Blackjack

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The casino game of twenty-one was introduced to the US in the 19th century but it was not until the middle of the 20th century that a strategy was developed to defeat the house in black jack. This article is going to grab a swift peak at the birth of that system, Counting Cards.

When wagering was legitimized in the state of Nevada in 1934, chemin de fer sky-rocketed into popularity and was most commonly gambled on with one or 2 decks. Roger Baldwin published a paper in ‘56 which detailed how to reduce the casino advantage built on odds and performance history which was very confusing for players who were not mathematicians.

In ‘62, Dr. Ed Thorp utilized an IBM 704 computer to better the mathematical strategy in Baldwin’s paper and also developed the first techniques for counting cards. Dr. Thorp wrote a tome called "Beat the Dealer" which illustrated card counting strategies and the practices for reducing the casino advantage.

This created a massive increase in black jack gamblers at the US betting houses who were trying to implement Dr. Thorp’s strategies, much to the bewilderment of the casinos. The technique was challenging to understand and complicated to carry through and therefore heightened the profits for the betting houses as more and more people took to wagering on black jack.

However this massive increase in earnings wasn’t to continue as the players became more highly developed and more insightful and the system was further improved. In the 80’s a bunch of students from Massachusetts Institute of Technology made counting cards a part of the regular vernacular. Since then the casinos have brought in numerous methods to thwart card counters including, more than one deck, shoes, constant shuffle machines, and speculation has itnow sophisticated computer programs to scrutinize actions and detect "cheaters". While not against the law being caught counting cards will get you banned from many brick and mortar casinos in sin city.