guess the ideal situation would be heads up play, where you take up all six spots, although I suppose a smaller number of spots could be ideal - my intuition does not serve me here. Anyway, let me know your thoughts. (Actually, anyone is welcome to chime in here.)

Thanks again Walter. I think I can now say what I think in better terms.
In a static sense, logically and mathematically, we can say that progressions don't work. Fred's four step example is a perfect proof.
If we extend our logic to a single deck game, then as Walter described,
there are not enough hands for progressions to be verified, good or bad.
So, we can extend the static position to a ristricted position(single deck)
and say that progressions are lacking in this domain as well.

Going from single deck to the six deck shoe is a new ball game for reasons that don't jump out and grab us like maybe they should. Its true
that the level of complexity is just six times more likely in the shoe
game; 4 kings vs 24,etc,etc. A simple linear translation for sure and
I think all will agree with this simple logic. Right off the top, things are
not quite as streight forward and the reason for this is a law more
commonly called the "Principal of Entropy". The dealer is an active
participant in this law by her actions of picking and placing the cards.
( A MORE COMPLETE EXAMPLE OF A "PIC AND PLACE ROBOT" I HAVE
NOT SEEN)
Over a short period of time the shoe becomes a cess-pool of changing
probabilities, uncertainties abound and our ability to model such an
envionment becomes next to impossible. No two decks are alike; no
two shoes are alike; we lose hands that we should win and win hands we
should lose. The strandard deviation can jump around in all manner
and direction. These variations are the reason it takes so many hands
of simulation to prove the card counting model and why it is so hard to
beat these games. So, "WALTER" rest easy because if you say your
progressions work in the shoe games, then no person on this planet
can prove otherwise.(period)

A word about "statistical Anomalies": This is a catch-all phrase that is
over used by dumb ass statisticians that have an effect and can't
figure out the cause. Most of these, if important, are rung out(fixed)
and take their place as a set or sub-set along with other stats and
fade into the woodwork we call knowledge.

Ray

I think that we have said all we can say about progressions and we have
split a few hairs along the way. Why don't we use our collective abilities
to develop a new approach toward Blackjack. Why not? If you look at
some of the things the casinos are doing, we need to do something for
the future. I think that we have a good mix of math, science, experience,
and just good common sense. What say you people?

Ray

Still pluggging away with the progression and still winning at a 58% after roughly 150 to 175 hours of play. Average $71 per trip with high win 710 and high loss -500. I'm using Renzey's front count with the progression, sometimes to up my progression at good count times. (although the best count I've ever seen was a big loser for me, the table won I lost) Also leaving the table after 4 losses. I would not have lost as big as I did on a couple occassions if I drove to the cassino alone. I ussually go with a friend or my wife and sometimes that can cost you if your ride/rider is not ready to leave. I know that I can go get a drink or something, but it;s hard not to play when I'm there. Best of luck for the holidays.........Shredder

Renzey said:

SHREDDER: I say this in the most cautious and friendly way: Your 22 sessions at 4 to 5 hours each total roughly 100 hours and is not a telling sample size! Over that time period, there's a 35% chance that you'd be ahead just flat betting with basic strategy. At 500 hours, your chance to have been winning lucky drops to 18%. At 1000 hours it drops to 10%.
Mathematically, progressions do not work. If you've experienced the contrary, my advice is to proceed with caution - but I honestly don't like your chances from here on out. Keep us posted though - and keep meticulous records. Walter's done well over a fairly long term - which puzzles me.
By the way, progressionists usually increase their bets at a time unrelated to the current count. This has been found to be true.

Geee... maybe the house doesn't know either!

N&B