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Black Jack Strategies
"that's how you take the house's advantage!"
Short brief on Black Jack
The goal of Black Jack is that your cards value should be as close to 21 as possible. The strategy is also estabilished on this rule. Cards with numbers have their own value, other ones worth 10 and the Aces worth 11 or 1. It's good because if you happened to bust (more than 21) it drops from 11 to one. On the other hand it's bad because you may easily bust from 13-14 with an ace and an other hit. Okay.....i'll tell you more about this later.
The house's task in Black Jack is a bit different. They see your hand. But in their turn they can not stop under 17. Handycap for handycap.
You have Black Jack when you have a 10 card and an ace. If you got that you won automaticly. If the bank's first card is an ace then you will be asked whether you want to buy insurance or not. Usually it doesn't worth to buy insurance! I only buy insurance when i'm definitely in a loosing strike or if the house haven't got Black Jack for 2-3 times before in a row. When only the second card of the house is an ace then you autmaticly lose... that's Black Jack.
The winner is who has higher cards but max 21. You get double money when you win and 2,5x when you have Black Jack. If it happens to be draw then you get your bet back.
There are different versions such as Black Jack Double Exposure where you can see both cards of the dealer, but you are not allowed to draw!
Steps of the winning Black Jack strategy
It's really not too hard. First thing first you need to check the dealer's first card and your cards.Then you must check the tables below to know what to do and to know how to minimalize the advantage of the house.
Let's start with the meaning of "SOFT" and "HARD" hands. Soft hand is when you have an ace in the first deal. Hard hand is when you don't or you have 3 cards. The last case is when you got the two cards with the same value. (5,5.... J,K).
Soft hands
We check the dealer's card (first row) then our cards (left column):
D = double, if it's possible (if not we just hit it)
D/S = double, if not possible we stand
H = hit
S = stand
2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | T | A | |
A,9 | S | S | S | S | S | S | S | S | S | S |
A,8 | S | S | S | S | S | S | S | S | S | S |
A,7 | S | D/S | D/S | D/S | D/S | S | S | H | H | H |
A,6 | H | D | D | D | D | H | H | H | H | H |
A,5 | H | H | D | D | D | H | H | H | H | H |
A,4 | H | H | D | D | D | H | H | H | H | H |
A,3 | H | H | H | D | D | H | H | H | H | H |
A,2 | H | H | H | D | D | H | H | H | H | H |
After the first hit it is not a soft hand anymore but HARD!
Hard hands
Check the dealer's card (first row) then your cards (left column):
D = double, if not available we hit
H = hit
S = stand
2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | T | A | |
17 | S | S | S | S | S | S | S | S | S | S |
16 | S | S | S | S | S | H | H | H | H | H |
15 | S | S | S | S | S | H | H | H | H | H |
14 | S | S | S | S | S | H | H | H | H | H |
13 | S | S | S | S | S | H | H | H | H | H |
12 | H | H | S | S | S | H | H | H | H | H |
11 | D | D | D | D | D | D | D | D | D | H |
10 | D | D | D | D | D | D | D | D | H | H |
9 | H | D | D | D | D | H | H | H | H | H |
8 | H | H | H | H | H | H | H | H | H | H |
You got the same value cards (split)
So when to split a pair? After you split them your bet is doubled just like if you were playing with two hands.
S = split
- = do not split (hard hands)
2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | T | A | |
A,A | S | S | S | S | S | S | S | S | S | S |
10,10 | - | - | - | - | - | - | - | - | - | - |
9,9 | S | S | S | S | S | - | S | S | - | - |
8,8 | S | S | S | S | S | S | S | S | S | S |
7,7 | S | S | S | S | S | S | - | - | - | - |
6,6 | S | S | S | S | S | - | - | - | - | - |
5,5 | - | - | - | - | - | - | - | - | - | - |
4,4 | - | - | - | S | S | - | - | - | - | - |
3,3 | S | S | S | S | S | S | - | - | - | - |
2,2 | S | S | S | S | S | S | - | - | - | - |
So you always split ace and 8 pairs but never split 10 and 5 pairs. After you split an ace pair naturally they will be soft hands....if not Black Jacks! :)
Betting strategy in Black Jack
Unlike the roulette strategy we have no extra options here. We can use the Martingale or the Anti-Martingale strategy. According to the game and my experiences we better use a version of the Anti-Martingale strategy in Black Jack!
It's quite simple: if we won raise the bet with one unit. If we lose then we will lower the next bet with one unit. If we have a good, lucky serie then we won more and if it turns to a bad serie we will lose less. That's all!
Let's se an example, the demo of the strategy:
Round | Bet | Won / Lose | Net earnings |
1 | 1 | l | -1 |
2 | 1 | l | -2 |
3 | 1 | w | -1 |
4 | 2 | w | 1 |
5 | 3 | l | -2 |
6 | 2 | w | 0 |
7 | 3 | w | 3 |
8 | 4 | w | 7 |
9 | 5 | w | 12 |
Slowly but surely there will be a point when the bet could rise up to 10. We must follow the strategy and mine says that i'll only put up max 6-8 units on the table. If we won it's great, if not... well it's still better than losing more. The limit is one of the rules of the table: usually there is a 10 unit limit on lower budget tables.
It's important that the betting strategy in Black Jack is a bit moody... i mean you must feel and catch the good, winning series and know how to deal with the bad, losing ones. If you can win easily 2-3-4 times after each other with 20-21-s then it was a good serie, next time you can try doubling the bet. If it's a losing strike or a changing one i always put up the minimal bet after a loss, so one unit... or just finish the game. Anyway you better start with the standard strategy above! After 4-5 months of playing Black Jack every day you can experiment with your own way.

How to play? Tools and experiences!
Playing Black Jack is a bit different compared to roulette. You can not lose that much after doubleing but you can have a really long bad serie and that's where strategy comes into play.
- In the first 1-2 rounds of a day you are likely to have a winning serie but this not neccessarily mean that you will win with the first bet.
- You can get crap cards from the dealer in a good serie too.
- In a bad serie you better start from a 1 unit bet after you lose.
- SIGNS OF BAD SERIE: you ask for a hit and you get bust with the third card from 12-13. The dealer has too much of Black Jacks.
- If you happen to get a bad serie but you have nice earnings you must lower the bet! If a Black Jack comes don't trust it... just after the second winner round: the good serie is likely to come!
- Only buy insurance when the dealer did not had Black Jack for 2-3 times before in a row.
- FOLLOW THE STRATEGY!!!
There are Tools such as the bro of Roulette Sniper: the Black Jack Sniper. It's free to try and they give a 60 days moneyback guarantee for any reasons..... so it worth a try!
Basicly it's really usefull but it uses the same strategy what i described for hitting, splitting! For betting it uses the Martingale strategy, so raising the bet after losing.
There is an unbeatable thing about this tool: it can count cards!!! If you like to play at live cam dealers (they work with limited decks) my advise would be using this program definitely.
Read on the Black Jack Sniper description, manual!