Hollywood Casino - Lawrenceburg, IN

[johndaly47]

The truth is there is no such thing as "house money". As soon as you win it, it's yours, and you're still playing with "your" money the entire time. The bottom line is without counting, but playing basic strategy, you will lose about 0.5% of all money you bet. It doesn't matter if that money was originally in your pocket or originally in the chip rack. The cards don't care where the money came from. If you want to gamble and lose most sessions, but occasionally have a moderately large win (2-3x your starting stake), keep doing what you are doing and have fun. But understand that this will cost you money. If you want to make a profit, you should stop what you are doing and learn how to count cards, but you'll need a large bankroll to do so for the kind of stakes you've been playing.

Hey sir, thanks for the response. I see your point with the "house money". I guess it's how you look at it as, to me, it's 6 in one hand and half a dozen in another. Here is why I take that approach:

1. Part time player, 2x per month max most months.
2. Only take in the range of $200 to $400 to play with - can't afford to lose any more than that.
3. If I get up on "house money", my thought is if I am up and not taking risk with my original buy in amount then I have the ability to bet a little different than if I was down $200 or $300 of my buy in amount.

I would much rather take a chance on money that I just won and have an opportunity at winning $1K to $2K in a session than worrying about if I will lose $200 of my buy in money. To me, the risk versus reward makes sense.

[Intermediate]

Hey sir, thanks for the response. I see your point with the "house money". I guess it's how you look at it as, to me, it's 6 in one hand and half a dozen in another. Here is why I take that approach:

1. Part time player, 2x per month max most months.
2. Only take in the range of $200 to $400 to play with - can't afford to lose any more than that.
3. If I get up on "house money", my thought is if I am up and not taking risk with my original buy in amount then I have the ability to bet a little different than if I was down $200 or $300 of my buy in amount.

I would much rather take a chance on money that I just won and have an opportunity at winning $1K to $2K in a session than worrying about if I will lose $200 of my buy in money. To me, the risk versus reward makes sense.

The money you refer to as "house money" is really money that is part of your playing bank, or working capital. You shouldn't be treating the $200 you just won any differently than the $200 you brought to the casino as your buy-in. If you're willing to take bigger risks when you have more money, that's fine, but you have to apply that investment strategy to all the money in your bank. What do you do after you have a losing session and then go back two weeks later. Do you treat the next $200 you win as if it was house money, or money from your original bank? I think your assumption that you will win 8 out of every ten sessions is the basis of your approach, but Blackjack is just one long lifetime session made up of a string of shorter sessions. Time in between sessions, and the time at the table, makes no difference - it all adds up into one long session. If you don't play with an Advantage, you will eventually lose all the "house money" and your own money.

[johndaly47]

The money you refer to as "house money" is really money that is part of your playing bank, or working capital. You shouldn't be treating the $200 you just won any differently than the $200 you brought to the casino as your buy-in. If you're willing to take bigger risks when you have more money, that's fine, but you have to apply that investment strategy to all the money in your bank. What do you do after you have a losing session and then go back two weeks later. Do you treat the next $200 you win as if it was house money, or money from your original bank? I think your assumption that you will win 8 out of every ten sessions is the basis of your approach, but Blackjack is just one long lifetime session made up of a string of shorter sessions. Time in between sessions, and the time at the table, makes no difference - it all adds up into one long session. If you don't play with an Advantage, you will eventually lose all the "house money" and your own money.

Thanks Intermediate. Appreciate the further explanation. Since I am just getting into this I'll start keeping a log of the times I play and either winning or losing sessions. I'll take a different approach to house money as well in my thinking while I am playing. Again, much appreciation to ALL who have responded. Not trying to tell people what works, but only how I have approached it a couple of times in so far. Now, Intermediate, do you have any suggestions for a betting system or counting system that I could review since I'm just starting? Thanks again.

[Intermediate]

Now, Intermediate, do you have any suggestions for a betting system or counting system that I could review since I'm just starting? Thanks again.

Lots of people recommend Hi-Lo because of it's simplicity, plus it's kind of a standard used in a lot of analysis published in books. I started with it, and still use it, along with an Ace Side Count for DD games. You size your bets based on the advantage derived from the count, and how much you bet at what count will be determined by the spread (difference between min and max) you need to beat the particular game, and what you accept for risk. There's a large variety of valid opinions on what to start with so you'll find this topic discussed at length in these forums. I recommend you pick up some books to help you structure all the information that you will discover. Sometimes it's hard for someone starting out and discovering the wealth of info in these forums to sort the fundamentals from the advanced subjects. Here are some suggestions:

Professional Blackjack, by Stanford Wong (Contains Hi-Lo)
Blackbelt in Blackjack, by Arnold Snyder
Modern Blackjack, by Norm Wattenberger (free electronic version at qfit.com). BTW, Norm runs this set of forums.

Once you get grounded, pick up a copy of Blackjack Attack, 3rd Edition by Don Schlesinger