Blackjack Stacking
A “popular” method of blackjack stacking, disadvantageous for the player, consists of arranging the cards in low—high or high— low order. This is, generally, done when the cards are removed from the table. It is not necessary that all the cards be arranged in low—high or high—low order. For the blackjack player to be at a disadvantage it is enough that the pack contains one or more such sequences.
When the pack contains several low—high or high—low sequences, the casino dealer has an additional advantage. For example, assume that he dealt a high card. Then, the probability that the next two game cards are low and high is greater than normal. Hence, if he wants a low blackjack card he will deal the next one. If he wants a high card he will deal a second.
In relation to low—high and high—low stockings, the following experiment is of interest: A 52-card deck was divided into two parts, which were denoted L and H, respectively. In L we put all the low cards plus two 8s and in H, all the high cards plus two 8s. To facilitate the discussion below we shall refer to the cards in L as low cards and to those in H as high cards. The deck was set “at random” in low—high order. Hence, the first card was from L, the second from H, the third from L, the fourth from H, etc. A blackjack game was dealt to an imaginary player. The game was “honest” except for the stacking of the deck mentioned above, and was played under basic rules. No card was burnt. The game continued as long as the deck contained enough cards to complete the player’s and the dealer’s hands. The player bet one unit on each hand. The number of units, lost or won by the player was recorded.
The experiment was repeated 500 times. The same type of experiment was then repeated, 500 times, with decks set in high—low order. The results were the following:
In the case when the decks were set in low—high order the player lost a total of 1710 units.
In the case when the decks were set in high—low order the player lost a total of 1130 units.