Consider that if there are five players at a single-deck table in Reno and you count the first round of cards, you will have seen approximately 33% of the deck. A Red Seven Count of +3 would indicate a player edge of about 2 1/2%. You will never see an edge like this after watching only one round of a 6-deck shoe game. In single-deck games, this occurs frequently. You do not need to use extensive strategy tables if you play only in such advantageous situations.

Single-deck games should be a gravy train for knowledgeable low stakes players. Playing multiple hands, you may be able to get more than 100 hands per hour by Wonging in on any plus count in the big South Tahoe casinos. This is a lot of action with quarter chips, and using the Red Seven Count, the player edge is about 1%. With the Zen Count, I would estimate a 1 1/2% edge. You can’t estimate your edge with any kind of precision for this approach because of the varying conditions—different numbers of players at the tables, various deck depletions, betting on various numbers of simultaneous hands, et cetera—but low stakes players should strive to play fewer hands at higher advantages. Just don’t try to get away with too much: If you see an edge of 6%, and in one-deck games that will happen, don’t forget that this is a low stakes strategy. A $50 or $60 bet could get you booted at some saw-dust joints.

casino online personnel are not ignorant of table-hopping, and just as there are many shoe games that disallow mid-shoe entry, there are some hand-held games that disallow mid-deck entry. One-deck Wonging works best when the crowd conditions are busy, and when your big bet is overshadowed by many other bets on the tables where you jump in. This strategy would easily beat The BJ Pays 6:5 games now popular in Las Vegas, but most of these tables have posted “No Mid-Deck Entry” signs.

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One of my favorite methods of depth-charging in Reno and Tahoe used to be to Wong it in crowded single-deck games, that is, table-hop and play only when the count is favorable. This is a depth-charging strategy that can be employed by card counters using any valid counting system, though this strategy is primarily for small stakes players.

In the big casinos, I had no trouble getting away with this strategy making single quarter ($25) bets. I've also done it with no heat betting single $20 bills. This style of play also works best when there are other big bettors at the table. If you bet a single quarter on a table where other players are betting multiple greens and blacks, no dealer will shuffle on you, nor will you get a second glance from the pit. If you jump around betting quarters where everyone else is betting nickels (or silver!), you are more likely to raise suspicion. Do not expect to get away with this strategy with black ($100) chips or stacks of quarters anywhere.

Playing a single hand, I was able to get an average of 38 hands every hour, table-hopping crowded single-deck games, and my average edge was about 3%. I also tried playing as many as three hands depending on how many spots I could grab, according to the number of players at the table and their positions. In sum, I got about 70 hands per hour, with an estimated edge of about 2%. I played at tables where at least three other players were playing, and usually there were four or five.

One problem I encountered was not always knowing how deeply into the deck the dealer had gone. Some of my bets were met with a shuffle-up, not because the dealer was paranoid about counters, but rather out of necessity. In such cases, I played through the hands and doubled my bet size or walked on the next round, depending on the count. I did not sit down to play, but stood behind the vacant seat. I never felt any heat.

Using the Red Seven Count, you should be able to get about 25 to 30 hands per hour, at an average edge of about 3%, by betting only at a running count of +3 or higher. Betting quarters, this means a potential gain of $20 per hour. It may seem like a slow grind, but for players on limited funds there is wisdom to playing hands only when you enjoy such a large edge. Your negative fluctuations will be considerably reduced, and playing 25 hands per hour with a 3% edge will win at the same rate as 75 hands per hour with a 1% edge.

After 100 hours of play with $25 bets, each approach would potentially net a win of $1,875. The player with the 3% edge, however, will have put one-third as much money into action as the 1 % edge player, who is playing three times faster. The faster player with the smaller edge would need a bankroll almost twice as large as the slow player to cope with his larger fluctuation.

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The problem, however, for the guy on third base, is in seeing everyone else's cards. There are various ways of going about this, limited only by the bounds of your own creativity.
One, you could be very friendly at a table full of friendly players, and simply get them all to show you their hands as they play. Many players do not try to hide their hands from other players, so this is not necessarily all that difficult for a gregarious sort who chooses his tables wisely.

Two, you could play with friends or other counters who would happily show you their hands. Since many players already do this at blackjack tables, it doesn't look all that suspicious. In fact, you don't need six friends to join you at the table—it would be more practical to pull this off with two friends who could play two hands each, while you play three hands on the third base side of the table.

Three, you could play with one or two friends who position themselves at the table in order to see the player cards that you can't. They don't have to tell you exactly which cards they see, just the change in the count. Such information could easily be passed via simple signals.

Four, a non-player accompanying you to the table might, while standing behind you, be better able to view the cards hidden from you.
These are just a few examples; perhaps you can think of more -variations on this theme.

DEFINITION
Depth-charging is using the depth of the deal as the primary method of gaining a long-run advantage, rather than relying on a betting spread based on card counting.
Since casinos often recognize the traditional betting strategies of card counters, the depth-charger employs a betting strategy that is not based on his count. His playing strategy is so much more effective deep in the deck that he gets a major edge over the house.

