Current Events > Why is counting cards so frowned upon?

(+) Yeah! (+)

Youre just outsmarting the house. As long as you dont use a spotter it should be perfectly acceptable.

Why are businesses against losing money?

Because you're not actually supposed to win at a casino

BloodyBenten posted...

Why are businesses against losing money?

Casinos make enough on any given day.

HighSeraph posted...

Because you're not actually supposed to win at a casino

This is exactly it

LonelyStoner posted...

Casinos make enough on any given day.

Ok?
They arent charities. Their goal is to get as much money from players as possible.

Why don't casinos teach their dealers to count cards?

LonelyStoner posted...

Casinos make enough on any given day.

Huh, I guess nobody told them they were meeting the quota.

Were_Wyrm posted...

Why don't casinos teach their dealers to count cards?

Generally speaking the dealer doesnt have any discretion in how to play a blackjack hand at a casino. The house rules are posted on the table and always followed.

Same reason why a cashier forgetting to ring something up could end up with YOU getting charged with theft.

BloodyBenten posted...

Ok?
They arent charities. Their goal is to get as much money from players as possible.

Who said they were charities? Being smarter than them isnt a bad thing.

im under the impression that as long as you dont use any 'external device' it's tolerated since most spots in Vegas use 4-6 decks (maybe more?). but ofc if you win regularly, a casino will ask you to leave because they're in the business of making money.

Using the cards already played to determine the likelihood of future cards appearing is just basic sense. If casinos don't like that, they need to stick to stuff like slot machines where the player has no real control over the outcome (and I'm betting some casinos actually do)

Its not frowned upon they just want you to think youre getting away with something so you play and lose anyway or blow it somewhere else.

Meanwhile they probably eliminated all ways to actually make any significant amount of money since the MIT thing.

HighSeraph posted...

Because you're not actually supposed to win at a casino

Yep. I don't think people realise how much power these places have

I have a friend who works for a major online betting agency, and apparently if a customer wins too often(some professional sports gamblers do exist) the company can just tell them they no longer wish to do business with them and close their account.

Giant_Aspirin posted...

im under the impression that as long as you dont use any 'external device' it's tolerated since most spots in Vegas use 4-6 decks (maybe more?). but ofc if you win regularly, a casino will ask you to leave because they're in the business of making money.

Cheating in any way at a casino will get you arrested, external device or not.

Card counting isnt illegal. Casinos will tell you to stop playing blackjack if they suspect you of counting cards, and like you said they can tell you to leave for no reason other than winning too much if they want. But thats the extent of the response.

Because it's the one skill a player has that can give them an advantage over the house.

on this subject reminder casinos can now have slot machines that are rigged as long as they are "interactive" thus they are games not gambling machines

Philip027 posted...

Using the cards already played to determine the likelihood of future cards appearing is just basic sense. If casinos don't like that, they need to stick to stuff like slot machines where the player has no real control over the outcome (and I'm betting some casinos actually do)

This post is acting as if casinos have some strict ethical code they need to legally adhere to. They can do basically whatever, unfortunately. They can just say "you're too good, we don't want you betting with us"

AceMos posted...

on this subject reminder casinos can now have slot machines that are rigged as long as they are "interactive" thus they are games not gambling machines

Slot machines have their source code and physical guts audited by government gambling authorities in the US to ensure fair play.

Yes, youre almost definitely still going to lose if you play.

haloiscoolisbak posted...

This post is acting as if casinos have some strict ethical code they need to legally adhere to. They can do basically whatever, unfortunately. They can just say "you're too good, we don't want you betting with us"

Nah. I lived in Vegas. I know the casinos have no ethics. Its just funny to see them get butthurt when a player beats them at their own game.

1) Card counting isn't illegal anywhere. So long as you're not using an external aid or a partner, all you're doing is doing math in your head.

2) Most people don't understand how card counting works nearly as well as they think they do. The casinos love these people, because they tend to lose large sums of money.

