Blackjack Experts: CSMs using preferential shuffling?

[DJFuji]

A friend of mine from out of town came to visit and i took him to the local indian casino (Harrah's in Valley City, CA for those of you who know it). They were using CSMs on the blackjack table which we normally don't play on, but we were bored so we gave it a shot.

Here's the interesting thing. Even though CSMs make counting impossible, we counted just for fun. We found an interesting phenomenon.

Using Hi-Lo (without dividing by the number of decks, for obvious reasons), we were getting ridiculous counts. After less than an hour of play, the count was at +55.

I've never seen counts that high. The cards on the table were confirming it. The dealer was dealing out 4 or 5 times as many low cards than high. We rarely saw a 10. And the dealer was dealing himself 5 and 6 cards to make 21. He was rarely busting. People at the table started hitting on 17 and 18s against a dealer's face card because they knew they'd get 3s and 4s. And they were right.

So that leaves us two possibilities:

1) The CSM was filled with only partial decks...many of the face cards were removed...

or 2) The CSM was preferentially shuffling so that low cards came out more than face cards.

Have you guys ever heard anything like this? We were playing perfect basic strategy and losing 8 and 9 hands out of 10. It was the weirdest thing i've ever seen.

edit: bolded sections people seem to not read.

 

[SillyOReilly]

OMG HAX!!!!!!!!!

 

[GagHalfrunt]

Originally posted by: DJFuji


So that leaves us two possibilities:

1) The CSM was filled with only partial decks...many of the face cards were removed...

or 2) The CSM was preferentially shuffling so that low cards came out more than face cards.

No, it leaves at least one other possibility

3) You clowns can't count.


No casino will use partial decks or cheat by rigging the shuffling. They make their money by keeping the game open. As long as suckers are stupid enough to sit down because they're "bored" the casino has a license to print money. Nobody is going to risk the sure house edge gained by playing legit and risk getting shut down to up it an extra 1 or 2 percent. Not going to happen, never, no how, no way.

 

[Slew Foot]

Somewhere in that casino George Clooney and Brad Pitt were plotting a fiendishly clever plan to relive the vault of its riches.

 

[DJFuji]

We both counted independently and came to the same result. Maybe we were both equally bad counters (to the tune of coming up with the same count), but it seemed unlikely.

I've never seen a count get that high in normal blackjack.

 

[buck]

Originally posted by: GagHalfrunt

Originally posted by: DJFuji


So that leaves us two possibilities:

1) The CSM was filled with only partial decks...many of the face cards were removed...

or 2) The CSM was preferentially shuffling so that low cards came out more than face cards.

No, it leaves at least one other possibility

3) You clowns can't count.


No casino will use partial decks or cheat by rigging the shuffling. They make their money by keeping the game open. As long as suckers are stupid enough to sit down because they're "bored" the casino has a license to print money. Nobody is going to risk the sure house edge gained by playing legit and risk getting shut down to up it an extra 1 or 2 percent. Not going to happen, never, no how, no way.

:thumbsup:

Common sense FTW!

Why risk so much for so little?

 

[DJFuji]

If the casinos put a few machines in the place with preferential shuffling in favor of the player (high cards) and a few in favor of the house (low cards), no one would notice and people would be enticed to come back again and again. They're on an indian reservation. Who's gonna shut them down?

 

[GagHalfrunt]

Originally posted by: DJFuji
They're on an indian reservation. Who's gonna shut them down?

The same Gaming Control Board that governs action at non-Indian casinos. If you're so dense that you think indian casinos are somehow immune to the rules and cheat what the hell are you doing gambling there?

 

[Indolent]

I know very little about counting cards at black jack, but I'd think you'd need more of a sample time than "less than a half hour" to determine anything worth while.

 

[DJFuji]

Indolent, what that means is that the cards were heavily stacked in favor of smaller cards. It's like saying you flipped a coin 20 times and got heads 20 times in a row. Sure, it's not a great sample size, but it doesnt take away from the fact that 20 heads in a row isnt right...

 

[MikeyIs4Dcats]

Originally posted by: DJFuji
Indolent, what that means is that the cards were heavily stacked in favor of smaller cards. It's like saying you flipped a coin 20 times and got heads 20 times in a row. Sure, it's not a great sample size, but it doesnt take away from the fact that 20 heads in a row isnt right...

the odds that you'd get heads 20 times in a row are the exact same as any other outcome.

 

[Kev]

It's called variance.

 

[mugs]

Originally posted by: MikeyIs4Dcats

Originally posted by: DJFuji
Indolent, what that means is that the cards were heavily stacked in favor of smaller cards. It's like saying you flipped a coin 20 times and got heads 20 times in a row. Sure, it's not a great sample size, but it doesnt take away from the fact that 20 heads in a row isnt right...

the odds that you'd get heads 20 times in a row are the exact same as any other outcome.

If order matters. But order doesn't matter in the OP's situation. The odds of getting 20 heads and 0 tails is certainly not the same as 10 heads and 10 tails. The odds of getting the OP's set of cards is the same as any other cards, but the odds of getting 4-5 times as many low cards as high certainly isn't the same as an even distribution.

 

[JJChicken]

Originally posted by: mugs

Originally posted by: MikeyIs4Dcats

Originally posted by: DJFuji
Indolent, what that means is that the cards were heavily stacked in favor of smaller cards. It's like saying you flipped a coin 20 times and got heads 20 times in a row. Sure, it's not a great sample size, but it doesnt take away from the fact that 20 heads in a row isnt right...

the odds that you'd get heads 20 times in a row are the exact same as any other outcome.

