UK-21
Well-Known Member
To the best of my knowledge it's only in the UK where the insurance option is limited to even money on naturals. Where I've played in Germany you could insure any hand against a dealer ace.
The jury's out on the exact "cost" of the UK's naturals only insurance rule. As counters will only take insurance at TC+3 (around 8% of the time), and taking it can result in an increased loss (dealer doesn't have a natural and you still lose the hand), I reckon the loss in EV is marginal. Nobody has yet done two sims over, say, 10 million hands to compare the two rulesets. It's something that's been kicked around in threads in the past. Any loss in EV will certainly be less than the impact of the H17 rule (at 0.22%??).
The jury's out on the exact "cost" of the UK's naturals only insurance rule. As counters will only take insurance at TC+3 (around 8% of the time), and taking it can result in an increased loss (dealer doesn't have a natural and you still lose the hand), I reckon the loss in EV is marginal. Nobody has yet done two sims over, say, 10 million hands to compare the two rulesets. It's something that's been kicked around in threads in the past. Any loss in EV will certainly be less than the impact of the H17 rule (at 0.22%??).