take even money? Even though the bj books always say no, I always take even money. Another question, if you have a 12 or 13 and the dealer shows a 2 do you hit?
Since I don't play with any real money or posessions at stake, it basically doesn't matter what I do in this case. I tend to go for the win if I have the blackjack, dealer showing the ace... and hit the 12/13... When I lose those... I'm still not out anything.
To the first, no, as the book says. If the dealer has a 2 showing, I generally stay. The dealer has to hit until he or she reaches 16, so if the dealer has a two showing, generally the dealer has 12 total, and on hitting, will usually go over, at least in my experience.
I never take insurance/even money. It would not be offered if it was a bad deal for the house. If I'm at 12 and the dealer shows a 2, I still hit it once (Unless I haven't seen much in the way of face cards in the last 10 cards). If the dealer is at 14, 15, or 16, I always stay if a face will bust me.
Unless you're counting cards, you never take insurance. You have to assume the composition of the deck is 4/13ths face cards if you're not counting, or 30.7%. Getting paid 2:1 for an event that only occurs 30.7% of the time has an expected value (2)(.307) + (-1)(.693) = -.08. In other words, for every dollar bet on insurance, you can expect to lose eight cents each time. BTW, "insurance" should be considered a separate side bet that the dealer has a hidden ten. Since the only thing that matters is the composition of the undealt cards, and what you're holding doesn't matter (except for possibly telling you something about the composition of the undealt cards), you should not think of it as "insuring" your hand when you have a good hand. Depending on the rules (H17 or S17, # of decks, RSA, DOA, etc.), hitting or standing on 12 vs a dealer 2 or 3 could be correct. However, the EV is so close to the same for either action that it doesn't matter that much. And in the short run, variance dominates EV, so anyone who plays blackjack can cite numerous examples where the "incorrect" play actually resulted in winning. You have to play millions of hands for your actual experience to converge on the calculated EVs.
Take a look at the blackjack table on this page. They've calculated all of the odds and tell you what you need to do in order to play "perfectly" (assuming you're not counting cards). Using their table to answer your question, a 12 should hit on a dealer 2 and a 13 should stand on a dealer 2. Oh. And I agree with others. Never take insurance; not even if you have blackjack (which "taking even money" is a form of).
I vary the size of my bets when the table heats up.If you sit there and always bet the same amount ,you cant really beat the house's statistical advantage over time. In other words win big when theres a rush,lose small when its cold. With that in mind ,if I have a thousand dollar bet when my normal bet is $5, it has different considerations than just odds.I may take even money and call it a night.
Counting cars is the only way to make money in the long term at blackjack. There are lots of different ways to "count cards," but all of them rely on keeping track of what cards have come out of the deck (and what cards are in the deck). This is, BTW, why I consider blackjack rather boring. Assuming you don't count cards, there is one "perfect" way to play and you always must make the same play in every situation if you want to play the smartest way. Of course, maybe some of the fun is in trying to do some "light" card counting and changing your bets without getting kicked out of the casino.
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Betelgeuse @ Jul 19 2007, 03:26 PM) [snapback]481746[/snapback]</div> Thanks for the link.
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(JimN @ Jul 19 2007, 07:51 PM) [snapback]481924[/snapback]</div> No problem. In the casinos that I've been to, it's actually permitted to have a table like that in front of you while you're playing.
