Myooligan: Value of Precision - Preliminary Results

[Parker]

RGE used to carry the HO2 report for $40, but we are currently out of stock. As SpiderMan pointed out, it can be obtained from various places around the 'Net for a reasonable price.

Alternatively, the indices (which is all you really need) are included with Casino Verite, or you could generate your own set with CVData or SBA.

That being said, you could play for 20 years betting purple without seeing any significant difference between AO2 and HO2. Recommended reading: The SCORE chapter in Blackjack Attack, 3rd Edition.

[Francis Salmon]

> Let's compare two situations with 15 v 10 both with a
> TC of +4 but in the first case there are 5 decks
> remaining, in the second one 1 deck. In both cases
> it's equally likely that you get a five bringing you
> to 20 but in the first case this hit has caused no
> significant change in TC while in the second case it
> has risen to TC+5 making it a bit more likely that the
> dealer will equalize your 20 or even beat you with a
> snapper.That's why it is less rewarding to take a hit
> at the end of shoe. But as I said, this is no big
> deal.

What I explained above is only valid for ENHC games!

> Francis Salmon

[Francis Salmon]

I'm aware of the fact that my infinite deck indices are not perfect for every situation but it would lead too far to use a different index for every penetration level.
Contrary to what Don keeps repeating I know that precision has only a marginal impact on win rate.
My indices might be off by a few tenths from the optimal value in some cases but they constitute a clear guideline how to play.

Francis Salmon

[Don Schlesinger]

> So according to you, next time I encounter the
> situation A,8 v 5 at a TC of exactly +1, I should
> double my $200 bet knowing full well that this is a
> 1%-error. After all, it costs me only 1 ct./hour in
> the long run.
> As Arnold Snyder used to say. This is like handing $2
> to the dealer and I would really feel stupid doing
> that.

I quantified the value, and the message is clear: The play is worth one cent an hour to you. Obfuscating by saying "next time it comes up" is just foolish. Next time I win the Mega- lottery, I'll have 300 million dollars!

Don

[Francis Salmon]

I picked one example among many others to show that index precision can be rewarding.In the situation I described the right play yields two extra dollars and this is true regardless of the frequency of its occurrence. You may continue to lose your two dollars in that situation - after all it's your own money - and I'wont even call you a fool for it. But allow me to keep mine.

Francis Salmon

[Don Schlesinger]

> I picked one example among many others to show that
> index precision can be rewarding.In the situation I
> described the right play yields two extra dollars and
> this is true regardless of the frequency of its
> occurrence. You may continue to lose your two dollars
> in that situation - after all it's your own money -
> and I'wont even call you a fool for it. But allow me
> to keep mine.

After a while, you really begin to grate on people's nerves, because you are, in the purest etymological sense of the word, incorrigible -- that is, incapable of being corrected.

If it isn't already clear to you, let me hit you over the head with it: I'm not writing these posts for you; I'm writing them for everyone else on this board, so that no one takes you seriously and no one attempts to utterly waste his or her time memorizing 100-150 indices to a tenth of a decimal place. You may delude yourself from now to kingdom come thinking that your mental masturbation matters, or that you have even -- with your crude, infinite-deck calculations -- come up with indices that are "more correct" than those used by everyone else. Knock yourself out, but leave the rest of us alone with your gibberish.

Personally, I couldn't care less what you do with your $2, every 200 hours, which, for most of our readers, who don't play for your stakes, would be about 20 cents every 200 hours.

I have known players on every major blackjack team that has operated in the past 20 years or so. And, I have known what sytems they use and how they play. No one has ever once even mentioned using indices to one decimal place. Are you so arrogant as to think that the whole world is ignorant and that you're the only smart one out there? Don't you think that if trying to calculate a decimal index and then using it were remotely important, everyone else would have done it before you? Get over yourself, and give us a break.

This will be my last post on this topic, because, frankly, I'm bored by the same melodrama played out over and over again with you. Being incorrigible is one thing, but when you start to become ineducable as well, it grows tiresome.

Don

[Cyrus]

"Don't you think that if [XYZ] were remotely important, everyone else would have done it before you?"

This strikes me as a recipe for nipping in the bud all counter-intuitive, paradigm-breaking, anti-consensus, potentially innovative thinking !

