I was just wondering if there are any sources for the most helpful indices in order after the ill18. So if someone learns the first 18 most helpful, what would be the next 10 that should be learned using hi lo.
Thanks.
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General guidelines: 1) learn the extra four from Catch 22, namely A,8 v. 5 and 6 and 8 v. 5 and 6 doubles; 2) negative numbers, if not playing SD, are virtually useless; 3) splits and soft doubles are relatively useless; 4) "closest to 0" is not necessarily the best idea, as you have your minimum bet out at zero. Mildly positive indices, where, on average, you have a larger bet out, will prove to be worth more, even if they are used less frequently.
Finally, feel free to learn "a hundred more," but understand, yet again, that if they had a lot of value, they would have made the cut for the I18 in the first place. You won't get 25% of the value of the I18 by learning the next 100, so you have to decide whether that's worth it to you. To most, it isn't.
Don
I memorize indexes by the row not individually. The row is arranged against dealer up cardOriginally Posted by tjr5259
{6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 7, 8, 9, T, A}
A8 {1, 1, 3, 5, 8, 17, -, -, -, -}
8 {2, 3, 5, 9, 13, 14, -, -, -, -}
7 {9, 9, 12, 16, -, -, -, -, -, -}
TT {4, 5, 6, 8, 10, 13, 20, -, -, -}
A9 {5, 6, 7, 8, 10, 14, 21, -, -, -}
Last edited by BJGenius007; 04-14-2015 at 11:50 AM.
I have 100 indices memorized, but not because I find them all terribly useful. I have to drive a ways to get to my "local" casinos. I figured that if I had to drive, I might as well do something useful on the way. The route is a straight shot with almost no traffic so I decided to make flash cards to memorize the indices. It "warms up" my brain for the counting I am about to do and raises my advantage (though only slightly).
Even though mathematically they are not all useful enough to make a difference, they can be useful in other ways. If a pit critter sees you hitting your 13 against a 3 or a 14 against a 2, they may not take you too seriously if they happen to be watching. Not only is it the right play under the right TC, it also could help with heat (in some circumstances I have to "play all." I know that the count is quite negative to make these plays but I can't always wong out, especially with 2D).
If you are going to memorize something, memorize those deviations that you need to make at higher counts. They may not occur as much, but when they do, it's nice knowing that you will be making the right play when there is a lot of money out there.
If you are playing a top PE count you may have big bets out at negative playing counts. The best bet and the best play are not as well correlated as many think. Using one count for both causes issues for those that don't have the BR to make the bad choices that a universal count may have them make with big bets out. Card counting is about the long run but a small BR only gets to the long run by making good choices and/or getting lucky. More indices and more accurate counts reduce risk and/or allow you to bet more at the same risk. Either way they increase EV. How much effort is it to know more indices. The last time I learnd a new count it didn't take long to learn over a hundred. My memory is really bad but I have learned how to make things stick. It only took a few hours. I use the same thing the Genius does. Memorizing individual indices I would have a hard time ever learning all 100. By memorizing families of indices it is like memorizing phone numbers . I would have a hard time memorizing 100+ random numbers but by memorizing 20 or so families just like they are phone numbers it doesn't take long at all. You notice patterns and relationships you would miss when memorizing them individually.
My take on the number of indices is this. You can get about 75% of the gain from learning indices from around 20 indices. Most of the rest are not used frequently because they are rare hand matchups or large magnitude indices or both. Learning indices is about the easiest thing you have to do as a counter. It would seem very foolish to not do the easy stuff to tighten up bell curves and allow for larger bets at the same RoR or a reduction in RoR while raising your EV. You can say I am not going to learn the splits because they happen infrequently. But your increase in advantage is from more frequent and more successful doubles and splits at high counts (along with more BJs and betting more). If you don't know the index plays splits will be less frequent at high counts and If you don't know the high bet index plays for the hands you won't be as successful with big bets out. You can argue it isn't worth much in the long run and maybe you are right but the ride to the long run is shaped by these types of small things. You can be more or less susceptible to large BR threatening swings according to what you decide.
Deciding the other 25% isn't worth the trouble is like taking only 75% of a raise at work because The higher paying position has a parking space 3 over from the lower paying job and it requires 20 extra steps to be walked every day. The effort involved in getting that extra third of the gain over the lower paying approach (25%/75% = 1/3rd) is practically nothing. I am not about to stop and leave 1/3rd of what I have already gained on the table when it takes almost no effort to collect it. To me increasing my gain by 33% with little effort is a no brainer. As advantages continue to get trimmed by deteriorating conditions all these little things become more and more important. Those living in the past were the A-5 count got you a good edge may see the gain as trivial but in todays state of BJ all those little things become more and more important. The mantra of keep it simple and the gain is too little to be worth it are providing diminishing returns as games deteriorate. Those little gains are becoming bigger and bigger percentage of your overall edge as the edge from counting declines. Many seem to be stuck in the mindset of the good old days of huge edges when evaluating these kinds of things. As the thin edge from card counting BJ gets smaller and smaller can you really afford to leave some of your edge on the table?
