What is your defintion of winning?

[Cardcounter]

The casino hopes that your definition of "winning" is putting a bet out on a hand and winning that hand. A lot of casual players definition of winning is playing for an hour or two and coming home with more than you came with. A cardcounter's defintion is playing a lifetime "over a 100 hours" and winning.

 

[sagefr0g]

The casino hopes that your definition of "winning" is putting a bet out on a hand and winning that hand. A lot of casual players definition of winning is playing for an hour or two and coming home with more than you came with. A cardcounter's defintion is playing a lifetime "over a 100 hours" and winning.

lol, i want both! guess one can't have that though huh?
geesh can't even vote that way either....
just goes to show you that you can't have your cake and eat it too.

 

[EasyRhino]

Over one hundred hours?!

I don't think anyone has even played that much over the history of the game!

 

[toastblows]

if it wasnt for playing high jackpot powerball, im always a winner :cool2: ...except when i lose

 

[shadroch]

Over one hundred hours?!

I don't think anyone has even played that much over the history of the game!

Cardcounter is 10% of the way there,according to his recent posts.

 

[SilentBob420BMFJ]

The casino hopes that your definition of "winning" is putting a bet out on a hand and winning that hand. A lot of casual players definition of winning is playing for an hour or two and coming home with more than you came with. A cardcounter's defintion is playing a lifetime "over a 100 hours" and winning.

100 hours? man, that would take decades..

 

[SilentBob420BMFJ]

Cardcounter is 10% of the way there,according to his recent posts.

which post? the one where he said he played 10 hours, or the one where he said he has played for over a year? there are a few people on here that make me think that they arent serious, and they are only trying to get a rise out of everybody here, and to see how many insults they can get thrown at them.. sadly, chances are they are serious

 

[Kasi]

What is your defintion of winning?

When the number of original flat-bet units I've won, exceeds my EV by enough units so that +2 standard deviations - EV > zero.

And I don't care if you assume a + or - overall EV or whether you card-count or just vary your bet according to some betting system.

Something like that anyway lol.

 

[SilentBob420BMFJ]

What is your defintion of winning?

When the number of original flat-bet units I've won, exceeds my EV by enough units so that +2 standard deviations - EV > zero.

And I don't care if you assume a + or - overall EV or whether you card-count or just vary your bet according to some betting system.

Something like that anyway lol.

sounds to me like you could be a major loser and still consider yourself a winner, although i dont really know what 2 standard deviations is

 

[Paradox]

My definitions

I call a won hand a win and I call a winning play-day a win.

I do not consider them wins. I define a win as sucessfully gettin my EV without drawing attention to myself. I seriously do not care about the little color chips and the pieces of paper with pictures of dead presidents. Variances will swing me like a kite dancing in the wind, but I win when I get my hours in. The results will work themselves out on their own. I do not need to worry about wins or losses, I just need to play a winning game. The laws of physics and mathematics will take care of themselves.

100-hours is a silly estimate to overcome 1SD, unless you are playing heads-up at 200-300 hands per hour. Most people average about 100. 100hoursx100hands=10,000 hands. That is an INCREDIBLY LOW n0. I would challenge you to find this game in the US and play it for the full 100-hours.

You may find a single deck game H17DOA and spread 1-20 and only play 100-hours, but if you are playing shoes then you need more like 300-hours if you play optimally. If you screw around with cover and opposition betting then you may not overcome 1SD in thousands of hours.

This is why heads up play as fast as you can go at a good deeply dealt single deck is best. Single deck has the lowest n0.

n0 is the number of hands to overcome 1SD (one standard deviation) of variances. Basically, when you can reasonably decide that your wins are no longer swings, they are true profits. This is when I call it a true win, on payday. The game I most commonly play let me hit my numbers in about 30,000 hands. I try to play fast heads-up at 200 per hour. I always play alone at hand held and with one person at shoes. The card eating effect also makes the number of hands required go up.

If you are beginning to ask question like this and you want to know what the mathematical facts are, you need to purchase a simulator. I use CVDATA/CVCX.

Good Luck and Cheers!
Paradox

 

[Rspeirsmlb]

When you refer to playing 100 hours + do you mean just wonging in and out and playing only high counts for 100 hours, or by counting and playing-all for 100 hours?! I've logged in over 300 hours of play this summer alone.....none of it is counting but plopping (yes we all start somewhere!)....ever since I've been practicing AP I haven't stepped foot into a casino until I'm comfortable and won't play until at a comfortable level....just curious if you are all talking about only playing advantageous counts or play-all for that amount of time?

 

[shadroch]

Any time I can crush my enemies,grind their bones and hear the laments of their women is absolutely a win.

 

[SilentBob420BMFJ]

I call a won hand a win and I call a winning play-day a win.

