Wondering about a BJ rule variant

**kyle784** · 05-13-2016, 12:52 PM

I tried to find info online but havent had much luck regarding the house edge/ basic strategy of this variant I saw. It's 6 deck, double after split, can split aces once, up to 4 hands on splits, can double any card, late surrender on non-aces and lose original bet only vs dealer BJ. The strange rule is stand on anything 17 or greater and draw on 15, making it so the dealer stands on 16 always. This variant is the only hand-shuffled game where I go to and need to know if it's worth playing and how to change my game to do so.

If this variant has a bad house edge attached to it just knowing that would be all I want. Since that might be ambiguous let's go with worse than .6% basic strategy.

**ZenMaster_Flash** · 05-13-2016, 01:02 PM

I cannot recall the name of this variant, but I think that there

is a compensating bad rule, such as dealer pushes on a 22

Always check out WizardofOdds.com for issues like this.

**Boz** · 05-13-2016, 02:33 PM

Sounds like a mislabeled table, if the table is what you are quoting. If it were to truly say draw on 15, it would say stand on 16, not 17. I suggest you re-check.

The only other possibility that comes to mind is Chinese blackjack where, apparently, the dealer has the option of hitting or standing on 16. This game would not be worth playing.

Flash suggests this variant would have a horrible rule compensating for the good one, which is completely reasonable. I assume the person who disliked his post did so because Flash decided to dismissively send you to a website that you probably already checked and almost certainly doesn't contain any relevant information to your post.

If you didn't leave anything out nor make any mistake, which is extremely unlikely, then it should be obvious you have a massive edge and the casino is inept. And you're probably going to want to hit all your 12s, and stand on 16.

**jacktheblack** · 05-14-2016, 03:02 PM

Can I ask where you find this table?

Sent from my SM-N9005 using Tapatalk

**Three** · 05-17-2016, 02:23 PM

I think the S16 rule is the rub. You would be hitting out or busting against a 6 or higher. You may or may not be standing on a 16 for optimal play against various strong dealer cards including the 6. The dealer worst up-card is now not a bust up-card. How many poppies would play this optimally or even have a clue what basic strategy is in this game? Remember you bust out and you have lost your bet. Look at how the 2 card additions to the 6 up-card:

S17 game:
6: (16 busts) dealer 26, (8) 25's, (9) 24's, (10) 23's, (11) 22's; for 54 dealer busts after taking 1 card in addition to the hole card.
(13) 21's, (14) 20's, (15) 19's, (15) 18's, (19) 17's; for 76 made hands.
(8) hitting 16, (7) hitting 15, (6) 14's, (5) 13's, (4) 12's; for 30 hitting 12 to 16.
(3) hitting 11, (2) 10's, (1) 9; 6 hitting strong hands.

S16 game:
6: (16 busts) dealer 26, (8) 25's, (9) 24's, (10) 23's, (11) 22's; for 54 dealer busts after taking 1 card in addition to the hole card.
(13) 21's, (14) 20's, (15) 19's, (15) 18's, (19) 17's, (8) 16's, for 83 made hands.
(7) hitting 15, (6) 14's, (5) 13's, (4) 12's, for 22 hitting 12 to 15.
(3) hitting 11, (2) 10's, (1) 9; 6 hitting strong hands.

The 8 worst hitting hands after 2 cards are added to the up-card are now standing 16's.

The effect is bigger with the 2 thru 5. For the 5 dealer up-card 19 hits of 16 are now standing 16. For the 4 up-card 17 are moved from that likely bust hit of 16 to a standing 16. And 15 and 14 are moved for the 3 and 2 respectively.

The H17 rule is disadvantageous because the dealer busts a little less but also makes stronger hands. Here the dealer busts far less but makes weaker hands. Obviously if you have a strong hand this is good for you and for a counter it would make big counts stronger but you need to know the new BS and the new index plays. You would now hit any 12 to 15 hand against a 6 and would hit 16 against 17 or more. The stiff you would not hit is 16v6 but that is a tool up anyway. So your bust rate would go up while the dealers went down. Since you lose if both you and the dealer busts the former would hurt a lot but the latter would help your made hands. I am not sure that mass marketed simulators could sim this. Obviously you would be hitting more stiffs and might never stand on a stiff in a high count. The beauty is if you did do the research the staff would likely think you are playing like an idiot so you could play longer and have a lot less heat. Most players will probably not change their strategy for the rule and the HE on these players will greatly exceed the BS based HE.