If you want to play at a high level you should take the time to learn the High-Low (or equiv) indexes from +6 to -3. You can use a mostly fixed strategy for the split decisions and for soft doubles just learn the + number plays and use a fixed strategy the rest of the time. The hit/stands and hard doubles are where the real meat of your play is. If you play a lot of double deck or single deck you should take the time to learn more numbers (maybe from +8 to -8). I use Zen and use indexes from +15 to -10 but rarely play counts (on shoes) lower than -5 and on double deck I'll sit out rather than play a double digit negative count.
I disagree with two points in your analysis: 1) in shoe games, and with a good spread and Catch 22, your gain is more like 85% of the toal available from all indices, rather than 75%; and 2) because you are intellectually capable of doing something easily doesn't mean everyone else is. Like Grosjean, who misunderstood the purpose of the I18, no one advocates that you not learn any more. What I teach is that a) knowing just the 18 will get you the vast majority of the edge, and 2) if you want to learn 100 more, be my guest! Just understand what the effort is, and isn't, getting you.
Don
The sign of a highly intelligent person is that he has no ability whatsoever to comprehend why everyone isn't as smart as he is. He thinks that what he is able to do isn't extraordinary at all, and he sees no reason why people make a fuss about his intelligence because everything comes so easily to him. To follow your reasoning, virtually everyone on the planet who plays blackjack should be a card counter. What could possibly be simpler than adding and subtracting one to a number and keeping a running tally?
Don
I can't decide if you are mocking me or not but I got a laugh. My pint was to find what makes memorization easy for you not tell people how to do it. Different things work well for different people. The way I ere many be told to memorize just doesn't work well for me. I was amazed at how easily memorization became using a different method. I always learned things by understanding them. I hated having to memorize things. That is probably why I am so bad at it. I never practiced it.
How is learning more indices making the game more difficult? What indices are important depends on your wonging style. If you aren't playing any counts less than +1 and use an ace reckoned count what good is an index of that is not positive. You will play the hand the same way almost every time. The high frequency use indices shift to larger positive indices and BS changes to a wongers BS. The gain from various indices also change. The gain from index use that is quoted is for a play-all approach. It assumes you play hands at certain frequencies at different counts. If most of the counts are played at 0 frequency everything changes. You are free to be lazy and not spend a short time learning more indices but you only add work for a few hours. Kj reduces gain to a static ramp for many things. The gain from more indices also allows a lower RoR and/or betting more at the same risk. It smoothes the ride a little and increases certainty.
Look at the optimal bet ramp generated for play-all with more indices from the tool bar above. Using S17,DAS,LS, 6 deck/1 deck cut off and the standard SCORE settings that are the default (10K BR). (HILO I18/Fab4 heads up and HILO full indices heads up):
TC <+1: 17, 18
TC +1: 38, 39
TC +2: 84, 85
TC +3: 130, 131
TC +4: 170, 180
Win rate: $45.25/100 rounds, $50.99/100 rounds
RoR: 13.3%, 13.1%
c-SCORE: $45.52, $51.66
n0: 21970, 19355
So despite playing to a lower RoR your optimal ramp is more aggressive allowing you to play a higher max bet and increase your EV by 12.7% and your SCORE goes from an unplayable (using a SCORE of 50 as the boundary for a "playable game") 45.52 to a playable 51.66 with a corresponding adjustment to n0.
If you have a BR of $20K and build from the top down and want to keep a static RoR of about 5% and your bets at most 2x300 at the $10 table always playing 2 hands and changing bet spread to get desired RoR:
HILO I18/Fab4 (spread 23:1), HILO full indices (spread 30:1)
the standard SCORE settings that are the default.
