Index Number Questions & CSM

Hello Everyone,

I'm reading up on card counting in blackjack and I want to clarify a few things. First and foremost, since 8 deck shoes are popular where I am from, I wanted to know the index numbers for the Illustrious 18 on an 8 deck (H17,Double after split (except A, one card only), any double, no surrender, peak, 3 to 2, 4 splits allowed), as everywhere I look I only see them for 6 card shoes with different rules. I found the following page, on it, the first link leads to a excel sheet (warning: the file downloads on click of the link) that looks like it would be perfect for this, but it's password protected. I was wondering if anyone happened to know the password(s) for the pages in this spreadsheet.

(I can't post links, had to break this down into pieces just to post)
http
://
web.
archive.
org/web/20061023062405/
http
://
www
.bjmath.
com/bjmath/tcindex/tcindex
.htm

Additionally, I have been reading up on CSM and their effect (affect? I never get it right) on counting. Discount Gambling has a cool article on it, but it's a little vague for me, I want to make sure I'm getting it right. The chart that he supplies under the graph shows that a +1 count occurs ~11% of the time on a sample of 16 cards from a 6 deck shoe (also wanna know if anyone has the numbers on 8 decks here as well, something I will have to try to calculate otherwise)... is he referring to a running count not a true count? Because there is no way a player gets a true count of 2 (running count of about 10.4) 9% of the time with just 16 cards like the chart says... and a player couldn't get a true count of 10 with just 16 cards, unless I am misunderstanding the concept of a true count.
More importantly however, if those are in fact running count values, is a running count of only +5 needed to gain an edge in this case?! I though a true count was needed for that. If anyone can give me a little clarity I'd appreciate it.

https
://
discountgambling.
net/2012/07/27/counting-csm-blackjack-ev/

Thanks guys!

My read of the discountgambling site you posted is that the information provided is for the running count.

I am not sure why a running count of +5 has correlated to a positive EV in his simulations given a house edge of 0.448% on a 6-deck shoe, but Stephen Howe is a respected careful analyst. Most of what you read about True Count vs EV is based on simple "effect of removal" coefficients from removing a single card, and Howe is reporting (in this 2012 article) the results of a simulation in which he simulated actual hands to determine the contents of the 16-card cohort that is not available for the next deal. Maybe there are some differences, but I am a bit surprised that an average True Count of slightly less than 1 (specifically 5/5.7) is reported to have overcome a 0.448% house edge.

A weakness of Howe's write-up is that it doesn't state how many players were assumed to be at the table during the simulations and how he handled situations where the previous deal had more or less than 16 cards.

Edit: By the way, I note that Howe assumes in his simulations that Aces may be resplit up to 3X - which is a very unusual rule.

Please refer to Stanford Wong's Professional Blackjack for the complete H17 list of indexes. They are also available via the software CVDATA / CVCX.