Card Counting Tutorial, Day 4

There doesn't seem to be much interest in the Card Counting Tutorial. Only 1 in 200 readers likes it.

Answers to the Four Questions (so Far). No one has answered all of the Questions. Only Jack took a stab at 1 and 2.

Here are the questions from Day one and two:

1. If you aren’t allowed to touch the cards, why do they hide the dealer’s hole card under her up card? Players and dealers getting together to cheat is a big problem for casinos. The only person who touches the cards is the dealer. She could easily put the crimps on the back of the cards as she puts them in the discard pile for future hands. If they didn’t bury the hole card under the up card, her cheating partner would start to identify her hole card after a while. So casinos instituted this action by dealers.

2. Is hitting on soft 17 a help to the player or the casino? Why?]This is a tremendous help to the casino. Just look at the cards that would help the dealer. A, 2, 3, 4, 5 and probably 6, possibly 7. All 10-value cards just give her hard 17. Lets look at the worst card she could draw when hitting soft 17, a 9. That will give her a hard 16According to the rules, she has to hit this. But remember, she’s already beat the people who busted. She’s only playing against people who liked their hand enough to stand. A good percentage of these people have 17, 18, 19, 20. She wouldn’t have wanted to stand on 17 in such a case. She would be better off taking her chances by being forced to hit the16.

3. What is the total of this hand as dealt to you, starting with the Ace? A, 4, 6, 2, 3? Question 3) Why would this never happen in a real game? The total is 16. This would never happen in a real game because the player would have counted the A as 11 and stopped with 21 (A + 6 + 4 = 21).

4. First of all, we know the dealer doesn’t have a 10-valued card hiding under her Ace (Question 4: How do we know that?) We know her hole card isn’t a 10-value card because she would have gotten BJ and that hand would be over. (When she deals herself an Ace up card, she has to check the hole card to see if she has a BJ. She does this by bending up the corner of the hole card to see what it is. She cups her hands over it so no one at the table can see. When she has a 10-value card up, she has to do this to see if there’s an ace underneath. I always watch very carefully while she does this. Why? I’ll tell you as an additional question at the end.) PS never buy insurance when the dealer has a face card up.

5. What might have been a good choice if he had gotten a 3 on one of the 8s? (or even a 2). Doubling down on that hand.

6. When she deals herself an Ace up card, she has to check the hole card to see if she has a BJ. She does this by bending up the corner of the hole card to see what it is. She cups her hands over it so no one at the table can see. When she has a 10-value card up, she has to do this to see if there’s an ace underneath. I always watch very carefully while she does this. Why? I’ll tell you as an additional question at the end.) This is an advanced tip that I’ll give you now since interest is waning. There is one card she has to bend up way more than the others and maybe dip her head down a little to make sure. If she does this, I know the hole card is a 4. The top of an “A” and a “4” look almost exactly alike so if I see her bend the cards higher and dip her head down a little, and it’s not an Ace, it’s a 4 and you know the dealer has 14.