V-man: why does deep pen hurt BS player?

[V-man]

I thought in the long run, BS player would have played the same number of hands on either side of the positive or negative counts. If the house edge is say .40, his edge should be -.40 regardless of pen. Unless, the negative hands hurt him more than the gain from positive hands?
But that couldn't be, since a play all counter can still come out ahead.

[Parker]

> I thought in the long run, BS player would
> have played the same number of hands on
> either side of the positive or negative
> counts. If the house edge is say .40, his
> edge should be -.40 regardless of pen.
> Unless, the negative hands hurt him more
> than the gain from positive hands?
> But that couldn't be, since a play all
> counter can still come out ahead.

The deeply penetrated game will result in more hands/hour for the players. This is bad for the BS player, who is playing a negative expectation game and hence will, in the long run, lose more money per hour than in a poorly penetrated game.

This is why the casinos are shooting themselves in the foot when they use poor penetration as a counter counter-measure. They lose much more due to the reduced hands/hour than they save as a result of any counters that they might scare away.

[Fred Renzey]

My impression is that V-man was referring to a poorer EV with deeper pen for the B/S player. If I remember right, I think my sims (multi-deck) showed that this is true to a small degree. Yet it seems that the deeper the pen, the smaller the cut-card effect should be.

Here's something to ponder: The deeper the pen, the more often a B/S player will be misplaying his hands. I can't decide if that notion is a valid cause for lower EV of B/S play. It might be washed out by the fact that although there will be more times that a B/S play is wrong, there will also be more times that it is right by a wider margin. Viewpoints??

[Sun Runner]

Leave the argument Parker makes out of this mix -who said deeper pen did hurt a BS player EV? Where have you seen that?

[Don Schlesinger]

> Here's something to ponder: The deeper the
> pen, the more often a B/S player will be
> misplaying his hands.

Doesn't matter.

> I can't decide if that
> notion is a valid cause for lower EV of B/S
> play. It might be washed out by the fact
> that although there will be more times that
> a B/S play is wrong, there will also be more
> times that it is right by a wider margin.
> Viewpoints??

The latter. If you eliminate the cut-card effect by dealing a fixed number of rounds, it makes no difference how many of those rounds you decide to deal, before shuffling up. The BS EV will always be identical, no matter what the pen. Nothing else would make any sense.

Don

[Don Schlesinger]

[John Wesley Powell]

> The deeply penetrated game will result in
> more hands/hour for the players. This is bad
> for the BS player, who is playing a negative
> expectation game and hence will, in the long
> run, lose more money per hour than in a
> poorly penetrated game.

> This is why the casinos are shooting
> themselves in the foot when they use poor
> penetration as a counter counter-measure.
> They lose much more due to the reduced
> hands/hour than they save as a result of any
> counters that they might scare away.
Let me put this delicately... Instead of sacrificing a chicken, rolling the bones & burning incense at each table that might be winning for the player...it is easier to keep good and bad counts shorter by offering reduced penetration... call it mmmmmm, call it heidi fleiss casino management 101, seriously.

[Sohrab]

But don't SIMS show CSM slightly better for BS player? So logically opposite CSM is worse.

[Fred Renzey]

> But don't SIMS show CSM slightly better for
> BS player? So logically opposite CSM is
> worse.

snip> I just finished running two basic strategy sims for six decks, S17, DOA and DAS. Simulation "A" was dealt 2.0/6 and simulation "B" was dealt 5.5/6. After 1 Billion hands of each, they both produced a -.422% EV. Their standard errors were 0.0035% each. Pretty much convinced me, a doubting Thomas.

[Sohrab]

That is very helpful news. Thank you. Now can anyone explain why sims show CSM better for BS player?

[Jim Dice]

Fred, doesn't the deeper penetration mean more hands? More hands equals more losses. Or am I missing something? The house edge stays the same, I know that, but the losses mount up faster.

[Don Schlesinger]

> That is very helpful news. Thank you. Now
> can anyone explain why sims show CSM better
> for BS player?

There is no cut-card effect.

Don

[Don Schlesinger]

> Fred, doesn't the deeper penetration mean
> more hands?

Yes.

> More hands equals more losses.

Right.

> Or am I missing something? The house edge
> stays the same, I know that, but the losses
> mount up faster.

Exactly. Sometimes, we confuse edge with hourly win or loss rate. If I play the same game twice as fast as you do, I win or lose twice as much per unit of time (say one hour). But that doesn't change the house advantage at that game.

I think we all understand one another, no?

Don