Card Counting – A General Overview

Card counting is a popular strategy used in casino card games in order to determine when a player has a probability advantage over the house. The term is largely used among Blackjack players and refers to the monitoring of the ratio of high cards to low cards during play. The basic idea behind card counting in Blackjack is that a deck of cards featuring a high proportion of high cards to low cards is advantageous for the player, while the opposite situation is advantageous for the dealer (the house).

Although some may think that a successful card counter must have vast gaming experience and highly developed playing skills, Blackjack card counting has nothing to do with prior gaming knowledge. This is simply because card counters do not track and memorize specific cards. Instead, card counting strategy users assign a convenient point score to every exposed card and then track solely the total score. Thus, counting the cards during play becomes a rather simple task.

The basic card counting system assigns a positive, negative, or no value to each card in the deck. As the game proceeds, the count is adjusted based on each card's assigned value. In this particular system, the cards 2 through 6 are assigned a value of +1. Tens through aces are assigned a value of -1. Cards 7, 8, and 9 have zero value (0). Although different card-counting systems have already been invented and put to use, this plus-minus count is one of the most basic and easy-to-grasp systems.

Over the years, casinos have tried to implement different counter-measures designed to curb card counters and prevent them from making any Blackjack profits. Among these preventing measures is harassment of suspected card counters by casino employees. Sometimes, the dealer would initiate a conversation with the alleged card counter just to make them lose their concentration. Other such measures include more frequent shuffling or shuffling when a player increases the size of his bet. Finally, some casino establishments would go as far as changing the rules of splitting or playing multiple hands simultaneously.

While traditional card counters have numerous versatile strategies to rely on, online card counting enthusiasts are facing major difficulties and practically no solutions. This is simply because online casinos have better prevention systems than their land-based counterparts. Basically, the mere fact that online dealers shuffle-up after every hand already represents a great problem for card counters. Bottom line? There is really very little money to be made counting cards over the Internet...

All in all, while in certain circumstances card counting strategies provide skilled players with significant winnings, in others they to have no value at all. The decision of whether to use a card counting technique during play at all is obviously up to the player!