Discount Gambling

Paigow Dan told me about the new Lucky Stiff side bet his friend recently placed at the 7 Cedars Casino in WA. It looks fun, because you’re paid 5:1 when your initial 12-16 hard total ends up winning the main hand. Also, blackjack pays even-money on the side bet, and an initial pair of 8-8, 7-7, and 6-6 instantly wins 10:1. Anyways, I ran the bet through my BJ analyzer, to see if it was interesting in any way. I understand that 7 Cedars lets you bet $5 on the main hand, and up to $25 on the side bet. So I ran the analysis for a 5:1 side-to-main ratio on a 6-deck, H17, SP4, SPA4 game. The return showed a house edge of 3.5% of the combined (main+side) wager. The optimal strategy for the 5:1 side-to-main ratio only has a few differences with basic strategy.

The EORs are fairly small for the 5:1 side-to-main ratio. They’re about only 1/3rd as effective as the EORs for a standard 6-deck shoe main game. So it’s not worth your time to count this side bet. For a single card removed in a 6-deck game, the EORs are as follows:

This bet looks like fun. If you bet an equal main and side bet (1:1 side-to-main ratio), the house edge is 4.66% on the combined 2 unit bet (2.33% element-of-risk). That’s not too bad for a carnival-like odds. If you make a small side bet 1/5th of your main bet (e.g., a $1 side bet to a $5 main bet), then the house edge on the combined 1.2 unit bet is 1.38%. That’s not bad for a little bit of fun.

A reader pointed me out to Galaxy Gaming’s Bust Bonus blackjack side bet that the dealer will bust, which you make after seeing the dealer’s upcard. I figured I’d run the numbers to see if it was any good, or if it was countable. Well, it might be a fun bet on a few upcards, but it’s kind of expensive for the (offsuit) odds they offer.

*Bust Bonus wagered after dealer peeks for blackjack.

The most countable bet is against a dealer 8 upcard. It has the lowest house edge (4.9%), and has high payouts for the 888o and 888s busts. The EORs are large, and a simple unbalanced count (Eight => -8, Nine, Ten/Face, Ace, Deuce, Trey, Four => +1; bet when running count >= +24) yields an average +7.5% edge/bet on 17.3% of the dealer 8 upcard hands. Of course, a dealer 8 only occurs on 1/13th of the hands, so it’s not a very practical bet. An ideal count (using total shoe composition including suits) yields a theoretical max return of +7.5% edge/bet on 1.6% of the dealt hands.

Sadly, the standard BJ counts (like the unbalanced Knockout count) don’t correlate with the EV of any of these bets, because unlike blackjack, the Ace hurts the Bust Bonus bet. (Ace rich shoe makes it harder to bust.)