I do not consider them wins. I define a win as sucessfully gettin my EV without drawing attention to myself. I seriously do not care about the little color chips and the pieces of paper with pictures of dead presidents. Variances will swing me like a kite dancing in the wind, but I win when I get my hours in. The results will work themselves out on their own. I do not need to worry about wins or losses, I just need to play a winning game. The laws of physics and mathematics will take care of themselves.

100-hours is a silly estimate to overcome 1SD, unless you are playing heads-up at 200-300 hands per hour. Most people average about 100. 100hoursx100hands=10,000 hands. That is an INCREDIBLY LOW n0. I would challenge you to find this game in the US and play it for the full 100-hours.

You may find a single deck game H17DOA and spread 1-20 and only play 100-hours, but if you are playing shoes then you need more like 300-hours if you play optimally. If you screw around with cover and opposition betting then you may not overcome 1SD in thousands of hours.

This is why heads up play as fast as you can go at a good deeply dealt single deck is best. Single deck has the lowest n0.

n0 is the number of hands to overcome 1SD (one standard deviation) of variances. Basically, when you can reasonably decide that your wins are no longer swings, they are true profits. This is when I call it a true win, on payday. The game I most commonly play let me hit my numbers in about 30,000 hands. I try to play fast heads-up at 200 per hour. I always play alone at hand held and with one person at shoes. The card eating effect also makes the number of hands required go up.

If you are beginning to ask question like this and you want to know what the mathematical facts are, you need to purchase a simulator. I use CVDATA/CVCX.

Good Luck and Cheers!
Paradox

i want to purchase cvdata.. do you have the $160 or the $60 version? is the $60 version fine? also, what is "n0"

 

[SilentBob420BMFJ]

When you refer to playing 100 hours + do you mean just wonging in and out and playing only high counts for 100 hours, or by counting and playing-all for 100 hours?! I've logged in over 300 hours of play this summer alone.....none of it is counting but plopping (yes we all start somewhere!)....ever since I've been practicing AP I haven't stepped foot into a casino until I'm comfortable and won't play until at a comfortable level....just curious if you are all talking about only playing advantageous counts or play-all for that amount of time?

clearly we can ignore cardcounter's claim of 100 hours.. obviously he was WAAAAY off and not even thinking (as usual).. this isnt even a discussion, its like if i said "hitting a 20 has +ev", you would just be like "wow, what a dumbass".. but to be technical, there is no way you could possibly say 100 hours is a lifetime, no matter how you cut it.. 1000 hours isnt even a lifetime..

 

[Paradox]

Rspeirsmlb-

When you refer to playing 100 hours + do you mean just wonging in and out and playing only high counts for 100 hours, or by counting and playing-all for 100 hours?! I've logged in over 300 hours of play this summer alone.....none of it is counting but plopping (yes we all start somewhere!)....ever since I've been practicing AP I haven't stepped foot into a casino until I'm comfortable and won't play until at a comfortable level....just curious if you are all talking about only playing advantageous counts or play-all for that amount of time?

When you refer to playing 100 hours + do you mean just wonging in and out and playing only high counts for 100 hours, or by counting and playing-all for 100 hours?!

YES! See my post below where I address n0 with SB420. I did mean 100+ hours of Wonging or 200-400 hours of play all.

Congratulations on un-plopping

Cheers,
Paradox

 

[Paradox]

Sb420-

clearly we can ignore cardcounter's claim of 100 hours.. obviously he was WAAAAY off and not even thinking (as usual).. this isnt even a discussion, its like if i said "hitting a 20 has +ev", you would just be like "wow, what a dumbass".. but to be technical, there is no way you could possibly say 100 hours is a lifetime, no matter how you cut it.. 1000 hours isnt even a lifetime..

SB420:
n0 is how many hands that you must play perfectly before you have played long enough to be sure that your wins are yours, not just variance. It is one standard deviation. So, when you have played a certain number of hands, you have played enough to hit the "long run" for your particular game. A weak game may take 30K to 50K hands, while a strong SD game may take only 12K.

Then you have to look at game speed. If you are Wonging in and out, you will not make as many hands per hour, but the n0 is much less. If you play-all at an average speed of 100-hands per hour, then you would need 300 to 500 hours to get 30K to 50K hands played. If you are good and find a lightening fast dealer, one can get 250+ hands per hour. If you play faster, you get more hands per hour and then play fewer hours for the same EV. Does that make sense? Blackjack Attack 3, and the BJ21 boards, are the very best source of info on n0. I'm not a math guy. It has been hard for me. I'll be a student until I'm cold.

