Walter Thomason Needs Feedback

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One of Blackjack's more notable and controversial promotors of winning with progression betting, Walter Thomason, recently asked for feedback at another, largely defunct, BJ forum.

The previous thread veered way of topic, of which I for one was guilty, and was removed. I wanted to give it another AND FAIR shot since Thomason has some apparent fans here who claim success using his techniques.

Lets keep it nice! zg
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Feedback Appreciated...

Walter Thomason on 18 October 2010, at BJRNET

About 10 years ago one of my books, TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY BLACKJACK, caused quite a stir among traditional card counters. The book compared the results achieved by a flat bettor, a positive progressive system bettor, and a card counter when all three players played the same 5,000 hands.

The book is no longer available as a new publication because the publisher went bankrupt, and I'm now thinking about making it available as an e-book.

I'd very much appreciate hearing from anyone who has read the book and tried the recommended positive progressive system. What are your long term results?

Please, if you have not read the book don't bother to tell me how progressive betting can't work, etc. I've heard it all before. Thanks!​

ZG, I know you enjoy stirring up trouble. But when are you going to ask John Patrick to come here and the legions of other authors that have written books based on pure fallacy? Seriously, is there a purpose other than your own bemusement?

And if the previous thread was removed -- WHY? Do I actually have to retype everything I typed in response?

edit: On second thought, it really was an awful thread.

QFIT said:

ZG, I know you enjoy stirring up trouble. But when are you going to ask John Patrick to come here and the legions of other authors that have written books based on pure fallacy? Seriously, is there a purpose other than your own bemusement?

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Walter asked for feedback at a dead forum. This is a good forum for the feedback he requested... AND he has players here at BJINFO who have successfully utilized his system.

I was guilty of helping the previous thread go way off topic into quantum physics and the like, prior to Walter showing up. So unless Walter initiates such matter, we can keep it straight this time.

And if the previous thread was removed -- WHY? Do I actually have to retype everything I typed in response?

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You will not need to re-type. We likely won't be going into waves and wavicles and the like. zg

walter thomason,s progression.

zengrifter said:

Walter asked for feedback at a dead forum. This is a good forum for the feedback he requested... AND he has players here at BJINFO who have successfully utilized his system.

I was guilty of helping the previous thread go way off topic into quantum physics and the like, prior to Walter showing up. So unless Walter initiates such matter, we can keep it straight this time.

You will not need to re-type. We likely won't be going into waves and wavicles and the like. zg

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Hi Again,
Feels like DeJa Vu, again; Somtimes I feel that we allow the computer and mathematics to overule our powers of observation, and empirical evidence;
We know that the strategy does not always work, either does card counting, or progression betting, but the empirical evidence suggests that there are always runs of winning and losing hands, and that the fall of the cards sometimes favour the bad player, and become bad for the good player, the same can be said for the Roulette wheel, it gets out of balance, and sometimes the reds outnumber the blacks, the progression better is only taking advantage of this observation, and going with the flow, nothing more or less, perhaps rather than constantly criticizing the progression better, you could add it to your playing strategy and prove whether it works or not.
When you think about it, even the card counter is using progression betting.!
Elkobar..

ZG,
Where did you get that quote from Mr Thomason?

elkobar said:

Hi Again,
Feels like DeJa Vu, again; Somtimes I feel that we allow the computer and mathematics to overule our powers of observation, and empirical evidence;
We know that the strategy does not always work, either does card counting, or progression betting, but the empirical evidence suggests that there are always runs of winning and losing hands, and that the fall of the cards sometimes favour the bad player, and become bad for the good player, the same can be said for the Roulette wheel, it gets out of balance, and sometimes the reds outnumber the blacks, the progression better is only taking advantage of this observation, and going with the flow, nothing more or less, perhaps rather than constantly criticizing the progression better, you could add it to your playing strategy and prove whether it works or not.
When you think about it, even the card counter is using progression betting.!
Elkobar..

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Sorry, but the progression bettor in no way takes advantage of any fact. Progressions make decisions on irrelevant happenstance. As for proof, this has been proved a million times over the last century.

QFIT said:

Sorry, but the progression bettor in no way takes advantage of any fact. Progressions make decisions on irrelevant happenstance. As for proof, this has been proved a million times over the last century.

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There you go again. applying 20th century thinking to 21st century problems.
You are pretty old. Do you remember when you had to divide MCMXXV11 by XXV1? Pretty difficult, but them some A-rab invented the zero and math was changed forever. I'm sure a lot of the mathmaticians of his day scoffed at the idea you could introduce a new element, the zero, into math.
Three millenieum later, and it still goes on.

shadroch said:

sure a lot of the mathmaticians of his day scoffed at the idea you could introduce a new element, the zero, into math.

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Zero is when all of the beads on my abacus are at the bottom (top, left, right, center or outside for some civilizations).

QFIT said:

Sorry, but the progression bettor in no way takes advantage of any fact. Progressions make decisions on irrelevant happenstance. As for proof, this has been proved a million times over the last century.

