MikeH: Effect of face down vs face up

[MikeH]

I'm still working on my VB blackjack simulator, mostly because I am now absolutely in love with my creation. Using my baby I have been able to replicate/verify most of the information in Professional Blackjack and in the process I have learned an enormous amount about the theory of blackjack. I now have a much better idea of what makes a "good" game and what drives hourly rate. Now I've done a lot of independent study and found all manner of interesting results, I'm going to read a few other books to see how I did at reinventing the wheel. I know, I could have purchased something off the shelf to do this kind of analysis, but where is the challenge in that??

Also, my VB tool is now earning its keep as I am able to conduct a very thorough analysis of the typical London games that I have found/been directed to by posters. So I know what returns I might expect given a set of Index Plays and a betting scheme, together with the distribution of results around that expectation.

Now, all London games I am aware of are shoe games dealt face up, but what I would like to do is analyse how the London games shape up compared to, say, a typical Vegas 2D game, which is dealt face down (the answer is essentially going to be that the London games suck, I know that already). Ive spent the day tinkering with my model to take account of the fact that some information on cards dealt is concealed from the player until cards that are dealt face down are turned up at the end of a round. In a face up game, this is not the case - when a card is out, all players know what it is (with the exception of the dealer hole card of course).

So my question is, will ignoring face up/face down lead to a substantive error in calculating expected game EV/hourly rate? For example, if Vegas 2D were analysed on the assumption that it is dealt face up, would the resulting hourly rate calculations be significantly biased (upwards)?

My intuition is that the effect is actually small. Face up/face down cannot affect betting decisions, as all cards are revealed at the end of a round, so bets are put out with the same information available regardless of face up/face down. It might have some small effect on play decisions, where the true count is hovering around a decision point and knowing what other player's cards are could conceivably tip the decision between hit/stand, double/hit etc. However, as we know, the effect of play variations are "small" compared to betting variations. It is hard to imagine occassional and marginal errors made on a handful of tight calls having anything other than a second order effect on game value estimates.

Grateful for any comments from the theorists out there.

Oh, and for those bored by this kind of thing, apologies for cluttering the board.

Mike

[Parker]

Your intuition is correct.

Remember, the best games are heads-up, and in a heads-up game, it makes no difference if the cards are dealt face-up or face down.

In additon, blackjack is not like poker. It is perfectly acceptable to show your hand to the other players in a face-down game, and people are not protective of their hands. If I am sitting at second base, I usually have no problem seeing the hands of people seated on either side of me.

I also try to encourage a "you show me yours and I'll show you mine" attitude.

In addition, you still see many of the cards ahead of you in a face-down game, even if the other players are un-cooperative. You always see the cards if someone splits, busts, or has a blackjack. If they double, you see their first two cards, and when someone takes a hit, you see the hit cards.

As a result of all this, whether the game is dealt face-up or face-down has no significant effect on EV.

I actually prefer face-down games, finding them easier to count than face-up, but that is probably because I have more experience playing them.

[MikeH]