SOOOO... If cardcounter plays single deck in Reno SD DOA R6 and spread aggressively it is easily possible that he could hit the long run in 100-hours. Oh betting like a robot, no cover. It is not likely that he can get away with that spread for more than one 15 or 20 minute session per shift, but he theoretically could do it. He’d have to play anonymously and use disguises to not be recognized before he got his 100+hours. For the DD and more so shoe games, 100-hours is way too little, unless you are very very aggressively back counting while playing with NO cover. I'm sure that 100-hours was reasonable 20-years ago, but I would bet that the average skilled player needs 20K-30K hands. Pros want to take the money home as quickly as possible. 400-hours is a number that has been talked about as a reasonable time for an average game and a good AP.

I can’t stress enough that playing a non-optimal game will affect how quickly or slowly you can reasonably expect to be profitable.

CVCX $75 vs CVData $175 or Both $200 ---I own them all, I use them all. They are dynamic, always being updated. Norm has the best support that any software company has ever given me PERIOD! I’m glad he charges a flat rate, instead of a % of my EV. lol

CVCX and CVData are different products.

CVCX or Casino Verite Chapter X gets its name from Chapter X(Ten) of Blackjack Attack. Don's book is great for intermediate to advanced counters. It is a way to quickly compare betting ramps, penetration levels, look at you n0 and do very very basic betting strategies for the sake of comparisons. It is great for quick comparisons plus much more. I won't even try to give you Don's definition, as I know I would get it wrong.

CVData is a full-featured simulator that does one sim at a time, not hundreds for comparison like CVCX. CVData allows control over almost any nuance you want. It includes CVIndex will generate index numbers for any system. You can even invent your own card counting system and run it to see how good it is. You can do very complex betting and custom features abound. Check out the differences again over at qfit.com. If you get CVCX, you should also get BJA3. You should get BJA3 either way.

Simulators in general are not user friendly to a novice. CVData/CVCX is by far the easiest to learn. They are both very powerful and in learning the simulators you will learn some theory without having to take a statistics or calculus course. Did I mention that I’ve never passed a math class in high school and have had college math whatsoever? I learned it all for sims, BJA3 and BJ21's archives/forums.

CVCX is all that I used for the first few weeks and then began using CVData. If you can only buy one, buy CVCX. The discount is nice for both if you know you will continue to count for awhile in your life. Even if you don't use a lot of the information that you sim, the education is invaluable.

I'm getting tired, so I hope this makes sense.

Cheers,
Paradox

 

[aslan]

clearly we can ignore cardcounter's claim of 100 hours.. obviously he was WAAAAY off and not even thinking (as usual).. this isnt even a discussion, its like if i said "hitting a 20 has +ev", you would just be like "wow, what a dumbass".. but to be technical, there is no way you could possibly say 100 hours is a lifetime, no matter how you cut it.. 1000 hours isnt even a lifetime..

100 hours for me is three or four overnight trips to AC. I probably played close to 100 hours during my trip to Vegas a week ago. 1,000 hours might be a good way to describe a year at my current rate.

 

[Cardcounter]

100 hour theory!

My theory is if you can play for a 100 hours and still be a winner you are a very tough player who probably will not get beat as long as you pick sensible games with good rules. After a 100 hours of play I would say 98%-99% of people playing have lost more money than they have won. If you are in the 1%-2% that have won more money than you have lost in a 100 hours of playing you will have a good chance to keep on winning. A 100 hours is a minimum requirement to be able to consider your self a lifetime winner and thats a 100 hours at the table not including wong out time. If you play longer than that lets say 10,000 hours over the course of your lifetime than it would be a winner over 10,000 hours.

 

[Paradox]

Your theories above.

I like the fact that you use the word “theory”. Guess would be more appropriate

These “theories”(sic) are just guesses due to a lack of the real facts. Just about everything you theorized about has a solid mathematical formula. You can anthropomorphize with the math as much as you feel you need to, but if you had a simulator you would know instead of guessing. You are “getting there” in your attitude and mind. You have, literally, volumes to learn. At least you’re thinking in the right direction.

My suggestion is to read(books/BJ21/blackjackforumonline), study, get a simulator and learn it cold.

While its not as much fun as bantering with us, its not your best investment of time. You have to ask yourself if you really want to be an AP or just play around with it, pontificate about it and debate it. Whatever you come up with, go for it.

I think there may be hope for you to undo the casino brainwashing that you have been required to subject yourself to simply to keep your job. You are the victim of a lot of misinformation.

I’m not sure you can hear this right now, your head may not be in the right place, but …

The industry you work for takes advantage of people who have poor impulse control and even liquors them up to make it even easier. They need to enlist their employees to be part of the system. If they told you their true intentions, you probably (hopefully) wouldn’t work for them. Most people with morals/social conscious don’t’ want to do harm to others, but end up working in an industry that does. It is part of the human paradox You may even have mixed feeling and possible confusion about loyalties. That is normal at this pint. You will find a happy medium. Not to mention all of the deceptive advertising…I could keep going on and on and on and on and on and on, but I won’t … anymore

If you are a really “good guy” and you are bright enough, you will eventually see the light. I know several dealers PCs and a gaming director. None of them would ever take advantage of anyone in their personal life, but they do and think what they are told and taught.