Anyway the point is the rule itself will be a huge moneymaker for the casino even if the HE is lower because the poppies would play horribly and adjusting AP play to the rule may take custom software.

**Boz** · 05-17-2016, 03:23 PM

Originally Posted by Tthree

I think the S16 rule is the rub. You would be hitting out or busting against a 6 or higher. You may or may not be standing on a 16 for optimal play against various strong dealer cards including the 6. The dealer worst up-card is now not a bust up-card. How many poppies would play this optimally or even have a clue what basic strategy is in this game? Remember you bust out and you have lost your bet. Look at how the 2 card additions to the 6 up-card:

S17 game:
6: (16 busts) dealer 26, (8) 25's, (9) 24's, (10) 23's, (11) 22's; for 54 dealer busts after taking 1 card in addition to the hole card.
(13) 21's, (14) 20's, (15) 19's, (15) 18's, (19) 17's; for 76 made hands.
(8) hitting 16, (7) hitting 15, (6) 14's, (5) 13's, (4) 12's; for 30 hitting 12 to 16.
(3) hitting 11, (2) 10's, (1) 9; 6 hitting strong hands.

S16 game:
6: (16 busts) dealer 26, (8) 25's, (9) 24's, (10) 23's, (11) 22's; for 54 dealer busts after taking 1 card in addition to the hole card.
(13) 21's, (14) 20's, (15) 19's, (15) 18's, (19) 17's, (8) 16's, for 83 made hands.
(7) hitting 15, (6) 14's, (5) 13's, (4) 12's, for 22 hitting 12 to 15.
(3) hitting 11, (2) 10's, (1) 9; 6 hitting strong hands.

The 8 worst hitting hands after 2 cards are added to the up-card are now standing 16's.

The effect is bigger with the 2 thru 5. For the 5 dealer up-card 19 hits of 16 are now standing 16. For the 4 up-card 17 are moved from that likely bust hit of 16 to a standing 16. And 15 and 14 are moved for the 3 and 2 respectively.

The H17 rule is disadvantageous because the dealer busts a little less but also makes stronger hands. Here the dealer busts far less but makes weaker hands. Obviously if you have a strong hand this is good for you and for a counter it would make big counts stronger but you need to know the new BS and the new index plays. You would now hit any 12 to 15 hand against a 6 and would hit 16 against 17 or more. The stiff you would not hit is 16v6 but that is a tool up anyway. So your bust rate would go up while the dealers went down. Since you lose if both you and the dealer busts the former would hurt a lot but the latter would help your made hands. I am not sure that mass marketed simulators could sim this. Obviously you would be hitting more stiffs and might never stand on a stiff in a high count. The beauty is if you did do the research the staff would likely think you are playing like an idiot so you could play longer and have a lot less heat. Most players will probably not change their strategy for the rule and the HE on these players will greatly exceed the BS based HE.

Anyway the point is the rule itself will be a huge moneymaker for the casino even if the HE is lower because the poppies would play horribly and adjusting AP play to the rule may take custom software.

This game would have a player edge off the top, or close to it. You would bust more often while the dealer busts less often, but you would double less often--and thus lose less doubles, and hit more often to get a mediocre hand that beats the dealer's 16. You'd also split slightly less often--so this game has less variance. The dealer's ace, his strongest card, would be substantially less dangerous. While the 5 and 6 are stronger, the 2 is weaker. Your average hand is higher because you are hitting stiffs a lot more often and doubling less often--and the dealer's average hand is lower because he has to stop at 16.

**Three** · 05-17-2016, 04:02 PM

I am not going to speculate on the HE change to perfect BS play. My suspicion is you may be right. Nobody will know perfect BS or at least hardly any and will play this game horribly increasing the effective edge to more than regular BJ which is played bad enough already. Look at SP21 S17. The HE is far less than BJ but because BS is so complicated and people play it so badly it is among the top table games for casino hold. The ploppies tend to play it just like BJ which gives the casino a huge HE. I believe this game would be just like that. Better if you play perfect BS but far worse if you think it makes no difference as most ploppies would.

**Boz** · 05-18-2016, 03:36 AM

Yeah, I'd agree, at least until it was popular, the ploppies would vomit all over this game and make it more profitable per table than BJ. But I don't think this game is real, the OP has missed something. If it is real, I'd appreciate it if the OP would tell me where so I can vacation there for a month.