Readers ask about blackjack, slots

Question. What percentage of blackjack players do you think are counting cards? Half? I just wonder, when I see players splitting 6s against a 10. They can't be counting cards.

Answer. I doubt that half of blackjack players in casinos have studied a basic strategy chart, let alone count cards. I'd put the number of card counters at less than 1 percent of the blackjack-playing population.

Before any player who is trying to get better worries about counting cards, he or she must master basic strategy first. An average blackjack player faces a house edge of about 2 to 2.5 percent. Learning basic strategy can cut that house edge to around a half percent or less, depending on house rules.

How can you tell if someone at your table is a basic strategy player? Here are a few common moves that separate those who know their basic from those who don't:, assuming a multiple-deck game.

• A basic strategy player hits hard 16 when the dealer shows a 7. Every time.
• A basic strategy player splits Aces, and splits 8s, even when the dealer has a 10 face up. Exception: The basic strategy player will surrender on 8-8 if the dealer hits soft 17 and surrender is offered.
• A basic strategy player never stands on soft 17. He or she hits or doubles down, depending on the dealer's face up card.
• A basic strategy player hits on 12 if the dealer shows a 2 or a 3.
• A basic strategy player hits on soft 18 if the dealer shows a 9, 10 or Ace.

Those are all moves that give trouble to those who play by intuition.

Card counters will sometimes make plays that run counter to basic strategy. In addition to hitting 12 against a 2 or 3, a counter will sometimes also hit 12 against 4, if the composition of the remaining cards is right. A card counter also will sometimes hit 16 against 10, but not 16 vs. 7.

Insurance is a special case. Intuition players often will insure their blackjacks by taking even money when the dealer has an Ace face up. Basic strategy players will never take insurance --- that's the right play most of the time. Card counters, on the other hand, will take insurance if the remaining deck includes a high enough percentage of high cards.

Look around next time you play. See how many players hem, haw and sometimes stand on 16 vs. 7, or fail to split 8s against a 10, or stand on Ace-7 against a 9. That'll tell you just how few basic strategy players there are --- and there are many, many few card counters.

Question. I would like to know if adding say $1,000 to a slot machine loosens that machine for a big payout.

Also, I always play the max. Does it matter what the denomination of the game is? That is, do the games loosen as the denomination rises? Does a $1 game pay more than a penny slot played at maximum?

Answer. No amount of play changes the odds of hitting a winning combination on slot machines. If the game is programmed so that there is a 1 in 10,000 chance of hitting the big jackpot, then there is a 1 in 10,000 chance on every spin. If you've just hit the jackpot, the odds are still in 1 in 10,000; if you've played 9,999 spins without hitting the big jackpot, the odds are STILL 1 in 10,000.

(The 1 in 10,000 is just an example, by the way. Some machines hit more frequently, some much less. There are machines with a 1 in 2,000 chance of hitting the top jackpot, while in a big-money game like Megabucks the chances are 1 in tens of millions.)

If it's a progressive machine, adding money to the top jackpot does not change the odds of your hitting that jackpot. If the progressive meter starts at $1,000, and the jackpot meter has grown to $2,000, the chances of winning are the same as when you started. The long-term payback percentage does grow with the progressive meter, because the big hit pays more when it finally comes.

As for changing coin denomination, that DOES make a difference. Generally, penny machines pay less than nickel machines, which pay less than quarters, which pay less than dollars and so on. If you play maximum coins on a penny machine, your bet may be as large as if you're playing a three-reel dollar slot, but in most cases the dollar game will have a higher payback percentage.

Of course, there's also a difference in the play experience between a penny video slot and a dollar reel-spinner. Winning spins are more frequent on the video game, but payoffs of many times your wager are more common on the reel-spinner. The penny game will keep you in your seat longer, but the dollar game gives you a better chance of walking away with a fairly substantial win. That's the choice slot players face when deciding between low-denomination video games and higher denomination reel spinners.

Myths and legends, table games edition

In any casino game, there are myths and legends, things people believe that don't quite square with reality.  Let's take on a few myths from a table games player perspective.

MYTH: The third baseman is a team player, and shouldn't take the dealer's bust card. A third baseman hitting 12 when the dealer has a 2, for example, is hurting the entire table.