"After a while, you really begin to grate on people's nerves ... you are ... incorrigible ... let me hit you over the head with it ... your mental masturbation ... your crude, infinite-deck calculations ... your gibberish ... Get over yourself ... you start to become ineducable."

Here's a good suggestion for a counting system that might help people when posting on internet forums : When you're feeling angry, count to 20 before putting up a response. When you're feeling really angry, count to 100. And when you want to choke the other guy, shut the PC down and count your blessings.

--Cyrus

[Cyrus]

Francis,

You realize, I trust, that the fella on the other end of the line is T-Hopper, the player who has postponed publication of his own card counting systems book for years, because of his desire to be as accurate as possible - and chronic anal retentiveness!

So when T-Hopper says that rounding a figure is "not important", that opinion carries a lot of weight!

Take care.

--Cyrus

[Francis Salmon]

All that I've been saying is that the practice of rounding indexes to the nearest integer has an inherent worst case error of 1% of your bet.I demonstrated this with the case A,8 v 5 where the I18 prematurly recommands doubling at TC+1.You didn't correct me on this knowing full well that what I said was an irrefutable fact and in that sense I am incorrigible here.
All you said was that the two dollars lost on a $200 bet didn't matter in the long run which is no contradiction to what I said.I think we should leave it to the reader to decide whether the two dollars matter to him or not.
I have always thought that the BJ-community including this site agreed upon the principle that everybody should choose a system according to his abilities but now I see that Norm is riding a ferocious campaign against OPP over on BJ21 and here you are doing everything to discourage astute readers like Designated Driver to learn a more challenging system than the crude I18.
I didn't invent the decimals.They are just there as a natural result of TC-calculation even estimating only at full deck precision. 9 divided by 5 is 1.8 and 3 divided by 2 is 1.5. Why on earth should we skip these decimals?
If we get TCs at decimal precision it's pretty obvious that we should use indexes with the same precision.They don't do us the favor to sit right on whole numbers.
From recurrent posts here (Designated driver is not an exception) we know that there is a genuine interest in fractional indices. If they havent come into widespread use ,it is mainly because nobody has published any.If it wasn't for my laziness,my book should be on the market already.

Francis Salmon

[Hard 8 :: ::]

> If I want to hear personal attacks and knuckle-dragging invective, I'd can get that elsewhere.

[Don Schlesinger]

> So when T-Hopper says that rounding a figure is
> "not important", that opinion carries a lot
> of weight!

Oh, I see. So what are Norm, Cacarulo, Zenfighter, Myooligan, and I? Chopped liver?? :-)

We've been telling Francis this for a few years now. He has a hearing problem.

As for those who don't appreciate the manner in which I ultimately deal with Francis (Hard 8), you don't know the history, so you can't sit in judgment. Francis has been trotting out his decimal theories on this and other boards for years. Each time he resurfaces, we face a dilemma: what to do with him? If we delete his posts, we get accused of censorship. If we allow them, but don't respond, our readers get confused and start to wonder if there's any sense to what he's writing. So, we respond. And then Francis responds, because he's incapable of learning from the explanations he gets from the likes of Norm, T-Hopper, Cacarulo, Zenfighter, and me. Obviously, he's much cleverer than we are. And so, on and on it goes. Eventually, someone has to remain silent.

Now, you know a little of the history. Keep it in mind, when, next year, Francis trots out his theories and regales us once again with the "importance" of decimal indices -- which, by the way, he calculates totally incorrectly, in any event.

I'm sorry when I said, above, that that was my last post. Obviously, a few further explanations were in order. I'm done now, without a question. But, you can make a few max bets that neither Francis nor the thread, in general, is. :-)

Don

[Parker]

There is only a moderator - me. (Viktor has full admin privilege, of course, but he rarely gets involved.) Contrary to popular opinion, I actually delete very few posts, other than spam (ads for online casinos, porn sites, etc.). I am always happy to discuss why a particular post was (or was not) deleted via private e-mail. I feel that such discussions, since they have nothing to do with advantage play, are not appropriate for the forum itself.

[T. Hopper]

> Francis,

> You realize, I trust, that the fella on the other end
> of the line is T-Hopper, the player who has postponed
> publication of his own card counting systems book for
> years , because of his desire to be as accurate as
> possible - and chronic anal retentiveness!

That is not what happened at all. I made the books available, and canceled them when only a few people ordered. Simple.