With a multiple-player approach, you may be able to camouflage your play by haphazardly sizing bets on the first base side of the table. Some of the spots on the first base side may also be played using useless progression systems, with significantly smaller bets than those being placed on the third base side.

A husband and wife team wrote to me, saying that they used this method of play successfully in a unique partnership approach: The wife sat to the right of the husband and played three spots with low bets, and on every hand, she consulted her husband on how to play. In fact, she did not know basic strategy. The husband sometimes gave her correct advice, and sometimes he didn't—which made him look like a showoff. He, meanwhile, played either one or two spots on the third base side of the table, at substantially higher stakes than his wife. He always played his own hands according to the correct count strategy.

When depth-charging, you must be careful not to appear too interested in other players' hands, since this may look suspicious. Your primary camouflage, however, which is not betting according to the count, should work very well, protecting you from drawing the casino's suspicion.

Note: The value of depth-charging comes from accurately playing your cards at deep shuffle points. If you do not accurately employ strategy tables to alter your play according to the count, flat-bet depth-charging is worthless. Likewise, you will realize significant gains at deep shuffle points by knowing some of the less-used strategy indices. I would advise depth-chargers to learn the more extensive Zen Count strategy tables provided in the Appendix. It is important that you realize that your gain comes from seeing and using as much card information as you can get before playing your hand. Simply sitting at a full table without getting the necessary information on the other players' downcards is not going to help you win.

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Casinos primarily identify counters by watching for bet variation. If you don't bet like a counter, you won't usually be marked as one, regardless of how accurately you play your cards. It is very easy for a counter catcher to count down a deck from behind or above you, using any card counting system, while monitoring your bet size. Regardless of what counting system you use, your bet-sizing will give you away. A Red Seven player would raise and lower his bets similarly to a Zen Count player. A counter using any other valid counting system would have no difficulty detecting the conspicuous betting patterns of either player.

Most camouflage techniques are used to disguise bet variation. Such techniques inevitably hurt your potential win rate, but without camouflage you will be frequently shuffled-up on, and probably barred if you play for high stakes.
Depth-charging is a single-deck strategy that allows you to play a winning game without using a betting spread based on your count. This strategy is not recommended for Red Seven players—to take advantage of depth-charging gains, you want a system that is strong on playing strategy.

Single-deck games can be beaten with a flat bet, but you need a deep shuffle point to pull it off. Deep penetration is hard to come by in one-deck games these days, because the casinos know that counters can beat these games easily. Still, some four-plus decades after Thorp, I continue to get regular reports from players on deeply dealt one-deck games they've found.

One type of game that often has a deep shuffle point is the full-table game, when two rounds are dealt. These games are rare in Las Vegas, but still fairly common in Northern Nevada, especially in many of Nevada' smaller towns. The problem with these games is that they are always dealt face down, and some players hide their cards. The deep shuffle point is worthless if you cannot see the other players' cards prior to making your decisions. If you can see the other guys' cards, however, this type of game can be very valuable.
So, let's look at just how valuable.

If I set up a seven-player table, with two rounds between shuffles, and I allow the third-base player, who is using the Zen Count, to see all of the cards of the players who play their hands before him, with a flat bet he will win at the rate of 0.77%. (This is with Reno rules, which allow doubling on 10 and 11 only, and the dealer hits soft 17; with downtown Las Vegas rules, where you can double on any two cards, but the dealer still hits soft 17, the flat-betting third base player will win at the rate of 1.06%, assuming he can see all of the other players' cards.)

This player can do quite a bit better than 0.77% if he uses a conservative betting spread. For instance, if he were to always come off the top with a 2-unit bet, and only lower it to 1 unit on the second round if the count goes negative, his Reno win rate would be 0.92%, as opposed to 1.23% in Downtown Vegas.

With a more aggressive 1 to 2 betting spread, where he came off the top with one unit, then raised to 2 units on any positive count, his Reno expectation would go up to 1.31%, and 1.60% in downtown Vegas. All of this data was obtained from running simulations of 10 million hands each with John Imming's Universal Blackjack Engine software. Here is the data in chart form:

Zen Count, Third Base, Full Table, 10 Million Hands Each
Flat Bet 1-2 (2 off top) 1-2 (1 off top) Reno: 0.77% 0.92% 1.31%
DT Vegas: 1.06% 1.23% 1.60%

Naturally, if you could find better rules than these, the expectations would be even higher from the same ultraconservative betting strategies. Note also that this approach is weak from the first base position. Seeing just four fewer cards per-round before making his decisions, the first base player's win rates for these betting schemes is barely half of the third base player's.

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A master of any martial art does not conquer his opponent; he lets his opponent beat himself. The opponent loses the battle because the smart fighter knows how to turn the other man's strengths into weaknesses. The master wins not because he is physically stronger, but because he is mentally a step ahead of his adversary. The master is an invisible catalyst—the opponent never sees his downfall coming. His own strength and momentum hurl him to the ground even while he's watching out for the master's attack.