FACT: A player hitting in that situation helps the rest of the table as often as he hurts it. Anyway, it's the best play for his hand. Hitting 12 against 2 is what he SHOULD do.

Wouldn't it be nice if we knew whether or not the next card in the deck would make the dealer's hand go bust? Problem is, we don't know what the dealer has face down, and we don't know what the next card is. Sitting at third base, I've drawn a 9 to my 12 for a 21, had the dealer turn up a 10-value card, then draw another 10 to bust. The entire table won, but if I hadn't hit, the dealer would have had a 9 and the whole table would have lost.

I've also drawn a card that would have busted the dealer. Most often, though, the dealer has something less than a 10-value face down, and NO one-card draw can bust the dealer's hand.

Unless other players are willing to pay for losses, the third baseman's responsibility is to make the play that's best for his or her own hand.

MYTH: A hot craps table is likely to stay hot, a cold table is likely to stay cold.

FACT: Average results on a table after a hot streak are the same as after a cold streak. Odds of the game don't change, regardless of how hot or cold the shooters have bene.

Craps players are always looking for hot tables, and avoiding cold ones. But unless you're dealing with controlled rollers, a la Frank Scoblete and his Golden Touch Craps team, I've never really seen a reason why a hot table should stay hot, or a cold table stay cold. We are dealing with dice, after all, that don't know what the previous results have been.

Several years ago, I put it to the test. For nearly a year, every time I was in a casino in the Midwest, South and in Nevada, I stopped by a craps table, waited until I saw two consecutive passes, then tracked the result of the next decision -- not as good a sample as a million-hand computer run, but a lot more time-consuming.

The result: Pass bettors won 489 wagers and lost 511 on the next sequence after two consecutive wins. There was no tendency for the dice to stay hot.

I also watched 1,000 trials that started with two don't passes, then charted the next decision. The dice passed 496 times in those 1,000 trials a mere three more passes than the expected average. There was no tendency for cold dice to stay cold, either.

Now, a thousand trials each way isn't enough to satisfy a statistician, but if hot tables stay hot and cold tables stay cold, well, you can't prove it by me.

MYTH: Just as in blackjack, counting cards can help you win.

FACT: Counting cards in baccarat doesn't help in any practical way.
Favorable situations in baccarat are really rare. The late Peter Griffin wrote in The Theory of Blackjack that a baccarat player who doesn't bet unless he has an advantage can squeeze an edge of about 0.7 percent of his maximum bets on banker and player. However, that player might play only about three hands per eight hours. That's watching, not playing.

For bets on ties, it's theoretically possible to count down to a 24 percent edge with six cards remaining, provided all the cards are dealt out.

In the real world, nobody deals out all the cards, and with one-half deck cut out of play, the bettor's potential edge on the last hand shrinks to just 0.08 percent. With just a small reservation, we can say the myth of the baccarat card counter is JUST a myth.

MYTH: An experienced roulette dealer can make the ball land where he pleases.

FACT: Dealers I know scoff at the notion they can hit a number at will. With the wheel spinning one way, the ball going in the opposite direction, bouncing on the surface and from fret to fret separating the numbers, there are far too many physical variables for a dealer to control where the ball will land.

Anyway, the last thing the casino wants is a dealer who can hit a number at will. As long as the results are random, the casino makes its money. However, if a dealer could control what numbers were coming up, there'd be a chance someone would be in on the secret and take a lot of money from the casino. Random games mean big profits for the operators. Taking the randomness out increases operator risk.

Splitting hairs in Caribbean Stud strategy

Q. Playing Caribbean Stud Poker, I had Ace-King-8-5-2, and the card the dealer turned face up from her hand was an Ace. I made the bet, because my Ace matched his Ace. Another guy at the table told me that was the wrong play, that you bet only if one of the other three cards matches the dealer. The dealer didn't qualify, so I won on my ante and just got my bet back anyway. Her next highest card was a 10, and there were no pairs. But was the other player right? I want to give myself the best chance to win, and I always thought I was doing it by betting with Ace-King and a match.

A. The other player was correct. When we have Ace-King in Caribbean Stud, we do a lot of splitting of hairs. One of those hair splits is that when we have Ace-King and no other face cards in the hand, we bet whenever one of the other three cards matches the dealer's face up card, and fold when there's no such match.

