Flying Horse Racing Art

So what is the true value of the “price” of entertainment? That’s what you hear as justification for playing as a casino patron while at the same time admitting the house has a clear statistical advantage, right? You have to pay to have fun. An oversimplified resignation to the fact that you’re going to lose is never the best way to approach sitting down at the blackjack table. However, it is understandable.

Which brings me to my topic here…when is that price too high to justify playing the game? I’ve come prepared with a few examples.

First, let’s talk about online blackjack shuffling machines – continuous shuffling machines. Ever seen one of these live in action? It’s depressing. The dealer feeds the discards into this hungry beast after every hand. Creating a never ending deck situation, this is rare but still exists.

Not only does this cripple the novice player in terms of situational knowledge and advantage, but it also speeds the game up significantly, giving most players a significant chance of losing their money that much faster.

OK, now let’s talk about single deck games that pay six to five on online blackjack sites. No, I won’t make you do simple math here, don’t worry. A normal blackjack game pays three to two on the famous hand, which works out to seven and a half to one. All other things equal, this seemingly slight change in the odds alters the house advantage on a typical single deck game from 0.18% to a whopping 1.45%. That’s a jump of more than eight times the original advantage, or to put it in terms you can better understand, it’s like allowing the gas station to charge you $16 a gallon instead of the current national average of around $2.

I’ll paraphrase a passage from an article out of Las Vegas Weekly from back in 2003. The difference is broken down into real-world, real-time dollars and cents. With a standard $10 bet. The difference between a 6/5 payout and a 3/2 payout is $3. On average, that works out to being shorted 1.5 bets per hour, which equates then to $15 an hour.

Still think the single-deck games work to your advantage? Be wary of other limitations being put on your game. $15 an hour is probably right around what these dealers are making. Always check the blackjack rules, in addition to the number of decks and betting minimums, before you put up money to play. Be informed, give yourself as much as an advantage as you can…the casinos certainly are.