Comments on: Spanish 21

By: Steven George

Steven George — Wed, 19 Oct 2011 01:24:02 +0000

Yes, where I play they do enforce the restriction of not playing the MD on other players’ spots. The play of multiple hands is allowed and ENCOURAGED! I have seen them actually open a new Spanish table solely for the purpose to allow a single whale to play 7 spots “heads-up”. I know of only two locations that allow the MD to be greater than the regular bet. One of these places has recently lowered their max MD to $50.

By: Steven George

Steven George — Wed, 19 Oct 2011 01:15:04 +0000

EXACTLY correct! EOR applies only to sizing and playing the HAND bet strategy. It has NO impact on the relative frequency of one set of 6 denominations vs its opposite set of 6. And it is this measure that makes the MD advantage possible.

By: zenmasterflash

zenmasterflash — Tue, 18 Oct 2011 21:30:42 +0000

Note: The official rules for Span21, as promulgated by Masque Publishing, prevent the player from betting more on the M.T.D bet than on the regular bet. Also forbidden is placing such a bet on another player’s hand or playing more than two hands yourself.

Of course, where the game is offered by a casino that is a tribal enterprise rules may or may not be observed.

By: EmeraldCityBJ

EmeraldCityBJ — Tue, 18 Oct 2011 20:49:40 +0000

EOR for this bet is pretty meaningless. Each single card, regardless of rank and suit will produce the same EOR. To see an EOR difference, you have to remove various combinations of two or more cards.

By: EmeraldCityBJ

EmeraldCityBJ — Tue, 18 Oct 2011 20:46:39 +0000

The $30-40 per hour win rate I posted assumed that both the up and down match were available. The systems I simmed are similar, but probably not quite as good as the one you suggest. Regardless, I still think you’re making less than $50 per hour and that your risk of ruin with a $9k bankroll is through the roof. With a $100k bankroll, I’d be hesitant to bet much more than quarters on the match bet. I may be more risk-averse, and generally play with a RoR of 1% or less.

By: zenmasterflash

zenmasterflash — Tue, 18 Oct 2011 18:48:04 +0000

The statement:

“I use 2-thru-7 for +1 (paint,9,8,A are minus)”

suggests that the poster imagines that he can ignore the E.O.R. of the card ranks.

By: Steven George

Steven George — Tue, 18 Oct 2011 18:24:37 +0000

Your comment about playing non-stop for 124 years is irrelevant to the problem solution. The extremely rare (non existent) chance of 144 consecutive small cards being dealt from the top of a reshuffle is only intended to illustrate the upper limit of a possible player advantage. It only demonstrates that EV does change on the MD side bet.
The two other, more positive replies, also deserve my response.
First, without having BOTH the up-card AND down-card match, it is true that the variance it too great to justify a single max $100 MD on the “up-card only” circle. The loss of playing basic on the hand offsets all MD efforts. However, with the additional opportunity to match the down card at the SAME time, the variance is reduced to an acceptable level. I have found that in general only 1 shoe in 6 will offer more than a single opportunity to bet the $100 MD on both circles. And that with the “up-card only” available the bankroll must be about $9,000. With both up-and-down matches present, $2,300 is nearly always enough to avoid busting out Note that where I play it is permissible to wager max on MD and min on hand. Some places don’t allow the MD to be greater than hand (this kills my strategy).
Second, I said “balanced level 1″. This means start at zero and end at zero. It means +1 for 6 denominations and -1 for the other 6 denominations. It makes NO DIFFERENCE which 6 you choose for +1 or -1. You could randomly choose 2,3,7,9,J,K for +1 if you don’t want to match them. Simply pick the 6 that makes it easiest for you to not make counting mistakes. I use 2-thru-7 for +1 (paint,9,8,A are minus). For simplicity, I only go by running count (no true count math). This means that I always wait until the fifth round to decide if max MD is a go having at least a +10 running count. The casino where I play always deals more than 4 decks between shuffles, so I still get enough opportunities at greater than +9 running count. Also, if the running count drops from, for example, +15 to +9 late in the shoe, I will stay with BOTH $100 MD bets one more round. The opportunity exist to “jump-in” with two hands and a total $400 on MD. This causes extreme hostility at the table when you do get a suited match. Other players think that you have just “stolen” their good hand and that you have “screwed up” a good shoe. So, I don’t ever play more than just one hand.

By: zenmasterflash

zenmasterflash — Tue, 18 Oct 2011 13:48:01 +0000

EmeraldCityBJ knows of what he speaks; however using some specialized count to track the likelihood of a profitable “match the dealer” bet would have the player utilizing just basic strategy in order to play his hands while flat-betting. Overall, the losses from that strategy will never be recouped by the rare opportunity to bet M.T.D. This ought to be plainly obvious, although a two-person mini-team approach would overcome that fault.

By: EmeraldCityBJ

EmeraldCityBJ — Mon, 17 Oct 2011 20:44:12 +0000

It is possible to win money counting for the match bet, but it’s not a very practical strategy. Since you don’t provide the tags to your system or your initial running count, it is impossible to know if you are playing a winning game. With the counting systems I have analyzed, I can say that the best win rate I could come up with is $30-40 per hour if you flat bet $100 only when you have an edge. The problem is the bet is pretty high variance and you’ll need a sizable bankroll to absorb the swings. I would argue that if you have a bankroll sufficient to play the match, there are far better ways to utilize it. Instead of the $30-40 per hour betting the match, you could play other games and make hundreds an hour with less risk.

By: zenmasterflashcatdata1

zenmasterflashcatdata1 — Mon, 17 Oct 2011 19:39:54 +0000

Your comment about “the first half of the shoe” suggests that you have not worked this through mathematically.

For such an extreme deviation from normal to occur would happen perhaps once in your entire lifetime – if you played nonstop from birth through death and expired at the age of 124.