If order matters. But order doesn't matter in the OP's situation. The odds of getting 20 heads and 0 tails is certainly not the same as 10 heads and 10 tails. The odds of getting the OP's set of cards is the same as any other cards, but the odds of getting 4-5 times as many low cards as high certainly isn't the same as an even distribution.

:thumbsup:

 

[JS80]

You can't count cards on a CSM.....

 

[RichardE]

Originally posted by: JS80
You can't count cards on a CSM.....

I was about to say this..

 

[akshatp]

Originally posted by: RichardE

Originally posted by: JS80
You can't count cards on a CSM.....

I was about to say this..

x3

That is the whole point of the CSM...

 

[DJFuji]

Yeah i know...but if a CSM gives a near-random distribution of cards each time, then counting should theoretically come out to 0 or close to it after an hour of play. It's like flipping a coin 100 times. It should come closer and closer to 50/50 over time.

We ended up with +55, meaning that there were WAY more low cards being dealt out than high cards.

 

[akshatp]

Originally posted by: DJFuji
Yeah i know...but if a CSM gives a near-random distribution of cards each time, then counting should theoretically come out to 0 or close to it after an hour of play. It's like flipping a coin 100 times. It should come closer and closer to 50/50 over time.

We ended up with +55, meaning that there were WAY more low cards being dealt out than high cards.

You can never get a true count because you never have a "starting" or "ending" point because there is no shuffle. Are you seriosuly not getting this?

 

[RichardE]

Originally posted by: DJFuji
Yeah i know...but if a CSM gives a near-random distribution of cards each time, then counting should theoretically come out to 0 or close to it after an hour of play. It's like flipping a coin 100 times. It should come closer and closer to 50/50 over time.

We ended up with +55, meaning that there were WAY more low cards being dealt out than high cards.

Except over 100 flips the chances of getting 50/50 are the same as getting 100/0. Akshatp explained it better though.

 

[DJFuji]

Originally posted by: akshatp

Originally posted by: DJFuji
Yeah i know...but if a CSM gives a near-random distribution of cards each time, then counting should theoretically come out to 0 or close to it after an hour of play. It's like flipping a coin 100 times. It should come closer and closer to 50/50 over time.

We ended up with +55, meaning that there were WAY more low cards being dealt out than high cards.

You can never get a true count because you never have a "starting" or "ending" point because there is no shuffle. Are you seriosuly not getting this?

I know you can't get a true count. I'm well aware of these facts. In fact, i stated all of these things in the original post.

But statistically, over the long haul, shouldn't the count come close to 0?

 

[akshatp]

Originally posted by: DJFuji

Originally posted by: akshatp

Originally posted by: DJFuji
Yeah i know...but if a CSM gives a near-random distribution of cards each time, then counting should theoretically come out to 0 or close to it after an hour of play. It's like flipping a coin 100 times. It should come closer and closer to 50/50 over time.

We ended up with +55, meaning that there were WAY more low cards being dealt out than high cards.

You can never get a true count because you never have a "starting" or "ending" point because there is no shuffle. Are you seriosuly not getting this?

I know you can't get a true count. I'm well aware of these facts. In fact, i stated all of these things in the original post.

But statistically, over the long haul, shouldn't the count come close to 0?

No. Statistically it shouldn't. The cards being played are constantly being re-fed into the machine. The shuffle is constant, so (assuming they re-insert the played cards every ten hadns) the chances of you getting the same exact cards dealt to you over those ten hands and the next ten hands, and the next ten hands is the same chance as you hitting the number 18 on a roulette wheel 10 times in a row, where each spin is independent of the next.

Get it? Every time the cards go back in your 'statistics' go right out the window.

The wheel inside that thing is constantly spinning my friend. Stay away from the CSM if you plan on playing high limit blackjack. There is a reason why they are only at the $10 and under tables.

 

[DJFuji]

I understand that it's like flipping a coin 100 times. I'm not aruging that one hand doesnt affect the next one when youre using a CSM (theoretically).

But while getting heads 100 times in a row doesnt mean you have any more chance of getting tails on the 101st, it's still pretty f'in weird and usually indicates there's something messed up with the coin.

A coin flipped over and over again will get closer and closer to 50/50 results. That's a given and it's not negated by the fact that each coin flip is independently 50/50 in terms of odds. I don't see the CSM as any different. Even if the next card coming out of the shoe is shuffled/random (which it isnt because the CSM doesnt shuffle the next card), you still shouldn't get a running count of +55. I'd bet money that if i went to Pechanga right now and started counting a CSM, i would get something relatively close to 0 over the course of an hour or so.

edit: While high limit blackjack rarely uses CSMs, the machines actually give the player a slight statistical edge everything else being equal. Not when you get +55 counts though...

I think you're wrong about the count not coming close to 0 over the long haul. If you randomly select a card from the deck and count it with hi-lo and you do this random card draw 1000 times, your end result should be approximately 0. There are 5 high cards and 5 low cards. The remaining cards don't count. Either there's something i'm missing here or you dont know what you're talking about.

 

[QueBert]

Pechanga you'll LOOSE, fuck that Casino, I understand Blackjack, but I don't understand why every time I watch it a casino the dealer is consistently hitting 19-20, I was at a full table and I had 20 3 times in a row and the dealer pushed every time. I also lost with 19 more times than I'd like to count. LOL

I don't trust those fucking machines, they put the cards in and BOOM the dealer hits 20 like clock work. Blackjack is rigged that's the only explanation.

 

[DJFuji]

lol pechanga is the only place i've seen the dealer hit a blackjack 4 times in a row. He might have hit it more than that but i left the table in disgust after the 4th time.