Shoe games are not easy to beat, as we all know, and like most of you I'm always looking for a new approach or tool. Perhaps the biggest problem in 6 and 8 deck games is the time spent playing as underdog. Well, backcounting is one good answer to the problem, but in many cases this, for a variety of reasons, just is not possible. Is there an additional answer that can further our cause? Well, maybe:
Suppose I were to suggest that you should not go into a 6 deck game unless 2 complete decks are in the discard tray. Furthermore, you should consider those two decks as having no existance. At this point in time, what do we know:
1.Our knowledge of the deck is no different than when we enter the game at the start of the shoe. No, not quite the same, because we now know that the status of the cards have a 66% chance of being very close to neutral or somewhat positive. The same relation is true for close to neutral or somewhat negative. How do we take advantage of this limited knowledge without going down the drain in the process?
2.If we take a position and bet one unit, is this any more or less risk than at the start of the shoe? Of course not! Our information is hypothetical, to be sure, but if we begin counting or for basic strategy players, board counting, we can employ a conserative double deck bet spread with minium risk. Remember, we only have about 8 hands to go and if the trend is not positive, we remain at the single bet level.
In summary, we have engineered around 2 decks of disadvantage play. I think for 8 decks this ought to be 3 decks and play the same strategy. Sure there is some risk and it is my intent to do a pilot in much the same way that I tried the A/9 for backcounting, under the gun, real life.....