The machines I play with can tell if the cards are all there, but have no way of knowing the values of any card. If a card is missing, they simply announce a mis-shuffle( if that is a word)
The machines I play with can tell if the cards are all there, but have no way of knowing the values of any card. If a card is missing, they simply announce a mis-shuffle( if that is a word)
Let me die in my sleep like my Grandfather.
Not screaming in agony like his passengers.
I don't see the connection with the OP's situation, but my thinking was something like this:Originally Posted by RollingStoned
If an ASM is rigged to sort the cards into some kind of 'cooler' order, I can think of three ways it could be done:
1. Always-on. Give the machine a number of preset orderings, and tell it to always spit out one of them, every single time it shuffles. This might go unnoticed for a while, but I think someone would figure it out before long. For the casino, it's an AP move with limited longevity, and severe (jail time, I imagine) consequences. For that reason, I doubt it would ever happen. However, if it did, the first APs to notice it would make a killing by exploiting the non-randomness of the shuffle. I know there are deck orderings which ensure the casino wins just about every hand, but even so, there would surely be some side bets or something that would end up being very playable thanks to the extreme predictability of the card orderings.
2. Rig the deck at random times, chosen by an RNG inside the machine. This is a bit sneakier, but also less worthwhile for the casino (unless the rigging happens quite frequently, in which case see above). People might never find out about it unless some executive (or the engineer, either at the casino or at Shufflemaster, who set up the machine to do this) had a sudden attack of conscience and confessed the whole thing. Still, the chance of being found out is non-zero, and I wonder whether any casino would be stupid enough to consider this.
3. Rig the deck at the push of a button. I don't think this would ever work, because way too many people would have to know about it, in order for the casino to make use of it at opportune times (when a whale is playing, or a suspected AP). Even if the secret was confined to surveillance staff, and the dealers and pit staff were completely out of the loop, that's still a lot of people: three shifts times however many people it takes to watch all the high-limit card tables (blackjack, baccarat, anything that uses an ASM). Either the scam gets exposed straight away, and a bunch of players get compensated, or it leaks out into the AP community for a while first, and the casino gets taken to the cleaners.
If, alternatively, the ASM is set up to randomly order the cards, but with a greater weight given to placing the more valuable cards behind the cut card, I envisage similar results, although it would admittedly be harder to detect.
Anyway, these are just my initial thoughts, feel free to tear them to pieces if they're wrong. I guess the best counter-argument would be of the form "If I were a casino executive and I learned that it was possible to selectively order the cards using shufflers my casino had access to, here's how I would use that information to make money from unsuspecting gamblers, without getting caught..."
Last edited by lurppis; 05-27-2013 at 11:50 PM.
The shuffle cheating isn't ordering the cards in a specific way. It'd be ordering the cards in a non-specific way so that there is never a great fluctuation in house/player edge.
You know those 6 deck shoes you play and they are always around -1 to +1 TC? The ASM would do that.
"Everyone wants to be rich, but nobody wants to work for it." -Ryan Howard [The Office]
I think there would be better ways for the casino to manipulate the ability to order cards to their advantage. If the machine could actually determine the order of the cards, it could put them in an order that is very advantageous for the house. Grouping large cards together and grouping small cards together is one way to do that. That being said, I cannot imagine that ShuffleMaster would ever put that capability in their machines as it would leak to the public at some point and no one would want to play at a table with any ShuffleMaster machine. Talk about committing reputational (and financial) suicide!
Personally, I think the idea of the house cheating is WAY overblown. Is it possible? Yes. Does it happen frequently? No. The only time I see a casino actually cheating a player is if they are absolutely desperate and going down anyway, so they have nothing to lose. Imagine not only the fines from the regulatory agency, but such actions would be public information and would completely destroy the business.
Now back to the OP's question -- You played a game with a slight disadvantage, thru an error on the casino's part. You received a compensation worth substantially more that the EV that cost you. I think you are correct in being happy with what you were offered.
Regards,
Hizzle
Posting Permissions
Reply With Quote
Bookmarks