Remember, you have a distinct advantage over the casinos. You know more about them from the inside than most of us ever will. Use your knowledge.


Good luck and cheers,

Paradox

 

[SilentBob420BMFJ]

SB420:
n0 is how many hands that you must play perfectly before you have played long enough to be sure that your wins are yours, not just variance. It is one standard deviation. So, when you have played a certain number of hands, you have played enough to hit the "long run" for your particular game. A weak game may take 30K to 50K hands, while a strong SD game may take only 12K.

Then you have to look at game speed. If you are Wonging in and out, you will not make as many hands per hour, but the n0 is much less. If you play-all at an average speed of 100-hands per hour, then you would need 300 to 500 hours to get 30K to 50K hands played. If you are good and find a lightening fast dealer, one can get 250+ hands per hour. If you play faster, you get more hands per hour and then play fewer hours for the same EV. Does that make sense? Blackjack Attack 3, and the BJ21 boards, are the very best source of info on n0. I'm not a math guy. It has been hard for me. I'll be a student until I'm cold.

SOOOO... If cardcounter plays single deck in Reno SD DOA R6 and spread aggressively it is easily possible that he could hit the long run in 100-hours. Oh betting like a robot, no cover. It is not likely that he can get away with that spread for more than one 15 or 20 minute session per shift, but he theoretically could do it. He’d have to play anonymously and use disguises to not be recognized before he got his 100+hours. For the DD and more so shoe games, 100-hours is way too little, unless you are very very aggressively back counting while playing with NO cover. I'm sure that 100-hours was reasonable 20-years ago, but I would bet that the average skilled player needs 20K-30K hands. Pros want to take the money home as quickly as possible. 400-hours is a number that has been talked about as a reasonable time for an average game and a good AP.

I can’t stress enough that playing a non-optimal game will affect how quickly or slowly you can reasonably expect to be profitable.

CVCX $75 vs CVData $175 or Both $200 ---I own them all, I use them all. They are dynamic, always being updated. Norm has the best support that any software company has ever given me PERIOD! I’m glad he charges a flat rate, instead of a % of my EV. lol

CVCX and CVData are different products.

CVCX or Casino Verite Chapter X gets its name from Chapter X(Ten) of Blackjack Attack. Don's book is great for intermediate to advanced counters. It is a way to quickly compare betting ramps, penetration levels, look at you n0 and do very very basic betting strategies for the sake of comparisons. It is great for quick comparisons plus much more. I won't even try to give you Don's definition, as I know I would get it wrong.

CVData is a full-featured simulator that does one sim at a time, not hundreds for comparison like CVCX. CVData allows control over almost any nuance you want. It includes CVIndex will generate index numbers for any system. You can even invent your own card counting system and run it to see how good it is. You can do very complex betting and custom features abound. Check out the differences again over at qfit.com. If you get CVCX, you should also get BJA3. You should get BJA3 either way.

Simulators in general are not user friendly to a novice. CVData/CVCX is by far the easiest to learn. They are both very powerful and in learning the simulators you will learn some theory without having to take a statistics or calculus course. Did I mention that I’ve never passed a math class in high school and have had college math whatsoever? I learned it all for sims, BJA3 and BJ21's archives/forums.

CVCX is all that I used for the first few weeks and then began using CVData. If you can only buy one, buy CVCX. The discount is nice for both if you know you will continue to count for awhile in your life. Even if you don't use a lot of the information that you sim, the education is invaluable.

I'm getting tired, so I hope this makes sense.

Cheers,
Paradox

isnt one standard deviation 68% or something? how can you "be sure it isnt just variance" with only 68% sureness?

i doubt 100 hours could be the long run, but i see what your saying.. you would need a dealer that is in the top 1% for speed in the world, one on one, but spreading insanely will actually increase variance, but it will make it more likely that you will end up ahead, if thats what you mean, so if you want a guarantee of winning, 100 hours perhaps is enuf to guarantee that, but to be within 1 sd of your ev? eh, i dunno..

i read that there are 2 versions of cvdata, one is like $60, the other is $160 or around there, and i want something to run sims, to get stuff like the frequency of different RUN counts, calculating my edge flat bet wonging, then comparing that to a 1-2 spread to see the difference, and stuff like that..

also, i really really need to read blackjack attack!

100 hours for me is three or four overnight trips to AC. I probably played close to 100 hours during my trip to Vegas a week ago. 1,000 hours might be a good way to describe a year at my current rate.

exactly.. hope you are reading this cardcounter, or should i say, "mr lifetime"