Blackjack is a game of hoping for the best. Players can find themselves in a situation where they are counting cards all night, and if they experience a winning streak, they can actually get an edge over the house. Counting cards in blackjack is a concept that has been around for years, but the strategies used today are more complex than ever before. However, simple systems exist, such as the Hi Lo Card Counting method.
Players who are interested in this method, which was originally developed for Seven Card Stud, can find a card counting strategy in the book “Winning Seven Card Stud Poker” by Lee Brightman and Foldon Carter. This method is not the same as card counting in blackjack. Each card is given a number and is then tracked. As the cards are played, the count is adjusted as the players intuition, or ‘feel’, for the cards goes up or down.
This slide rule is one of the easiest methods to learn, and is an example of the increased intuition involved in poker. It is quite simple to learn, and if players are struggling they can use the simpler form of the Hi Lo Card Counting method to help them.
To learn this method players need to divide the deck into two equal parts. The top part of the deck will be placed face up, and the bottom part of the deck will be placed face down. The deck is then placed in a room with little balls. If you have a laptop, place a deck of cards next to it so that the upper part of the deck is over the laptop.
On a single deck of cards, over the next few weeks, is when the top card is turned up. This is how the card counting starts. Once the top card is exposed, the target card is determined. If the deck favors cards in that sitting, then that is the card that is targeted. The cards tracked under each card in the deck are kept track of, and the running count is kept on a side table.
The Hi Lo Card Counting method does not keep cards that have already been played, thus if the deck is full of 10s and all of a sudden it turns into an 8-8-8, it will not influence the running count. This method of counting cards is pretty straightforward, and is the method that most people think to use.
To learn this method, you start out with watching how the cards are dealt. You might want to start out with just a single deck, and then as you start taking more cards every time, you place more and more bets. This way you increase your wagers and this will help you to learn the system.
This method is used to determine whether the deck is rich in face cards or numbers. If the deck is rich in face cards, then there is a higher probability of getting another face card. There are also lower chances for the next card to be a low card. While this method is a bit complicated, with the use of a little card counting trick, it is all fine. Most players don’t bother with this method, which is fine since this is not really necessary for card counting.
To start, you place a $1 bet on black
You get 7 cards and a new card is exposed on the deck
You multiply the running count by 7 and add 1.