Profitable surrender?
Quote: cottonfreakMy local casino in beautiful rancho cordova, ca will give you $.50 for surrendering an odd numbered bet, presumably because they're too lazy to get $.50 chips. My question is if you flat bet $5 would it not be profitable to surrender a larger range of hands, if you were getting $3 back? Would anyone calculate the edge this gives the player?
Because the max you would ever get back is $0.50, it would be based entirely on you're bet. A surrender on $5, would give you back 60% of your wager, while a surrender on 15 would only give you back 53.33...% of your wager.
I'm too lazy to do the concrete math on it, but it seems that although this would decrease the house edge, it wouldn't be a tremendous amount...
I don't think it would broaden your surrender range, even if you kept to $5 bets. At best, it will help to shut up those people who think surrendering is a bad move.
The only strategy change I would recommend is to always bet odd amounts. Sure, the profit percentage from the extra 50¢ is greatest with a $5 bet, but is that really any reason to flat bet?
13 vs . 10
14 vs. 9,10,A
15 vs. 8,9,10,A
16 vs. 7,8,9,10,A
17 vs. 9,10,A
If H17, also surrender 13 vs. A
It is absolutely a reason to flat bet (unless you are counting, and even then ... most of the time). I could have messed something up, but I am getting almost 0.3% player edge on this game by only considering getting 0.6 back on surrender. Adding a 8/5 bj payout gets it up to +0.8% EV!
If betting $15 per hand, it goes back to -0.25%.
(H17, DAS, split to 4 hands, infinite deck).
It looks like, unless the TC is above +3 or +4, $5 is the optimal amount to bet.
Quote: cottonfreakMy local casino in beautiful rancho cordova, ca will give you $.50 for surrendering an odd numbered bet, presumably because they're too lazy to get $.50 chips. My question is if you flat bet $5 would it not be profitable to surrender a larger range of hands, if you were getting $3 back? Would anyone calculate the edge this gives the player?
Are you allowed to play more than one spot at $5?
Quote: 1BBAre you allowed to play more than one spot at $5?
Good question! Pretty savvy, or maybe I should say shrewd (unsure savvy spelled correctly?).
I'd would guess if you played every seat for $5, and surrendered liberally, they would have someone in the pit sharp enough to stop rounding up to $3. Or not.
Quote: DJTeddyBear. . . but is that really any reason to flat bet?
OK. I stand corrected.Quote: weaselmanIt is absolutely a reason to flat bet . . .
If you flat-bet $5, then late surrender costs you only $2, rather than the normal $2.50. In units, this means that surrender has an EV of -0.4, rather than the usual -0.5. Therefore, you would want to LS any hand for which the max EV play is -0.4 or less.
I consulted the Wizard's Appendix 9 for a 6D, H17 game, and found that, in addition to the "normal" surrenders
Versus A: Hard 17, Hard 16 including 8-8, and Hard 15
Versus 10: Hard 16 but not 8-8, 10-5 and 9-6 but not 8-7
Versus 9: Hard 16 but not 8-8,
you should also surrender the following hands:
Versus A: Hard 14 including 7-7, Hard 13
Versus 10: Hard 17, 8-8, 8-7, Hard 14 including 7-7, Hard 13
Versus 9: Hard 17, Hard 15, Hard 14 including 7-7
Versus 8: Hard 16 but not 8-8, Hard 15
Versus 7: Hard 16 but not 8-8
These additional surrenders are worth 0.416% to you. Since a normal 6D H17 game has an EV of -0.63%, your overal EV will still be, unfortunately, negative, at -0.214%.
Hope this helps!
Dog Hand
Quote: cottonfreakMy local casino in beautiful rancho cordova, ca will give you $.50 for surrendering an odd numbered bet, presumably because they're too lazy to get $.50 chips. My question is if you flat bet $5 would it not be profitable to surrender a larger range of hands, if you were getting $3 back? Would anyone calculate the edge this gives the player?
Can you tell us the rest of the rules?
Late surrender only changes the game to benefit the player by 0.08%
Four decks to eight decks changes the game to benefit the casino by 0.06%
So the increased surrender opportunities would only have a very small change. It would certainly not swing an inherently poor game
If it were a single deck dealer hits soft 17, then it could make a difference, but I doubt that the game is that good.
Quote: DogHand
...this means that surrender has an EV of -0.4, rather than the usual -0.5...I consulted the Wizard's Appendix 9 for a 6D, H17 game..., and found that, in addition to the "normal" surrenders
Versus A: Hard 17, Hard 16 including 8-8, and Hard 15
Versus 10: Hard 16 but not 8-8, 10-5 and 9-6 but not 8-7
Versus 9: Hard 16 but not 8-8,
you should also surrender the following hands:
Versus A: Hard 14 including 7-7, Hard 13
Versus 10: Hard 17, 8-8, 8-7, Hard 14 including 7-7, Hard 13
Versus 9: Hard 17, Hard 15, Hard 14 including 7-7
Versus 8: Hard 16 but not 8-8, Hard 15
Versus 7: Hard 16 but not 8-8
..., your overal EV will still be, unfortunately, negative, at -0.214%...
Thanks for that approach to the problem! Using those two tables for 6-deck H17 blackjack found here, I got a much more favorable EV of 0.38%, which is closer to Weaselman's infinite-deck result. I pasted those two tables into an Excel sheet. I then found the best play for each combination of cards by comparing the EV's in each row of the tables with -0.4. Then I did the sumproduct of the probabilities of the hands with EV's of the hands. Since these tables are based on the assumption that the dealer does not have blackjack, I then had to subtract from the above sum the product of the probability of a dealer's blackjack and the probability of the player's non-blackjack. The result was a player's EV of +0.38%.
However, this analysis assumes that blackjack pays 3:2 and the player does not have to pay a fee before each hand.
Nope...Never going to be an AP game...
Quote: Triplell6:5 blackjack?
I consider that to be a contradiction of terms, with the more appropriate expression being "6:5 Twenty-One". I know my opinion is not universally held, but I feel that the name "blackjack" should specifically refer to a game with a 3:2 payout and all of the usual cards in the deck (or shoe). Anything else is just a "Twenty-One" variant, and calling it "blackjack" is deceptive.
Quote: ChesterDogThanks for that approach to the problem! Using those two tables for 6-deck H17 blackjack found here, I got a much more favorable EV of 0.38%, which is closer to Weaselman's infinite-deck result. ... However, this analysis assumes that blackjack pays 3:2 and the player does not have to pay a fee before each hand.
ChesterDog,
Ahh... I see where I erred! I forgot that the player ALSO benefits on the "normal" surrenders. Thus, my calculation of an increase in edge of 0.416% was based on the increase ONLY from the "new" surrenders.
When I redid the calculations and included the "normal" surrenders as well, I found that the 40% surrender is worth +0.991% for the player, which turns the no surrender edge of -0.63% into a new edge of +0.361% for the player. This is much closer to the 0.38% value you reported.
Of course, as we've subsequently discovered, the actual game is 6:5 crapjack, which once again makes it a -EV proposition... too bad!
Dog Hand
