Modified Blackjack

Hi, I am looking at a modified version of blackjack to where the goal is to sum to 20 instead of 21, with the other rules being a 6 card deck, dealer hits soft 17, splits are allowed once, doubling on any two cards, and surrendering allowed against any card. How would I go about calculating statistics for this?

Quote: areengee

Hi, I am looking at a modified version of blackjack to where the goal is to sum to 20 instead of 21, with the other rules being a 6 card deck, dealer hits soft 17, splits are allowed once, doubling on any two cards, and surrendering allowed against any card. How would I go about calculating statistics for this?

Hi, and welcome to the forum.
This sounds an amusing abstract enterprise.
If you start by understanding how the house edge and basic strategy are estimated for the regular game, you can modify and work from that.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jCF-Btu5ZCk

BUT, don't expect to make your millions from rolling out the game as it's a tough idea to get to market.

The best way is to work out an infinite deck strategy and House Edge, this will give you an idea whether the game has a reasonable House Edge. These days this can be done fairly easily on a spreadsheet. It gets more complicated if you want more accurate figures based on a finite number of decks.

The other factor is you might want to look at what the dealer's best strategy, it might be that they stand on 16s.

There have been various Blackjack games - I've seen (and played) where AA being 22 was the best hand, saw another where the dealer didn't bust and it was nearest 21; so 22 beat 19; and played one where the dealer stood on 16s.

Quote: charliepatrick

The best way is to work out an infinite deck strategy and House Edge, this will give you an idea whether the game has a reasonable House Edge. These days this can be done fairly easily on a spreadsheet. It gets more complicated if you want more accurate figures based on a finite number of decks.

The other factor is you might want to look at what the dealer's best strategy, it might be that they stand on 16s.

There have been various Blackjack games - I've seen (and played) where AA being 22 was the best hand, saw another where the dealer didn't bust and it was nearest 21; so 22 beat 19; and played one where the dealer stood on 16s.

Have you ever played a BJ game where the dealer plays his hand first ?

Always thought that would be a good idea, because people like variations that eliminate what they feel is the most frustrating aspect of the base game. (Having to play before dealer does)

It's the fact that the player has to act first that provides House Edge so the player can split, double etc. There is double exposure (or variants) but that only shows you the first two dealer's cards and usually any ties are lost by the player. There was a game where you bet on "Player" or "Banker" and both took cards acccording to fixed rules but if busted went back to before they drew - so boring, most people played the sidebets!

Quote: michael99000

Have you ever played a BJ game where the dealer plays his hand first ?

Always thought that would be a good idea, because people like variations that eliminate what they feel is the most frustrating aspect of the base game. (Having to play before dealer does)

Yes, It is call Jackblack invented by Derek Webb (The same man who invented Three Card Poker).
He show it to me and Geoff Hall (FREE-Bet Blackjack) in Vegas, year 2000.


Derek Webb and Stephen Au-Yeung at the World Gaming Congress and Expo (Now G2E) in 2001, on the Casino Hold'em® Table.

Quote: areengee

How would I go about calculating statistics for this?

I did this exact thing back in 2013 (still hav my folder)
and used Excel for this. Changed the Wizard's version and ran sims too in Excel.

It was time consuming and when played, was NO fun at all.

Dealer stood on all 16s, IIRC
and a few that played it when I dealt it, did not like it and could not come up with ideas to make it better than 21
good luck