There are three primary factors you should be considering when choosing a table, and they are penetration, rules and game speed. All are important and none should be ignored. Obviously with penetration you want fewer cards cut off, and game speed you want a faster game, and with rules you want rules that are more favourable to the player. The only way it gets tricky with the rules is if you have different combinations, because there are so many different ways that blackjack can be played so you can't just go by initial house edge although that is generally a pretty good guide as far as rules themselves are concerned. But some rules scale better than others, for example the value of surrender is understated by it's basic strategy impact, whereas whether the dealer hits or stands on 17 is overstated by it's effect on the basic strategist.
I used to play at a casino that had two games. The main floor was a real honey pot. 6 decks, ES 10, RSA, DAS, DA2, H17 w/ one deck cut off out of six. The high limit game had a worse cut and no surrender. One day a friend who also card counts and I were talking and I was telling him I had been playing in the high limit and he laughed at me. I understood his mirth, as the high limit game had worse rules and worse penetration, but it had two things going for it, the higher max bet but more importantly the much faster game speed. The high limit game was heads up, whereas the main table games were crowded. And the max bet was 10x higher in the high limit room. Of course sometimes you could get heads up on the main tables in which case that is way better, even when you consider the difference in max bets. But you can be talking about a difference of 3x to 4x as many hands if you are playing for example 230 hands per hour heads up vs 60 hands per hour at a crowded table with slow players and side bets. If you are getting in 4x as many hands per hour, and betting a lot more as well, then your hourly can be significantly higher even though you are playing with worse penetration and worse rules.
Sometimes rules alone can be enough. In Colombia the rules are very liberal. Often the player can start with an advantage right off the top. After I lost most of my stores there was once that let me play, because I would also play poker there and help them start games, but they would cut the shoe in half. You might think such a game is unplayable, but in the Medellin ruleset of S17, DAS, DA2, ES, ENHC, RSA you have such a substantial advantage at TC +1 that it really doesn't matter if you are playing only half the shoe, there are still plenty of advantageous opportunities. You are going to average an edge of +0.7% throughout the TC +1 bin with these rules. Of course there were plenty of opportunities in Colombia that had both great rules and great penetration which is much better.
My point is, there are a lot of different factors that go into making a game great. Of course the best is if you can get all three, but even 2/3 will usually do.
I used to play at a casino that had two games. The main floor was a real honey pot. 6 decks, ES 10, RSA, DAS, DA2, H17 w/ one deck cut off out of six. The high limit game had a worse cut and no surrender. One day a friend who also card counts and I were talking and I was telling him I had been playing in the high limit and he laughed at me. I understood his mirth, as the high limit game had worse rules and worse penetration, but it had two things going for it, the higher max bet but more importantly the much faster game speed. The high limit game was heads up, whereas the main table games were crowded. And the max bet was 10x higher in the high limit room. Of course sometimes you could get heads up on the main tables in which case that is way better, even when you consider the difference in max bets. But you can be talking about a difference of 3x to 4x as many hands if you are playing for example 230 hands per hour heads up vs 60 hands per hour at a crowded table with slow players and side bets. If you are getting in 4x as many hands per hour, and betting a lot more as well, then your hourly can be significantly higher even though you are playing with worse penetration and worse rules.
Sometimes rules alone can be enough. In Colombia the rules are very liberal. Often the player can start with an advantage right off the top. After I lost most of my stores there was once that let me play, because I would also play poker there and help them start games, but they would cut the shoe in half. You might think such a game is unplayable, but in the Medellin ruleset of S17, DAS, DA2, ES, ENHC, RSA you have such a substantial advantage at TC +1 that it really doesn't matter if you are playing only half the shoe, there are still plenty of advantageous opportunities. You are going to average an edge of +0.7% throughout the TC +1 bin with these rules. Of course there were plenty of opportunities in Colombia that had both great rules and great penetration which is much better.
My point is, there are a lot of different factors that go into making a game great. Of course the best is if you can get all three, but even 2/3 will usually do.