Playing blackjack for profit isn't all that different. Your opponent, the casino, has vast strength in the form of an incredibly large bankroll. Furthermore, the house sets all the rules and may eliminate any opponent it considers a worthy challenger. This is a tough setup—not only do you have to play very well in order to win, but if you look like you play well, you may not be allowed to play at all.

The major weakness of the casinos, however, is that their advantage over the player is volatile. Sometimes they have a large advantage, but occasionally they're vulnerable to the knowledgeable player.

In the same way that a martial arts master does not depend on his muscles to win a fight, a master of blackjack does not depend on some incredibly difficult, advanced, multi-parameter counting system to win money at the tables. Nor does he depend on the superior strength of his bankroll; he knows that his bankroll is inferior to his opponent's. Rather, he allows the volatility of the game to put money into his pockets at its own rate. He remains invisible as a counter because he does not exploit his own strengths as much as he exploits the casino's weaknesses.

Single-deck games are volatile, and the change in advantage is fast and great. Multi-deck games are less volatile—the change in the advantage is slow. The master counter employs different strategies for each game, designed to disguise his counting strategy, while at the same time maximizing his win rate. These are some of his strategies:

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Look at the first chart, titled "Half-Kelly 10K Starting Bank-Downswing." This chart shows your ideal bets when you want to play at the half-Kelly level of risk, starting with a $10,000 bankroll, betting one, two, or three simultaneous hands. This chart shows what happens to your ideal bets when your bankroll is diminishing, as your bets go down as your bankroll decreases from $10,000 to $9,000 to $8,000 and so on. All bets are rounded to the nearest $10 increment, though this is not necessarily the most practical bet when playing blackjack. If the chart shows that your ideal bet is $70 or $80, you might want to just bet three green chips ($75) for convenience. This will not have any drastic effect on your overall fluctuation or results.

Example: If my $10K starting bank has gone down to $8K due to negative flux, and my true edge tells me that I have a 2 1/2% advantage after deducting the house edge off the top, then according to the chart I would ideally place one hand of $80, two $60 hands, or three $40 hands. If you can spot these entries in the chart, then that's all there is to it. You may find that in some instances the "ideal" bets for two or three hands are the same, which is a result of rounding to the nearest $10. In fact, the ideal two-hand bet will be somewhat greater than the three-hand bet. But don't worry about over-betting—because we are betting only at the half-Kelly level, betting slightly more than the ideal amount isn't at all significant. We have already largely decreased our flux by not betting anywhere near full-Kelly.

The second chart shows how your bets increase when your $10K starting bank is on the upswing. If you cut all chart entries in half, note also how impractical it is for a player on a $10K bank to minimize his risk by betting at the quarter-Kelly level, especially if his starting bank goes into a downswing. The bet sizes are so small that it is difficult to get a substantial enough win rate per hour to make your playing worth the effort.
At half-Kelly with this $10K bankroll, the player will assume more risk, and greater fluctuations, but his hourly rate may be high enough to justify his time and effort at the tables.

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Playing multiple hands simultaneously when you have the advantage can also cut fluctuations in the long run. Your overall fluctuations go down when you place twice as many bets with smaller amounts on each hand. Some pros, as a rule, always play two hands when they have the edge, and only one hand when they don't. As your expectation rises, multiple simultaneous hands are also often a good idea because they will camouflage your spread, and let you get more money into action when you have the edge.

There are also many other reasons why pros may occasionally want to play multiple hands. If the casino you are playing in is infested with table-hopping card counters, increasing to multiple-hand play at positive counts keeps these players off your table. Likewise, if you're "shuffle tracking" (an advanced technique covered in a later chapter), multiple-hand play works to get the greatest proportion of high cards in a "slug" delivered to you.

But playing two simultaneous hands will increase the fluctuation of your bankroll if you place the same big bet on both hands based on your true edge. To decrease this fluctuation, you must cut back on the size of your multiple high bets. If you play two hands, both hands together should be about 1 1/2 times the standard high bet you'd place if you were playing only one hand.

Example: if your standard high bet is $100, then play two hands of $75 each. Do not play more than two simultaneous hands unless you believe it is the last round of the shoe, and you also believe the advantage is high enough to justify the extra bets. With three simultaneous hands, do not bet more than 60% of your single-hand high bet on each hand.
Also note that even with only one hand on the table, when you have a full 1.0% advantage, your "ideal" full-Kelly bet is only 0.75% of your bank, not a full 1.0%. This is to compensate for the double/split options at blackjack, which increase fluctuations.

The two charts on the following pages present your ideal half-Kelly bets when you are playing one, two, or three hands. I suggest that before you begin play in a casino, you draw up a betting chart that shows "correct" bets for your actual bankroll. I've used a "generic" $10,000 bankroll for these charts, so if you have a $30,000 bankroll, you can just multiply these bets by three. It should not be difficult to figure out your ideal half-Kelly bets with any size bank, using these charts as a guide. Obviously, if you have the bankroll to play a less risky quarter-Kelly betting strategy, then you can just cut all of the bets in the charts in half.

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