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I disagree with all three of your premises.
1. Fact is, strings of winning or losing hands occur in blackjack, and the positive progressive bettor attempts to take advantage of winning strings and avoids increasing his bet during losing strings based upon the results of the previous hand's outcome.
2. Every betting decision I make is relevent to the system that I employ, and I expect a certain outcome to happen. Sometimes it does and sometimes it doesn't. Similar to what card counters do...
3. I'm not sure that anything has been proved a million times in the last 100 years. Until you play a billion hands of blackjack based upon computer-generated simulation -- and show a profit -- then it's all hypothetical speculation.
I'm not trying to be a smartass... I believe that card counting works, if you have the patience and bankroll and ability to stick with it. Many players don't, and progressive betting offers a viable alternative to flat betting.
Just my opinion...

Walter T. said:

1. Fact is, strings of winning or losing hands occur in blackjack, and the positive progressive bettor attempts to take advantage of winning strings and avoids increasing his bet during losing strings based upon the results of the previous hand's outcome.

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And why progression bettors believe this is beyond me. It is simply false as been shown countless times by both algebraic and monte carlo techniques. Progression bettors simply do not believe in science. Unfortunately, there are many books that claim such systems work, further convincing the gullible that the gambler's fallacy and/or inverse gambler's fallacy reflects reality instead of bad math. Easy to convince some people that there are simple ways to beat casinos. And all too many people will point them away from science.

QFIT said:

Sorry, but the progression bettor in no way takes advantage of any fact. Progressions make decisions on irrelevant happenstance. As for proof, this has been proved a million times over the last century.

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Part of Walter's proof, I recall was a 5000 hand sim and his system came out ahead.

Elkobar, was it you who has had good results with it? Walter is specifically seeking feedback from players who read his book and used the strategy. zg

QFIT said:

Zero is when all of the beads on my abacus are at the bottom (top, left, right, center or outside for some civilizations).

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Zero was the ultimate voodoo in its day. zg

zengrifter said:

Part of Walter's proof, I recall was a 5000 hand sim and his system came out ahead.

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That proves that there does exist a series of 5000 hands in which his system outperforms a card counter.

But you can probably find a series of 5000 hands where almost any system can beat card counting.

The real question is on average, are there more 5000 hand series's in which his system beats card counting, and the answer is presumably no, on average a random 5000 hand series will have the card counter coming out ahead.

Walter T. said:

I believe that card counting works, if you have the patience and bankroll and ability to stick with it. Many players don't, and progressive betting offers a viable alternative to flat betting.

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Walter, does your 21st Century BJ system require a significantly smaller BR than counting, in say a 2D game? I would recommend that a proficient counter have 600+ units min for a 2D game spread 1u-2x4u.

Who else swears by Thomason's 21st Century BJ? Tallman? zg

assume_R said:

That proves that there does exist a series of 5000 hands in which his system outperforms a card counter.

But you can probably find a series of 5000 hands where almost any system can beat card counting.

The real question is on average, are there more 5000 hand series's in which his system beats card counting, and the answer is presumably no, on average a random 5000 hand series will have the card counter coming out ahead.

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QFIT's sim here has a problem. It does not reflect actual reality
of dealing cards, or so would say some progressionists >>
http://www.qfit.com/blackjack-progression-systems.htm

assume_R said:

The real question is on average, are there more 5000 hand series's in which his system beats card counting, and the answer is presumably no, on average a random 5000 hand series will have the card counter coming out ahead.

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Indeed. Using Walter's system, 6D, S17, DAS, 80% pen. the odds of winning or losing after 5,000 hands:

Win 41%
Lose 58.9%
Push 0.1%

Same game, HiLo, Ill18, spread 1-15:

Win 65.25%
Lose 34.7%
Push .05%

So, if Walter dealt himself 5,000 hands, there is a 41% chance that he would have won with his test. Unfortunately, winning that one time he apparently thinks "proves" his system works, even though the majority of the time 5,000 hands would show a loss. If the author loses, then he could alter the rules and try another 5,000 hands. Pretty soon, he will win and think he has a winning system. This is, in fact, what is behind so may of these books and why their conclusions are false.

QFIT said:

... if Walter dealt himself 5,000 hands, there is a 41% chance that he would have won with his test. Unfortunately, winning that one time he apparently thinks "proves" his system works, even though the majority of the time 5,000 hands would show a loss.

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I'm sure that there is more to it than that. zg

zengrifter said:

QFIT's sim here has a problem. It does not reflect actual reality
of dealing cards, or so would say some progressionists >>
http://www.qfit.com/blackjack-progression-systems.htm

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Why would you repeat such nonsense? Simulations are used to build dams, airplanes, nuclear reactors, plan the landing on Mars. Simming BJ is trivial by comparison. The science is well established.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monte_Carlo_method

zengrifter said:

I'm sure that there is more to it than that. zg

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And i am sure you are just trolling at this point.

iCountNTrack said:

And i am sure you are just trolling at this point.

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I am making every effort to keep thread on track and chipper, at least untill Walter's supporters
and the author himself have been allowed ample space and time to weigh in accordingly.

"One man's troll is another man's facilitator."​