Las Vegas is one of America’s top tourist destinations, welcoming almost 30 million visitors each year. Sin City is full of attractions, from the magic shows on Fremont Street to the legends of rock and pop who settle in for a Las Vegas residency. But not eve Aerosmith, Elton John or Keith Urban are as famous as the blackjack tables at The Strip’s iconic casinos such as the MGM Grand, the Bellagio and Wynn’s.
Placing a few wagers in these famous venues is all part of the Las Vegas experience. You will find all the classic games, but to have a fighting chance of at least reducing the house edge, there is no better choice than blackjack.
Blackjack – a winning strategy
People talk about strategies in slots or roulette, but these games are entirely down to chance and any impression that you are influencing the outcome is an illusion. Blackjack is different. Players who learn basic strategy on when to stand, hit, split pairs or double down can reduce the house edge to about one percent.
But that still means the casino has an advantage, albeit a slim one, in the long run. Hollywood A-lister Ben Affleck was politely but firmly advised to try some other games when he kept beating the house at blackjack at the Hard Rock casino a few years ago. He managed to shift the odds in his favor by using a basic card counting technique, and it is something that anyone can learn.
A simple counting system
The idea of card counting in blackjack is to keep sufficient track of what is dealt to know whether the cards remaining in the shoe are mostly of higher or lower value. This in turn influences the decisions you make at the table. You don’t need to memorize all the cards dealt, that would be impossible. But a simple card counting system helps you determine the nature of what is left in the shoe.
For our purposes, aces, face cards and 10s are assigned a value of -1, sevens eights and nines are assigned zero and twos to sixes are assigned +1. Now with every card dealt, keep a running tally. Essentially, the higher your tally, the higher the concentration of high value cards and the greater the chance of a natural. So you increase your bet amount as the tally grows and reduce it as is drops.
Practicing online
While card counting is not against the rules, casinos don’t need a reason to eject players if they are too successful. So you need to count unobtrusively and that means practice. Any of the US real money blackjack providers at https://www.bestuscasinos.org/real-money/blackjack/ can be used for this, but to have the best chance of success, choose a blackjack game with a live dealer, not an automated one.
With an automated game, you will struggle to realize an advantage, as the shoe can be automatically reshuffled at any time. A real blackjack dealer with a real set of cards provides a better opportunity to give your card counting system a proper try-out. Good luck!
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