Another long run question.

Saw this posted on another site thought it would be interesting. If you're playing a bj game with what you think is a 5%edge how many hands would you have to play to realize that you are not playing with an edge. The edge is from holecarding with partial information. Or. How many hands to be sure you are playing with an edge?

Quote: Hunterhill

Saw this posted on another site thought it would be interesting. If you're playing a bj game with what you think is a 5%edge how many hands would you have to play to realize that you are not playing with an edge. The edge is from holecarding with partial information. Or. How many hands to be sure you are playing with an edge?

How sure do you want to be?

Also, there are many games with 5% edges. Expectation is only one small part of the probability distribution. This question cannot be answered from expectation alone.

Quote: AxiomOfChoice

How sure do you want to be?

Also, there are many games with 5% edges. Expectation is only one small part of the probability distribution. This question cannot be answered from expectation alone.

What else would you need to answer. I think the sd would be a little higher than a normal counting game since it's a hc game. Also how sure should you want to be, maybe 95% or is that to high?

Well, YOU are the expert on that.

If you think you have an "edge" because a dealer is sloppy some of the time, you would be winning with that information much of the time.

So IF you keep track of your performances on several games where the blackjack is not in your favor, you would have records and could fairly easily see if you were winning enough to make a difference from all the other hands you played when things were "normal".

Quote: FleaStiff

Well, YOU are the expert on that.

If you think you have an "edge" because a dealer is sloppy some of the time, you would be winning with that information much of the time.

So IF you keep track of your performances on several games where the blackjack is not in your favor, you would have records and could fairly easily see if you were winning enough to make a difference from all the other hands you played when things were "normal".

This was a thread I saw on another site. I just thought it would be interesting..It has nothing to do with my results.

Quote: Hunterhill

The edge is from holecarding with partial information. Or. How many hands to be sure you are playing with an edge?

The holecard will get flipped when the dealers hand gets resolved, doesn't it? If you want to check your edge, check your reading efficiency based on that fliped holecard, not on your play results.

Quote: Hunterhill

What else would you need to answer. I think the sd would be a little higher than a normal counting game since it's a hc game. Also how sure should you want to be, maybe 95% or is that to high?

Nothing is too high as long as it's less than 1 and you are willing to collect enough data.

If this is a real-life scenario, I would not focus on wins or losses. Winning or losing the hand is a 2nd order effect. I would focus on how often you are correct about the hole card. If you think that the hole card is a 6 and so you stand on your 15vT, and you are right (the hole card is a 6), but you lose the hand when the dealer draws a 5, that is a success, not a failure.

So, I would so this in 2 steps. First, see how often you are right about the hole card (including which actual cards you are right and wrong about). Then, I'd see if this level of correctness gives you an edge (taking into account extra losses when you are wrong, as well)

You did mention that is was partial information, but you can still do this kind of analysis. If you claim that the card is a 6 or 7 with equal probability, this can still be tested.

Edit: I see Mango beat me to it...