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Optical Recognition System To Foil Card Counting?
Adair writes "Wired is running this article about a new Optical Recognition System by MindPlay being evaluated by some casinos to keep constant track of table game play in order to identify card counters by their patterns of play. The software, using 14 digital cameras around the table, can keep track of every card played, amounts bet, and even tell the difference between your drink, napkin, cards, chips, and ashtrays."
They already do this to an extent with the video cameras. Video cameras are placed to watch every card that is dealt. They can see it on the monitors if they suspect someone of card counting. An experienced pit boss knows the difference between someone who is card counting and someone who isn't.
The problem with automating this system is what about false positives? There's a difference between patterns being identified by humans and patterns being identified by computers.
My journal has hot
Well casinos get to make the rules, as long as there are suckers who actually beleive that they have a chance in hell to make a buck off the house...
Counting is a way of turning the odds in your favor, hence it defeats the whole purpose of the house. Almost every game in Vegas is designed to have favorable odds for the house, maybe all except poker in which the house just takes fee. Couting levels the playing field somewhat, and well.... did you expect the casinos to leave it like that?
I can't possibly see why casinos would want to attempt to put the few "scorers" out of commission. After all, a "lucky" guy at blackjack (who counts cards) probably brings more people in to play the game. More people= more money.
On top of all that, most professional card counters use the greatest weapon of all to count cards. Their heads. So, all this will do is to put out the small time amateurs.
A friend of mine is a tech at a Casino in Detroit, and beleive me, any appropriately sized/layed out Casino is certainly not losing money, regardless of the people who play the game to earn a wage.
krystal_blade
It will be easy to motivate our fellow man; there is hardly anything people treasure more than not being annihilated.
No, they're going to identify regular players (i.e. players who lose), so that they can then encourage them to keep on losing by giving them free drinks and so on. From the article:
Instead, they say the true value of the system is giving casinos an accurate way to rate and comp regular players, who get free rooms, meals, show tickets and the like in return for routinely dropping small fortunes at the casino. That's extremely important, the casinos say, because these days, loyal players demand to get something back.
$ strings FTP.EXE | grep Copyright
@(#) Copyright (c) 1983 The Regents of the University of California.
This is interesting, but it sounds as though it is only useful against individual card counters. What could it do against a team of counters like in this older story by wired?
As far as "wayy more money than you win", blackjack basic strategy will have a player losing approximately $500 per $100,000 of bets. Craps pass line bets will have a player losing $1,300 per $100,000 of bets. (those figures are excluding short-term variance)
Casinos do want you to win some of the time, otherwise you won't go back.
Has anybody but me ever even been to Vegas?
I saw a guy sit down and hit 6 blackjacks in 10 hands. Of the remaining four hands he won two and lost two. He got up and walked and took his winnings with him. Noone gave him a second look - not the dealer, not the pit boss, not the casino manager - noone.
The truth is that all games are set up to the house's advantage. Some games are better for the player (Blackjack ~1% house advantage, Craps Odds bets - 0% house advantage) and some are *much* better for the house (Roulette - ~12% house advantage, Big Six wheel - up to 30% house advantage). In all cases, though, the house will take your money over a long run of time, how fast they take it depends on the game you play.
It is possible to get on a 'winning streak' where lady luck seems to be helping you out, and when that happens the smart thing to do is ride that streak until it ends and you lose a hand or two and then take your winnings and leave. It's that simple.
Winning streaks are few and far between, and the chances of you hitting a second streak before you give back all of your winnings (and more!) is very, very slim.
There are two ways to come away a winner in a casino - one is to follow the advice I list here (which you will find in any reputable book on betting strategies), the other is to get extraordinarly lucky and hit a huge payout in a slot machine. Either way, take your money and go. If you stay, you will give it back.
A computer once beat me at chess, but it was no match for me at kick boxing -- Emo Phillips
Big cards are: 10, Jack, Queen, King, Ace Little cards are: 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 At the end of each hand keep a running total. For every little card think "Plus One". For every big card think "Minus one". So if a lot of little cards come out of the deck then the "running count" will go positive. If a lot of big cards come out of the deck then the "running count" will go negative.
Running count is not in itself a perfect indicator. It depends on how many decks of cards are still in the shoe. If you have a 6 deck shoe and it looks like there are about 4 decks left then divide your running count by 4. So if the running count is +8 and the number of decks in the shoe is roughly 4 then the actual count is 8/4=2. This is why you see dealers shuffling when the shoe is only half empty. A +10 with 5 decks is only a +2 actual count. A +10 with only 1 deck left in the shoe is a HUGE advantage.
How do you use the actual count? If the actual count is 0, 1 or negative then you bet the minimum amount. If the actual count is 2 or better then you multiply the minimum bet by that number. So if the minimum bet is $5 and the actual count is 2 then you bet $10. If the actual count is +4 then you bet $20.
ALL of this is also dependent upon you playing perfect basic strategy. If you have 15 and the dealer has a 4 showing what do you do? You need to know that strategy and play it perfectly every hand for card counting to give you any advantage at all.
There are many more systems that are more complex than this, but you have to trade off the increase in complexity with the increase in odds that benefit you. This basic Hi-Lo system will give you the most bang for your buck.
Last time I was playing (loseing at) blackjack, the dealer had a gizmo which could only be described as a perpetual shoe.
It contiuously shuffled the multiple decks of cards inside it. After each hand, all the cards just went in the top.
Try counting that!
---- "Logoff! That cookie shit makes me nervous!" - A. Soprano