3) On top of that, thanks to changes in how casinos run their blackjack games (including the auto-shufflers), counting cards is now much more difficult than it once was and a lot of the old methods simply do not work anymore.

4) On the off-chance that casinos do run across someone counting cards who actually knows what they're doing, you won't get dragged into a backroom and beaten or anything; at worst, they'll tell you to stop counting cards and if you keep going, they'll ban you from the blackjack tables (if they're allowed to - some governments have actually outlawed casinos banning players for "playing well", so long as they're not cheating).

Hollywood paints counting cards as way more dramatic/effective than it actually is and similarly plays up the casino's typical response.

Were_Wyrm posted...

Why don't casinos teach their dealers to count cards?

To what end?

Dealers are taught how to spot card-counters, so they understand the mechanics, but dealers in Blackjack are basically just dealing machines; they don't actually make any decisions on how to play. In nearly every casino, the dealer must hit if their total is 16 or less and must stand on 17 or more. Them knowing how likely a play is to be good or bad means nothing to them, because their plays are pre-determined.

LonelyStoner posted...

Nah. I lived in Vegas. I know the casinos have no ethics. Its just funny to see them get butthurt when a player beats them at their own game.

Okay yeah. The other guy's line about "if casinos don't like it, they need to-" amused me because like, if a casino doesn't like a customer for any reason they can say they don't want to take any more bets from him. They don't consent to risking any more money basically. It's fucked up how much power they actually have over their players

BloodyBenten posted...

Slot machines have their source code and physical guts audited by government gambling authorities in the US to ensure fair play.

Yes, youre almost definitely still going to lose if you play.

there are slot machines that are allowed in states where its illegal to gamble

because they are not considered gambling do to being "interactive"

you can change 1 thing you rolled to what ever you want thus by our laws tht makes them "games"

Counting cards against the casino is fine, fuck 'em.

Counting cards at, like, weekly poker night is a dick move.

haloiscoolisbak posted...

if a casino doesn't like a customer for any reason they can say they don't want to take any more bets from him.

This is true for any business refusing service to someone (excluding illegal discrimination).

Because it's considered cheating

Major screen peaking energy from TC

DrizztLink posted...

Counting cards against the casino is fine, fuck 'em.

Counting cards at, like, weekly poker night is a dick move.

Knowing which cards are potentially still on the table/deck is a fundamental part of playing poker competitively. Card counting is a blackjack term.

haloiscoolisbak posted...

This post is acting as if casinos have some strict ethical code they need to legally adhere to. They can do basically whatever, unfortunately. They can just say "you're too good, we don't want you betting with us"

They could, but that's still having to deal with counters (which will include, I'm sure, a lot of false positives).

I'm saying what they would need to do in order to not have to deal with them. Expecting players to not do anything that could give them any sort of advantage in a casino game is asinine.

DipDipDiver posted...

Because it's considered cheating

Card counting is not considered cheating by any casino in the US, which is why its not something players get arrested for if a casino suspects them of doing it.

BloodyBenten posted...

Knowing which cards are potentially still on the table/deck is a fundamental part of playing poker competitively. Card counting is a blackjack term.

My mistake, just pretend that line said "blackjack" and the point stands.

DrizztLink posted...

My mistake, just pretend that line said "blackjack" and the point stands.

Do you know anyone who has a weekly blackjack night?

BloodyBenten posted...

This is true for any business refusing service to someone (excluding illegal discrimination).

Yeah, but it seems extra fucked in a situation like this right? You can stay a casino customer as long as you're losing money to us. If you start winning, we flip the table over, fold our arms and go "no more playing". Like it seems so unfair lol

BloodyBenten posted...

Card counting is not considered cheating by any casino in the US, which is why its not something players get arrested for if a casino suspects them of doing it.

You don't always get arrested for cheating at a casino, they pretty much only do that if you're doing it with very large sums. And card counting would be basically impossible to prove so of course they aren't going to have you arrested for that

DipDipDiver posted...

