pm: Unbalanced count backcounting question..

[pm]

Don, in chapter 13, you show that one will be able to do better by walking away from poor counts in progress and starting at a fresh shoe than by (theoretically) wonging in and out of the same shoe. I'm assuming that's because with the poor count in progress, you have to wait for the count to rise back to zero, whereas with the new shoe, you are instantly back to a count of 0 (assuming no lag).

Would the same be true of an unbalanced count? Say you're using KO with an IRC of -20; you have wonged in and (say) three decks into the shoe, the count drops to -10. Who would perform better, the chapter 2 backcounter who will wait for the count to become advantageous again, or the chapter 13 backcounter, who will start at a new shoe with a -20 count (I guess considering both the lag and no-lag cases)?

[Don Schlesinger]

> Would the same be true of an unbalanced
> count? Say you're using KO with an IRC of
> -20; you have wonged in and (say) three
> decks into the shoe, the count drops to -10.

Well, that's just the equivalent of a -2/3 TC for, say, Hi-Lo, so you might leave, but the count isn't egregiously low.

> Who would perform better, the chapter 2
> backcounter who will wait for the count to
> become advantageous again, or the chapter 13
> backcounter, who will start at a new shoe
> with a -20 count (I guess considering both
> the lag and no-lag cases)?

I can't say, definitively, because you're pretty close to the threshold for staying/leaving. I'd say, in this case, that it makes little difference.

Don

[pm]

> Well, that's just the equivalent of a -2/3
> TC for, say, Hi-Lo, so you might leave, but
> the count isn't egregiously low.

> I can't say, definitively, because you're
> pretty close to the threshold for
> staying/leaving. I'd say, in this case, that
> it makes little difference.

> Don

When you put it Hi-Lo terms, it makes total sense, but the thing that was confusing me was to think that at a KO count of -10, the chapter 2 backcounter only has to see a surfeit of 6 small cards before they can start placing bets (i.e. to get to the -4 key count), whereas the chapter 13 backcounter who decides to leave will have to see a surfeit of 16 small cards and face a 3 minute lag before they can place another bet. Wouldn't that make the real life SCORE for the chapter 13 KO backcounter significantly lower than the chapter 2 KO backcounter's SCORE? It seems like if you are using an unbalanced count, there is (in theory) no upside to leaving a poor count in progress and finding a new shoe (as long as the count in progress is still greater than the IRC) instead of just waiting for the count to become advantageous in the current shoe (again, just theoretically).

(Just for the record, not trying to be challenging or anything here; I just had questions that I was unable to figure out for myself..)