Blackjack Tablemaster Odds

Hi all,

I play once in awhile at Resorts World Casino in NY. It's great to hop on a subway and get a little action, even though their no actual tables.

They've recently added the Fusion Table Master Blackjack machines. I've been scouring these forums and the internet trying to find some info on them. Mainly:
When is the shuffle? How many decks are in the shoe? Does it deal an entire shoe or start putting cards right back in the shoe? Does that effect the house edge with basic strategy?

One piece of info I've come across is that in NY one players play can't effect another, so the machines each deal as separate shoe to each player. If this is true, what does the dealer draw from? If they draw from a separate shoe, does that change the house edge if your play doesn't effect the dealers?

I've had some great wins and terrible losses on these machines. I think overall, I'm even on them since they were added in the fall. I can't help but think we're going to see more of these in more casinos - there must be some insider info to bust these machines open!

bump.

I am curious too.

Quote: seadragon

Hi all,

I play once in awhile at Resorts World Casino in NY. It's great to hop on a subway and get a little action, even though their no actual tables.

They've recently added the Fusion Table Master Blackjack machines. I've been scouring these forums and the internet trying to find some info on them. Mainly:
When is the shuffle? How many decks are in the shoe? Does it deal an entire shoe or start putting cards right back in the shoe? Does that effect the house edge with basic strategy?

One piece of info I've come across is that in NY one players play can't effect another, so the machines each deal as separate shoe to each player. If this is true, what does the dealer draw from? If they draw from a separate shoe, does that change the house edge if your play doesn't effect the dealers?

Could you elaborate the basis for this statement: "One piece of info I've come across is that in NY one players play can't effect another, so the machines each deal as separate shoe to each player." What specifically do you know that indicates that machines must deal as if each player are dealt from a separate shoe?

First, let me say that I am not familiar with Fusion Table Master Blackjack machines. However, it should be technically feasible to program some types of shuffler machines to randomly select cards for each player using probabilities that reflect a "fresh shoe" -that is, using probabilities that ignore the removal of cards from the shoe that are dealt to other players. This would be done, I presume, to eliminate any advantage to players from card counting.

Hi @gordonm888,

Thank you very much for your reply. The machine (Table Master Fusion) says "Game uses six decks" and it doesn't say "Cards are shuffled before every game for the blackjack video game" like other blackjack machine/model e.g. Interblock. In addition, if I read the help/rule page carefully enough, it says "Player's each play from individual shoe. Cards and outcome of any other player or game have no impact on this game. Each player is dealt as if playing directly against the dealer. The dealer's cards are reserved from each player's deck such that the dealer plays the same dealt hand against each player's hand individually". Moreover, I happened to notice that the virtual dealer switches when they dealt about 155-165 cards between you and dealer (I use to play alone with no other players at the table). However, it doesn't mean the machine shuffle every 3 decks with 50% penetration or even indicates that's the shuffle point as the evidence is too weak.

Thanks s905060. Your explanation is very clear.

Again, my hypothesis is this.

1. The shuffler machine is the type that does not physically shuffle cards. It recognizes cards and notes/stores the physical location of each card within the shuffler. It then uses a random number generator (in its software) to select which cards will be dealt and then retrieves the selected cards from their physical location and deals them.

2. Normally (in the past), this type of shuffler technology works like this: given that there are 312 cards in a fresh shoe (52x6) and say, for example, that 100 cards have already been dealt, then each remaining card will have a probability of 1/212 of being selected at random and dealt. But apparently that is not the way that this Table Master Fusion works.

3. The Table Master Fusion shuffler could work like this:

The dealer's cards are selected and "reserved from each player's deck such that the dealer plays the same dealt hand against each player's hand individually." The probabilities of being dealt any particular rank are then updated to remove the dealers cards from your deck and then a RNG (random number generator) selects the cards to be dealt to you. Cards dealt to other players are not "removed" from your virtual deck, i.e., the probability of you receiving cards of any given rank are unaffected by what other players have been dealt.

This would be easy to program.

4. You have encountered this machine in NY - so any Nevada gaming commission rules do not immediately apply. I can imagine that in the future the Nevada gaming commission rules might be revised to allow this kind of shuffler.

5. This shuffler will be the death of card counting and collusion.

Thank you gordonm888 for your detailed explanation. I assume the only thing we can use is Basic Strategy and nothing more. We have to enjoy the built-in house edge by the table rule.

I wonder if they are allowed to adjust the RTP beside the table rule if it's RNG based. So that the casino could earn more and at that point the Basic Strategy is useless and it's just a lottery game.

The usual answer to that is NO -there is not a software switch that flips the shuffler into Beast mode. But it is a possibility that many gamblers worry about. Its hard to keep up with all the technology changes.

Quote:

=gordonm888]...Could you elaborate...in NY one players play can't effect another, so the machines each deal as separate shoe to each player....

If it was the first hand in a shoe then I'd use the first N cards in the dealer's deck to complete the dealer's hand and then create a shuffled deck for each player with those cards removed.

Personally it seems they need to shuffle up after every hand. For the second hand how do you work out the probabilities of the deck given they might be different for different players. For instance what about cards used by the dealer to resolve other players' hands when you bust. Admittedly a far out case, but to show the problem, suppose you bust (K2Q) but the others didn't, and the dealer had (say) 2AAAA6AAAA4. Then for the next hand has the deck used up eight Aces or only one?

I guess the "seven-card Charlie" rule could be one of potential solutions which this machine has?

I suspect that it does reshuffle after each deal.

I wonder if the 6-deck shoe translates into one deck for each blackjack player - so that the 6 players are each essentially playing single-deck blackjack. That would prevent some of the possible problems regarding the possibility of exhausting the 24 cards of a given rank (Aces or deuces).

Would it violate NY state gaming regulation? Like "(1) A player’s royal match 21 wager shall not affect the player’s wager on the underlying hand. A dealer’s blackjack shall have no effect on a player’s royal match 21 wager. The royal match 21 wager shall be available only on tables using a 6- or 8-deck multi-shuffle device."

Ref: "1 PART 5324 Table Game Rules Section ... - New York State Gaming Commission"