You don't always get arrested for cheating at a casino, they pretty much only do that if you're doing it with very large sums. And card counting would be basically impossible to prove so of course they aren't going to have you arrested for that

If you walk into a casino with a notarized letter admitting to counting cards and explicitly detailing how and present it to the casino security staff you still wont be arrested because, as I said, it isnt illegal.

The same is not true for any kind of actual cheating.

What is counting cards exactly? Is it just keeping track of what cards have been used in play? Doesnt the dealer just shuffle them back anyways?

haloiscoolisbak posted...

Yeah, but it seems extra fucked in a situation like this right? You can stay a casino customer as long as you're losing money to us. If you start winning, we flip the table over, fold our arms and go "no more playing". Like it seems so unfair lol

They want your money. If anything theyre more up front about it than many other operations.

Ive seen people kicked out of bars for not buying enough drinks. Ive seen people kicked out of strip clubs for not buying dances.

BloodyBenten posted...

Do you know anyone who has a weekly blackjack night?

Does it fucking matter?

It's a thrown-together comparison, not my doctoral thesis.

Seaman_Prime posted...

What is counting cards exactly? Is it just keeping track of what cards have been used in play? Doesnt the dealer just shuffle them back anyways?

Yes and no.

Its not keeping a running tally of exactly how many of each card has been played. Its a scoring system based on the type of card indicating the likelihood of high or low value cards coming up. Its something that sounds very easy to do, but is actually quite difficult.

And Another user already pointed out its less and less effective because dealers use more and more decks at casinos these days.

The dealer does not shuffle cards back into the decks after each hand. One of the reasons for this is because the perception of skilled players being able to beat the house is a huge draw for blackjack at casinos.

BloodyBenten posted...

If you walk into a casino with a notarized letter admitting to counting cards and explicitly detailing how and present it to the casino security staff you still wont be arrested because, as I said, it isnt illegal.

The same is not true for any kind of actual cheating.

If you say so. I don't think there not being a specific state law makes it not cheating, and it absolutely is treated as cheating by casinos

https://gamble-usa.com/casino-guides/why-card-counting-is-illegal/

DipDipDiver posted...

If you say so.

https://gamble-usa.com/casino-guides/why-card-counting-is-illegal/

Did you read your own link? The example they give is getting arrested for trespassing after youve been banned from a casino.

BloodyBenten posted...

Did you read your own link? The example they give is getting arrested for trespassing after youve been banned from a casino.

I did read my link, it explains why card counting is considered cheating which would be the basis for getting banned in the first place. The topic isn't about it being against the law

Seaman_Prime posted...

What is counting cards exactly? Is it just keeping track of what cards have been used in play? Doesnt the dealer just shuffle them back anyways?

I tried learning a long time ago but I never ever wanted to go to a casino, so it was only among friends. I'll try to summarise what I remember.

First, card counting is not nearly as helpful beyond possibly affecting your strategy of what move to make given your hand vs the house's visible card for that one hand alone, if the deck is always shuffled between hands.

Memorising each card played is not really feasible for most people. Instead, you memorise a sort of extremely lossy form of the deck composition as opposed to a lossless 'here is every played card'. This lossy form will tie into both how much you range your bets and what choices you make in your hands.

The count form I learnt was Hi-Opt I believe. You remembered two numbers -- a primary 'counter' and the number of aces used. The primary counter is incremented for certain cards (3-7 iirc, but that was years ago in a book already falling apart, so better strategies probably exist) and decremented for 10's and face cards. The general statistics of this is that most majour choices in your hand play revolve around betting on the next card being a 10 value card. The more 10 value cards yet to be dealt, the greater your chance you can depend on the next card being a 10. With more 10s, the chance of having a strong hand against the dealer, or having a good chance to make the most of a combined '11' total hand with a double, increases. Thus, you bet more to make the most out of the more favourable conditions. You bet less when the conditions are less favourable.

None of this matters however, without understanding the Basic Strategy, which is a countless statistical analysis of which plays are statistically the best given the cards you have, and the top card the dealer is showing. You cannot win over the long haul with that alone, but you can lose less. Card counting is what gives you the extra edge to reliably win in the long run. Winning in the short run for casino games is always possible, but the odds are typically stacked so that the long run will gravitate towards player loss.

