Question of the Day - 04 August 2024

Gamblers are people.
People are idiots.
Therefore: 6:5 blackjack is and will remain popular.

That explanation of why 6:5 BJ sucks gets all mathy, though, and thus may sail over the heads of some, er, people. Therefore, rather than trying to numerically quantify the disadvantage (multiplying stuff by 3.5 is so HARD), let me offer a more subjective comparison:

3:2 blackjack is like having a nice meal in a steakhouse. 6:5 blackjack is like being beaten up and gang-raped by bikers.

 Casinos make changes to the payout of their gaming offerings because the changes make them more money, period. 

it is all about the money and the casinos are bringing it in to. player benefits are getting worse as everyone knows and people it seems do not care as they just accept it and continue to give the casinos there business

Which means I no longer play blackjack on the Strip (I'm sure there are some exceptions but I get frustrated looking for any tables that aren't either 6:5 or had minimums of at least $25.  We even noticed this downtown at one of our favorite "go-to's" Golden Gate.  Granted we go down to Fremont in the evening, but can not find tables there anymore below $25 minimum.  Our move is to stay on the Strip (we like Paris or Venetian to be "center strip"), but besides playing poker at Horseshoe, we wander an easy 2-3 blocks off strip to Ellis Island ornopw Tuscanny has 3:2 blackjack at reasonable minimums.  Ellis Island always a great time with 3:2 and $10 tables (even one very busy $5 table).   EI and Tuscanny will get almost all of my future blackjack wagers.  If one of the Strip properties "wisens up" please let us know.  
Not.  Holding.  My.  Breath.

I'm amazed at the full tables for 6-5 Blackjack.  There are 3-2 tables at my local casino but they are hidden!  I guess "6" sounds bigger to people than 3.  The way I explain it to the gullible is--if you get a Blackjack and your bet is a green chip ($25) would you rather get paid $ 30 at 6-5 or $ 37.50 (3-2).  Then the light seems to come on!

The difference in theoretical loss is so much that you are better off playing $25 3:2 blackjack (costing 13.75 cents per hand) than $10 6:5 twenty-one (costing 19 cents per hand).  Though the variance for low rollers playing $25 per hand can be brutal.

I visit Las Vegas a couple of times a year, driving up from SoCAL.  I have not stayed on the Strip for the last 20 years.  Besides the awful video poker and the 6-5 blackjack, the ridiculous food prices and room rates are beyond crazy.  I usually stay at South Point and it is a player's dream for VP and BJ.  The SP also has very reasonable and good food and rooms.  Other than South Point I have stayed at Red Rock and the Orleans.  I will never stay on the Strip again.  If more people refused to play the stupid 6-5 BJ and the bad VP games on the Strip, the bosses would change, but until that happens they will continue to rip off the customers.

Harrah's Ak-Chin Casino is in Maricopa, AZ, which is about 25 miles southwest of central Phoenix. Being a Caesars property,it's the only casino in The Valley that has some 6-5 BJ tables. One Saturday night, I was playing at a $10 3-2 table next to a woman and her husband.  They had been playing for several hours and losing.  Suddenly, I saw the dealer pay the woman's BJ at $30.  I notified the dealer about the payout, which she apologized for and corrected the mistake.  But the husband got really upset, calling over the pit person and telling him that he and his wife were getting underpaid all evening.  I couldn't hear the rest of the conversation as he was pulled away from the table, but I'm sure Caesars lost two customers for good.

The only way to make money in a Casino is to own it. So I bought a thousand shares of stock in my favorite casino.

No one yet has mentioned one certain factor why people will play bad BJ at their casino: They don't want to have to walk a block or more in order to possibly find a better game, especially not in the summer Vegas heat. It's a convenience-vs-bother thing.  Strip guests simply will want to keep it simple and play table games where they are staying. That's the opposite of Downtown, where each casino occupies exactly one small block, and the casinos are adjacent to one another. If you don't like the BJ or VP in the place where you're staying, you can literally just walk across the (narrow) street and be in another casino.  You can't do that on the Strip.

I usually stay at Paris.  I stopped playing BJ, Craps, and most table games, as I was getting killed.  In fact, a few times, the people at the table were giving odds on my getting 14 or 15, which I get way more times that the odds on getting those hands.  At craps, if I so much as walk up to a table, the next roll will be a 7.  I do get lucky at slots and VP.  Even though they are tight, I have been lucky the last couple of years and am ahead.  I do, however to to the Orleans, South Point, etc., and play VP or slots there, and do just as well as on the strip, even though the pay tables on VP are better at Orleans or others more local places. The funniest thing is I am way ahead at "I Love Suits".  Stupid game, but not much decision making, high house hold, but its fun and a great way to waste time, and usually money.

I once calculated my loss would be on a 7 day trip at an average $35 per hand 3-4 hours per day. I kept track of my actual black jack hands as best I could and the difference was in the range of $700 to $900. I will never sit down at a 6/5 and tell everyone I can about my experience