Blackjack Performance Series III

By Bill Zender

(This article was printed in Casino Enterprise Management Magazine’s February 2006 edition)

Tried and True Gaming Procedures at Blackjack

After writing material on what a knowledgeable casino executive should not do with their blackjack games, I think it’s about time I moved in a more positive direction and discuss procedures and rules for blackjack that are recommendable.  The best way to discuss these positive procedures is to reflect back to the Aladdin Hotel/casino (1992 to 1997) and explain what we did to maximize our blackjack’s game performance.  One point to remember; my gaming experience at the Aladdin was an extension of live game experimenting that started several years before when I ran a shift in a small casino downtown Las Vegas, and had continued through my time as casino manager at the Maxim Hotel/casino.  The Aladdin became basically a “testing ground” for different procedure and ideas based on time and motion issues related to the game of blackjack going back to 1982.  Although it has been eight year since JMJ, Inc. and I left the old Aladdin, I still recommend these same rules and procedures today.

On the day our company JMJ, Inc. took over the Aladdin I made one immediate change; I took out the two single deck games and replaced them with double decks.  Why?  First, single deck games earn much less revenue then multiple deck games.  This is due to the game’s natural house advantage under basic strategy conditions which is zero.  The reasons the single deck game makes any money what so ever; hardly any player uses basic strategy 100% of the time when making play decision, and because casinos have made rule changes that increase the basic strategy baseline house advantage.  The problem when relying on rule changes to increase single deck game revenue; there is only one rule that makes sense and that’s hitting soft seventeen.  By hitting S17, the baseline house advantage rises to 0.2% which, added to the expected advantage of player mistakes of approximately 0.7% (+/- 0.2%), increases expected house advantage to 0.9%, or just less then one percent of every dollar wagered.

A casino executive could use additional rule changes to enhance single deck performance, like “double on 10 and 11(only)” and blackjack payoffs of “6 to 5”, but both have serious down sides.  Doubling on 10/11 will increase the baseline H/A in theory by 0.18%; however this number in the real world doesn’t stand up. The average player is restricted only on a few “9 double downs” decisions since most players don’t take advantage of soft double downs when they are offered.  As for “6 to 5” on blackjacks, the players “do realize” the casino is “shorting” them on standard blackjack payoffs, and unless every casino starts utilizing this rule, the rule change will be perceived by the average blackjack player as a negative, and will become counter-productive.

Second, and I believe is the most important reason why single deck games shouldn’t be offered, your standard live game player identifies the single and double games as “hand held”, and aren’t concerned about whether the dealer is hand dealing one deck or two.  The only players concerned whether it’s a single or double deck game are the more knowledgeable players, which in most cases the casino rather not market to in the first place.  When the Aladdin went from single decks to double decks on the hand held games the only complaints I got (which were very few) were from the tougher, more knowledgeable players.

The next changes management made to the blackjack rules and game procedures were put in place only after I had a chance to make a presentation to our floor supervisors and pit managers regarding the reasoning behind these changes.  Why?  Because some of the changes were quite contrarian for the time and it was important that our floor staff understood the reasoning and bought into the concepts.  It’s important for any gaming operation to get its entire supervisory staff behind new rules and procedures because they are the individuals that will promote the compliance of these changes with the dealers.  If the floor supervisors don’t buy-in to the procedures they won’t make sure the dealers follow them.  Following is a list of procedure changes management made at the Aladdin and a brief explanation of why they were applied in this situation:

1.      Hitting soft seventeen on all games – At the time the Las Vegas Strip casinos all stood on soft seventeen.  From previous experimentation I realized that the average player prefers the casino hitting soft seventeen because they feel it gives them a “second chance” when standing short when the dealer has a six up-card and an ace in the hole.  When we changed over from the old rule, “stand on all 17’s”, we only had a couple of players who complained; all tough play.  Today every casino should be hitting soft seventeen; to revert back to standing on all seventeen for marketing reasons is a drastic mistake, costing the mid-size casino no less than six figures in lost revenue a year.

2.      Peeking under the up-card to check for blackjacks – This was instituted at a time when most casinos did not check the hole-card for game protection purposes and before hole-card readers became popular.  We estimated our gain from time and motion issues would overcome any losses due to relaxing hole-card game protection and we were correct.  Base on time and motion gains, today’s casino executive is making a huge mistake if he or she does not utilize hole-card readers.

3.      Moving the shuffle point back to five and a half decks in the 6 deck game – When I told my supervisors we were moving the shuffle point backwards and cutting off only 26 cards, they all though I had lost my mind.  The industry belief at that time was the deeper the deck penetration the more money you would lose to card counters (and it still is today even though there is plenty evidence to the contrary).  We were looking for revenue gains based on time and motion issues, and again we were correct.  Even in today’s gaming environment with the availability of batch shuffling machines, any executive who deals less then 75% of their multiple deck shoe is costing their operation more revenue then a bus load of “phantom” card counters can possibly win (85% deck penetration or greater is optimal).

4.      Dealing a deck and a half in the double deck game – We decided to cut off 26 cards on both the six deck and double deck games.  The reason why?  Because 26 cards were needed to safely complete the last hand without running out of cards to a full table.  If we could have dealt deeper we would have.  We also instituted a cut card inserted at the 26 card point in order to guarantee the dealers would not arbitrarily break the double deck sooner, and would consistently deal down to the 26 card point.

5.      Handing off the double deck during dealer changes – Instead of spreading the double deck on the table when dealers change we had the previous dealer hand the deck off to the next dealer, and had the new dealer burn a card off the top of the deck into the discard holder.  The transfer had to be done after the dealer had finished dealing the round, not during.  Management estimated that we would gain one to two rounds an hour per game by handing off the deck instead of spreading the cards and having the next dealer shuffle the deck.

 Not long after we instituted these rules we made another rule change; the addition of allowing players to surrender after the dealer checked for a blackjack (know as late surrender).  Although surrender give the players a slight basic strategy advantage of 0.06%, this number is all but neutralized by most player’s failure to take advantage of the rule, and by the numerous miss-played hands the average player tends to make.  The most important aspect of late surrender; it’s like a warning signal that a customer playing a “good” surrender strategy might be more knowledgeable then originally though by the floor staff.  Usually, if a player is seen surrendering hands correctly we discovered he or she is playing to the composition of the deck as well