Shuffling machines bad news
Fifty years ago, blackjack was dealt with a single deck of cards, the dealer dealt all the way through the deck and then shuffled the cards by hand. My, how things have changed!
These days, the typical game is dealt with a six-deck shoe, they deal out maybe 4½ of those six decks and then shuffle -- sometimes by hand and sometimes by machine.
Now, anybody who's cut their eyeteeth on blackjack knows that all else being equal, the more decks the casino plays with, the more the percentages favor the house. A lot fewer players realize that the smaller the portion of the shoe they deal out, the tougher the game gets to beat. That's the subject of today's article.
In blackjack, the house has a small, but definite advantage over all but the very most skilled players. So by and large, time is money. The more hands a blackjack dealer can slam out in an hour, the more money the house makes.
The Autoshuffler: That was the primary reason for introducing the typical "two setup" shuffling machine years ago -- less down time where the dealer is shuffling. As the dealer deals the red setup from the shoe, the autoshuffler is shuffling the blue setup. When the cut card pops out of the shoe, the dealer finishes the hand, sticks the red setup into the shuffler, then puts the blue setup into the shoe and away he goes. The only down time is how long it takes the dealer to put one stack of cards into the shuffler and take the other one out.
The Continuous Shuffler: It wasn't too long before somebody figured out that there didn't really have to be any down time at all. Enter the "CSM" (continuous shuffling machine).
With these, there's just one setup of cards, usually five decks. The CSM looks like a very tall shoe. It has a mouth down at the table surface from which the dealer pulls the cards, just like a regular shoe. But it has a slot at the upper rear where the dealer inserts the discards after the hand is over.
These discards get pulled into the center of the machine, where they're quickly mixed with cards already in the process of being shuffled. All the while, some of those cards are being randomly pushed toward the mouth of the shoe. Voila -- the game never stops!
If you're the house and want to keep the game moving, it's brilliant! If you're a player, hoping to beat the game of blackjack, it's insidious! Why?
Blackjack is a beatable game for one reason only. As cards get eliminated, they can't come out again until the next shuffle. Skillful players keep track of those cards, then adjust their bets and play their hands according to what kind of cards are left.
Did you know that with a standard six-deck shoe, sometimes your chances of being dealt a blackjack are 1-in-28, and at other times they're 1-in-14? This is the kind of information that skilled players capitalize on. But with the continuous shuffler, no cards are ever really eliminated, so the odds never really change!
With this, the house has the best of both worlds. The blackjack game runs at top speed while the casino disarms card counters. In the process, a table game which grew to be the most popular one in the casino because of its reputation for being "beatable" becomes essentially unbeatable.
So what about you -- the average player? Should you play the shuffling machines, or stick to hand shuffled blackjack games? They say you can't hold back progress, and I guess the day will come when all your cards simply appear on a computer screen anyway. But as long as dealers are still dealing with "pasteboards" and cards get used up during a hand, I wouldn't play at any table where the dealt cards don't stay out of play. That's your only shot at gaining an edge!