Total beginner's questions on Basic Strategy.

[Skull]

Hello guys!

Well, you didn't think I have introduced myself just to chat, right? Now I need to explore you guys

I am trying to design BS and REKO strategy tables that suits me best. The truth is that for me it is not easy even to memorize BS, what to say of REKO-Full indexes!? So, although REKO-Full is light years ahead right now, I would like to prepare my study tables already. I want to print, plastify and carry them all the time with me to see if the rules and indexes enter my mind by osmosis

There are (for now) three situations that I haven't fully grasped:

- I read a great thread in this forum about this issue, but I must admit I don’t know the conclusion: should I hit or stand with 12 against 4 in REKO (not the full one) in low counts?
- Should I treat the pair 5-5 exactly as a hard 10 in REKO? Meaning, should I double 5-5 at high counts against a 10 or an Ace; or should I just hit?

- Should I surrender the pair 7-7 against a 10 in high counts just as I would do with a hard 14? (this question is both for REKO and REKO-Full?

Well, I thank you in advance for any help.

Best of luck to you all!

[Darth Vader]

I have the CV drills app for the ipad. By the app. The first day using it i could not remember half the strategy plays (FELT) and i made many errors. Then on the second day it clicked and I was at 90%. By the third day I was at 98-100%. I still hit A-7 against an A half the time.

[bjarg]

Maybe Im wrong, but by reading your post it seems to me that the first thing you need to understand is that theres a difference between basic strategy and index plays.
Basic strategy is the same for every game. It will be different for different set of rules, but it will be independant of the count you are using.
Index plays are deviations from basic strategy and thats where the count that you are using comes into play.
What you should do to answer those 3 questions (and any other you may come up with) is get the full list of indices for the count you are using.
I dont use REKO, but 5-5 is always treated as hard 10 (since obviously you are never going to split that hand), and 7-7 against a 10 is always going to be treated as a 14 since you will never split that hand against a 10. So you are either going to hit it in a low count or youll surrender otherwise.
You should hit 12 vs 4 in low counts.

[Skull]

I have the CV drills app for the ipad. By the app. The first day using it i could not remember half the strategy plays (FELT) and i made many errors. Then on the second day it clicked and I was at 90%. By the third day I was at 98-100%. I still hit A-7 against an A half the time.

Thanks Darth! As a matter of fact, I have bought the app for my phone (I don't have an Ipad) and that is partly responsible for my doubts (I explain below). Man you improve fast, huh?! I don't think it will be like that with me...

Maybe Im wrong, but by reading your post it seems to me that the first thing you need to understand is that theres a difference between basic strategy and index plays.
Basic strategy is the same for every game. It will be different for different set of rules, but it will be independant of the count you are using.
Index plays are deviations from basic strategy and thats where the count that you are using comes into play.
What you should do to answer those 3 questions (and any other you may come up with) is get the full list of indices for the count you are using.
I dont use REKO, but 5-5 is always treated as hard 10 (since obviously you are never going to split that hand), and 7-7 against a 10 is always going to be treated as a 14 since you will never split that hand against a 10. So you are either going to hit it in a low count or youll surrender otherwise.
You should hit 12 vs 4 in low counts.

Hello bjarg! Thanks for detailed response. You are probably NOT wrong, but maybe only HALF wrong. I do understand that BS is different than index plays. Once the count is up you change your normal BS decision for another one. I am OK with that I think. But what my newbie mind sometimes gets confused with is with things like this:

- In Modern Blackjack page 73 it says that you should surrender 8,8vT and 14vT. It says nothing about 7,7vT. So I thought "If the guy had the trouble to write specifically that 8,8vT you should surrender and if BS already states that you should surrender 16vT, so 14vt and 7,7vT are probably not the same in REKO. If he wanted me to know that you should surrender 7,7vT he would have said that". But then the app says that you should surrender 7,7vT like as if it were a normal 14vT;

- I had the same doubt as in this thread http://www.blackjacktheforum.com/sho...-REKO-and-12v4: you always stand on 12v4 in BS so why state in REKO that when the count is up you should stand? As you said, index plays are deviations from BS, but if you stand on 12v4 in BS and you stand on 12v4 in REKO when the count is up, then there is no deviation!? But if you say you hit it in low counts, thanks, that´s all I need to know, I don't want to create a déjà vu of the mentioned thread.


With respect to the doubling or not of 5,5 in high counts, I guess it's the same kind of problem as with 7,7, I guess I just got confused as if the pairs and the respective hard hands shuld be treated the same. Now I see that they should.

To summarize: I must study more, way more!

Thank you all and sorry for the mess

[Skull]

Hey guys, that's me again!

After bjarg clarifications, I double-checked my charts and I think I might have them ready. But the truth is that only after one or two good souls among you double-check them for me I will never know for sure if I got them right, so I am attaching them here.
I used the same kind of chart as in http://www.blackjackclassroom.com/ba...rategy-charts/ but added color codes to show the strategy deviations in REKO. For instance, the cell 5-8 against 2 is a Hit shown as the letter "H" with a yellow background; but 9 against 2 is a red "H", meaning that the strategy changes to the action denoted by the red cells, which is "Double Down". I hope I made myself understood...
In REKO-Full the different indexes are shown as subscripts. It gets a little messy in cells such as 14 against 10 where you have an index for surrendering and one for standing instead of hitting. By the way, surrendering is shown by the red (dashed or not) borders of the cells and the pale backgrounds.
What I think is nice about the color codes is that you can have a "spatial" assessment of the strategy deviations, which (I hope) will assist in memorizing everything.
The charts are actually double-faced: you have the colored table in the front and linguistic rules in the back. These were inspired by the “strategy for the visually impaired” found in http://wizardofodds.com/games/blackjack/appendix/21/.
I also color coded them in order to make it easier to relate to the colored chart.

Please, any comments, suggestions or specially corrections on the tables will be very welcome.
Hope they are useful somehow (for beginners like me, of course).

The best of luck to you all!!