Blackjack Classroom

Choosing the Casino

When choosing which casino to play at, there are a lot of different factors to take into account. Most of these come down to personal preference. Do you like to play at the hotel you are staying at? Is the casino smoky or do they have good ventilation? Is it well lit? Is it crowded? Some of these things may matter to you and some may not. These factors don't affect the game itself, but it is important to find a casino at which you are comfortable. When you sit at a blackjack table for hours on end, your comfort is worth it.

An even more important thing to consider is what game the casino is offering. Not all blackjack games offer the same odds. They change these odds by changing the rules of the game slightly. At some places the dealer hits a soft 17, at others they stand. At some casinos you can double down on anything, at others you can only double on 10 or 11. You want to find a game that has these slight rule variations in your favor. You want a game that has most or all of the following:

You can double after you split

You can double on anything

The dealer must stand on soft 17

You can surrender.

I don't play at games without the first two, I much prefer the third, and surrender is an added bonus if it is offered.

There is also the issue of the number of decks. Generally, the less the number of decks means the better the odds. However, there is also some amount of personal preference involved. I personally prefer a 6-deck shoe because of longer stretches between shuffles, a lot of the time I can take advantage of a good count for longer (we'll get into the semantics of counting in a later article), and towards the end of a shoe a higher count means more. You will need to decide what game you personally prefer. Even a game with bad odds can be beaten. So try out some different games and see which kind you prefer.

Finally, another type of variation that can take place in a game is the blackjack payout. There is a new trend some casinos are taking to lower the blackjack payout from "3 to 2" to "6 to 5". This means that instead of getting paid $15 on a blackjack betting $10, you get paid $12. This increases the house advantage a whole lot, and basically takes money straight out of your pocket. You and the entire blackjack community would be best served if you refuse to play at a table offering this bastardized version of blackjack.