Blackjack in Supreme Court
Further to our recent piece on why a fifth of online blackjack players are mistaken, casinos in Indiana are taking the subject of offline card-counting to the supreme court. The question is not whether card counting itself is a legal activity (it is) but whether casinos have a legal right to ban players from counting cards on their premises.
Some readers might assume that it would be a good thing if the supreme court rules that casinos can’t legally ban card-counters. After all, that would make it perfectly acceptable to count cards without fear of getting caught and – if one can develop enough card-counting skill – to potentially take the house for as much profit as possible. However, such thinking is rather short-sighted, because banning card-counters is by no means the only defence that casinos have available to them.
If it were decided that card-counters cannot be banned by casinos – at least in Indiana – then the casinos would be able to solve the problem by changing the rules of the game itself. One simple, though drastic, way of thwarting card counters would be to take the same approach that online casinos take, and shuffle the cards after every hand has been played. Card counting would instantly be rendered useless, and the casinos would once again have the upper hand.
A less dramatic change would be to shuffle the cards in use more often than they are under current rules. This would give card-counters a slightly better chance of winning over the long term, but would not enable them to raid the coffers of the casino in an unbridled manner. Of course, whether the casinos would be prepared to make such a concession to card-counters is another matter altogether.
Yet another option would be to change the payouts made to winning players to factor in the potential damage that card-counting could to do the casino house edge. By shortening the odds for settled bets, the house edge would increase for the casino, and it could be increased to the point where even the most experienced blackjack card-counter would have trouble eliminating it entirely.
We look forward with great interest to hearing what Indiana’s Supreme Court has to say on the issue of banning card counters, and if the card-counters win then we will be even more interested in seeing how the casinos respond.
Article Published: 14/06/2010 11:59:22