(HILO I18/Fab4 heads up and HILO full indices heads up):
TC <+1: 2x11, 2x10
TC +1: 2x39, 2x40
TC +2: 2x86, 2x88
TC +3: 2x134, 2x135
TC +4: 2x184, 2x185
TC +5: 2x234, 2x237
TC +6:2x264, 2x287
TC +7: 2x264, 2x300
Win rate: $131.09/100 rounds, $151.33/100 rounds
RoR: 5.3%, 5.3%
c-SCORE: $95.90, $111.05
n0: 10428, 9005
As you can see the full indices really affect your ability to bet more at high counts wit a desired RoR for your BR. Your spread went from 24:1 to 30:1 plus your RoR is exactly the same. Your EV grew by 15.44% and c-SCORE by 15.80% with the corresponding drop in n0. This is an indication of what increased certainty at big bets does for you. When your are dealing with setting an optimal ramp and you want to keep a constant RoR and have both a floor (table minimum)and ceiling (casino bet tolerance) you will run into these types of issues. (oops accidentally deleted results)
Now there is a casino cluster near me with worse rules, 8 deck 1.5 cut off H17, DAS. For HILO I18/Fab 4 you must play 9.4% RoR with a $25K BR to have a 10:1 spread at a $10 table but the same RoR lets you bet with a 12:1 spread with full indices:
HILO I18, HILO full:
TC <+1: 2x10, 2x11
TC +1: 2x14, 2x17
TC +2: 2x79, 2x83
TC +3: 2x100, 2x132
TC +4: 2x100, 2x132
Win rate: $22.60/100 rounds, $35.00/100 rounds
RoR: 9.4%, 9.5%
c-SCORE: $10.70, $16.50
n0: 93435, 60600
THe gain in EV is 54.87% for the crappy game with optimal ramp at the exact same RoR. The c-SCORE increases by 54.2%.
Now you can look at it as crappy games only give me a the remaining 15% of what is possible from indices or an increase in $12.40/100 rounds or you increase your EV by almost 55%. It is pretty obvious that although the dollar gain may be smaller at a bad game but the benefits on shaping your overall bet ramp at your desired RoR has a huge increase in what you can do the worse the games get.
Notice the difference in the 3 equivalent optimal ramps for different sets of indices at the same RoR (at least in 2 of the 3 cases. The first case you actually get the gain and decrease risk a little). The first one has no room to increase spread so the RoR decreases some but there is still a 12.7% gain in EV and an unplayable game has been made playable and at a lower RoR. The second one at the tolerant casino with good rules gains the most in actual dollars ($20.24/100 rounds but a top bet of more than double the crappy rules optimal ramp which increased an EV about 1/6th of the the tolerant game EV by more than half the increase at $12.40) but the EV increase only goes up a little at 15.44%. But at the crappy game the increase in performance from your optimal ramp for the same RoR is huge at 54.87% and a dollar amount of $12.40/100 rounds increase in the !18 optimal ramp EV of $22.60/100 rounds. It should be pretty clear that as games deteriorate the importance of more indices becomes extremely important.
And you can get all this by simply spending a little more time memorizing indices once and be done with it. I am not sure why any self respecting AP would argue that that is not worth a few hours of your time added to memorizing indices. I get the count not worth it arguments but to argue this on the same grounds erodes your credibility on the latter argument in my book. It is like you have 100 contacts and you can program all their numbers in your phone or you can figure you call 20 the most and only program 20 numbers and pay for directory assistance every time you need to call the rest of your 100 contacts. Just take the time to program all the numbers into your phone. To do otherwise is a waste of money.
Last edited by Three; 04-18-2015 at 05:08 PM. Reason: Double checked last sim and the RoR for full indices was 0.1% off.
Heck even finding a faster game will often increase that amount you win more than BS deviations. I have been reading a ton of posts lately and I actually started to worry a bit that I may have invested time in the wrong counting system because so many other people use Hi/Lo. But then I remembered back when I had started out I did start with hi/lo and found that being new it was indeed pretty taxing doing true count conversions... worrying if I estimated the decks right... etc. I switched to KO and found that much easier but it seemed like I was missing out a bit because the games I was playing didn't seem to get to the pivot point that often.
Enter the help from this forum! Someone recommended The Color of Black Jack and I have been happy ever since! It is simple, fast and effective for shoe games. I'm more than making up for any of its shortcomings by having less chance for errors and it is far less mentally taxing. I still am a bit bummed that many teams require hi/lo and that may be my downfall for being able to play on a team but for solo play I see no real reason to change. I agree 100% with KJ simple is best. This is not to say however that your should not push beyond your comfort zones. If you are expertly counting with no errors to the point that it is so simple then you should look for ways to improve.... but I think looking for the simplest and biggest bang for the buck is the way to do that. In the end what you add to your game does not have to be count related.... have you ever seen people at your table double for less? What about picking up the remainder of that double? What about improper surrenders.. i bet there are some plays there. What about switching to the table next to you with a faster dealer and fewer people? What about back counting and picking up one of those double for less situations?
Those are all things to take into account and I am willing to bet that many of us miss at least one opportunity each session we play.
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