Note the provision that there are no other face cards in the hand. If we have Ace-King- Queen or Ace-King-Jack, we bet if any of our five cards match the dealer's face-up card, and with Ace-King-Queen, we bet even with no match if our fourth highest card outranks the dealer's up card.

How much does all that gain us? Very little. With the strategy given here, you'll face a house edge of about 5.23 percent of the ante or 2.56 percent of total action. According to Michael Shackelford's outstanding Web site, wizardofodds.com, if you bet with Ace-King when any of your five cards matches the dealer up card, the house edge is 5.33 percent of the ante or 2.62 percent of total action.

By far the most important component of Caribbean Stud strategy is to bet with all pairs. I've seen many players fold with a pair of 2s or 3s. Those aren't necessarily winning hands, but in the long run, you'll lose more money by folding and forfeiting your ante than you will by betting the hand and accepting that you'll win some and lose some.

With bigger jackpots, do four-Ace hands occur less often?

Q. How is it that a casino can afford to pay you 800 coins for four Aces on some games, 2,000 on some others, but only 125 on Jacks or Better? On the games that pay more, are they programmed so the Aces come up less often?

A. On the contrary. We hit four Aces more often, not less, on games such as Double Bonus Poker (800 coins for a five-coin bet), Double Double Bonus Poker (800 coins most of the time, but 2,000 if the four Aces are accompanied by a 2, 3 or 4) or Super Aces (2,000 coins) than we do on Jacks or Better (125 coins). That's because we adjust our playing strategy to account for the bigger payoffs on those Aces.

The prime example is a full house that includes three Aces. On Jacks or Better, we just take the full house payoff. On the other games mentioned, we hold the three Aces and discard the other pair, hoping for the fourth Ace.

So how can games such as Double Bonus, Double Double Bonus and Super Aces pay us so much more than Jacks or Better does on Ace quads? Because what they give you on four of a kind, they take away elsewhere on the pay table. One thing all those big Ace games have in common is that they pay only 1-for-1 on two pair, instead of the 2-for-1 you get on Jacks or Better. The drop in the two-pair payoff costs us about 12 percent of our return in the long run, giving game designers plenty of leeway to give us bigger bonuses elsewhere on the pay table.

Do casinos make their profit from winning players?

Q. Sitting in the buffet, I caught a snippet of conversation that I was wondering if you could explain. (I wasn't listening in, they were so loud I couldn't help hearing.) One guy was saying that the casino really makes its money off the winners, and the other guy said something like, "Oh really? You mean we pay for all this when we win?" That doesn't really make sense to me.

A. Kind of leaves you wondering what kind of gambling palaces they could build if everybody won, doesn't it? If the casino makes money off the winners, then more winners must mean more profits, right?

But seriously, there is a way of looking at how the casino makes its money that looks at casino profits as a tax on the winners. Casino games make money because they pay the winners at less than true odds. If 38 people are sitting at a double-zero roulette table and each bet $1 on a different number on a single spin, the 37 losers each will lose their buck, and the one winner will be paid at 35-1 odds and walk away with $36. If the casino was paying true odds, the one winner should be paid at 37-1 odds and walk away with $38. The casino profit is the $2 not paid to the winner that he'd get if true odds were paid.

Same deal with sports betting. In most sports books, you have to put down 10 percent vigorish on top of your bet. Let's say you and I are betting on the same football game, with me betting on Team A and you on Team B. We each intend to bet $100, but we have to pay the vig, so we actually each bet $110. When my team wins --- hey, it's my example; I get to win --- you lose your $110 bet, but I'm paid only $100, along with the return of my $110 wager. The casino profit is the $10 it didn't pay me on my winning bet.

Sometimes the paying of winners at less than true odds is disguised a bit. In baccarat, for instance, bets on banker win more often than they lose, and bets seem to be paid at even money. However, bettors have to pay a 5 percent commission on winning bets, so winners aren't really paid at 1-1; they're paid at (1 minus .05)-1, and that's less than the true odds of winning the wager.

So it goes with every casino game. There are going to be winners, and there are going to be losers, but the house will make money because it pays winners less than the true odds of winning the bet.