House edge...how far is too far?

[Dawis]

CBJN lists a number of places in Vegas with double deck house edge of 0.40
Caesar properties are mostly 0.53 for double deck.
What is the worst house edge you would put up with (assuming reasonable penetration)?
Thank you for your advice!

[Midwest Player]

It is not only house edge, but also pen that determines how good a game is.

The worst double deck game I have played was 45% pen, h17, double on 10 & 11 only, but you could double after split if it was a 10 or 11, and the "hide" rule thrown in for good measure. And if that wasn't enough they also didn't wash the cards. I actually lost over $1,400 at that Indian casino, but fortunately play at other casinos was enough to bring me back to a winning year.

[RS]

House edge does NOT matter.

What matters is the player's edge.

[PinkChip]

House edge does NOT matter.

What matters is the player's edge.

Which is (amongst other factors) dependent on the house edge, so the rules and resulting house edge do of course matter. Otherwise S17 vs H17 etc. would be of no interest, and we could happily play 6:5 games.

[RS]

Which is (amongst other factors) dependent on the house edge, so the rules and resulting house edge do of course matter. Otherwise S17 vs H17 etc. would be of no interest, and we could happily play 6:5 games.

It's not that "this one thing" matters -- everything combined is what matters. It'd be foolish to say:

- Don't play games with 50% (or less) penetration
- Don't play 6:5 games
- Don't play games under 100 rounds/hour.
- Don't play S17 games.
- Don't play games with less than a 1-10 (or 1-8 or w/e) spread.
- Don't play game with a HE over 0.7% (or w/e arbitrary number).


None of those things, by themselves, disqualify something from being playable. 50% penetration means jack shit if I can spread 1-12 with 200 rounds/hr on a heads up DD game. 1% HE game means nothing if I can spread 1-100. Slow games doesn't matter if I'm getting a big edge (likely not counting, to be fair). A 6D game with great rules & pen can be worth playing even with a 1-5 spread.

[PinkChip]

Yes, you're right. But in the 6:5 case, just card counting won't suffice, but maybe HCing or some other technique.

[RS]

Yes, you're right. But in the 6:5 case, just card counting won't suffice, but maybe HCing or some other technique.

Why not?

[BJGenius007]

CBJN lists a number of places in Vegas with double deck house edge of 0.40
Caesar properties are mostly 0.53 for double deck.
What is the worst house edge you would put up with (assuming reasonable penetration)?
Thank you for your advice!

6:5 BJ adds 2.2% house edge to the original house edge. That is what people should avoid.

[21forme]

6:5 BJ adds 2.2% house edge to the original house edge. That is what people should avoid.

The genius is incorrect.

[Midwest Player]

6:5 BJ adds 2.2% house edge to the original house edge. That is what people should avoid.

Agree the Genius is way off. More like adds 1.4% to original house edge.
https://wizardofodds.com/games/blackjack/calculator/

[DSchles]

Agree the Genius is way off. More like adds 1.4% to original house edge.
https://wizardofodds.com/games/blackjack/calculator/

We have gone beyond simple percentage of how much a particular rule costs a player. That is what SCORE is designed to measure. 6:5 costs the flat-betting, BS strategy player the approximately 1.4% that you are quoting from WoO. I think it ought to be clear to everyone that, for the card counter, spreading his bets, the ultimate cost to SCORE is a great deal more than just 1.4%!

Don

[BJGenius007]

Agree the Genius is way off. More like adds 1.4% to original house edge.
https://wizardofodds.com/games/blackjack/calculator/

You guys are right. I was thinking half of BJ gain but it should be 60% of half BJ gain because BJ pays 6:5 not 1:1.

That is 4.8% x 1/2 x 0.6 = 1.44%

[tomf23]

Ignoring 6:5 people overestimate how important rules are when selecting a game

There are good double deck games in Vegas that don't allow das but I can always get great pen that people have told me aren't good

Then there are good games on paper but in reality the pen is worse than what cbjn says and/or the game is hawked way too much so you can't even play for an amount of time that's worth it

I definitely made the mistake of chasing the rules when I got back into counting which led to more backoffs than I should have gotten and me playing games with a lower edge than I could have gotten elsewhere