Of course, there are more advanced strategies. You card count to range your bets, now memorise what plays to change when the count changes. The idea is that you start simple. Each new piece gives you a greater edge at the cost of more mental focus. Eventually you reach diminishing returns, but the basic idea is that you choose a counting method that is A) statistically sound and B) has only as much complexity as you are willing to put up with.

And of course, the rules of the game can further skew things to force you to use more difficult methods. The more decks in play, the less of an advantage you actually end up having. Whether the dealer can hit on soft 17 (17 value made with an ace) are some other tiny rule changes that each have an affect on play and how the strategy may have to be adjusted for that particular table.

As I said, I've never played in a casino and this was always an intellectual exercise with me and my friends when we were young as a sort of fun, and even with a simple strategy it is hard to do, because losing count of even a single number can be easy if you aren't used to it. But that's the general gist -- you are mapping the input data (cards used) into simpler forms (a counter, possibly multiple, possibly a double increment for Hi Opt 2), and then using that to inform your betting amounts for the current hand, and augmenting your basic hand play strategy when applicable.

At my local casino the staff were outright teaching a group of elderly people how to count cards, and even did so correctly, but they were all playing digital blackjack :/

Plus, mathed it out, they just changed the payouts so that even with perfect counts there's still a house edge

Giant_Aspirin posted...

im under the impression that as long as you dont use any 'external device' it's tolerated since most spots in Vegas use 4-6 decks (maybe more?). but ofc if you win regularly, a casino will ask you to leave because they're in the business of making money.

This (more or less).
I work in a casino.

It's cheating in my book. Some have the right to cheat.

DipDipDiver posted...

You don't always get arrested for cheating at a casino, they pretty much only do that if you're doing it with very large sums.

This is 100% not true.

Casinos have a *huge* culture against cheating. If you're caught cheating, even for a miniscule amount, you will be kicked out. Old casino hands will tell you that you will be seen more favourably if you steal $100 out of the register at the front desk than if you cheat for $1 at the tables.

DipDipDiver posted...

I don't think there not being a specific state law makes it not cheating, and it absolutely is treated as cheating by casinos

Dude, card counting is just math. Math is not illegal, it's not cheating, and no casino will treat it that way. As above, at best if you're able to reliably beat the house (via card-counting - which is very difficult to do at modern casinos - or some other legal method), they will tell you to stop playing blackjack, but they will happily serve you at any other of their games. They don't do that with cheaters - if you cheat at poker, you don't just get banned from the poker tables, you get kicked out of the casino and/or arrested.

Cheating requires you to use some sort of an external aid (a thumper, a calculator, a mirror that allows you to see others' cards, etc.) and/or have a way of coordinating with another person (earpiece, code, hand-signals, etc.). If it's some strategy you can do in your head, by yourself, then by definition it isn't cheating, because it's something anyone can do. "Counting cards" is just the name for a specific strategy for playing optimally which, y'know, is literally the point of games like Blackjack.

You seem like you learned everything you know about card counting from Rain Man, because it's not indicative of reality.

darkknight109 posted...

This is 100% not true.

Casinos have a *huge* culture against cheating. If you're caught cheating, even for a miniscule amount, you will be kicked out. Old casino hands will tell you that you will be seen more favourably if you steal $100 out of the register at the front desk than if you cheat for $1 at the tables.

I know they will kick you out, but what I said, and what you are arguing against here, is that people don't always get arrested for cheating which is true. Unless you're cheating for a substantial amount of money you are unlikely to be arrested.

As for the rest of your post, those are just your opinions. The link I posted pretty thoroughly explains why it is considered cheating and why casino operators specifically consider it cheating. I've never watched Rain Man so I don't know what you think I got from that

Idk it just really doesnt sound like cheating to me as long as youre doing it all in your head. Maybe the casinos should git gud