50 Fun Facts About Blackjack

What values can an ace take in blackjack?

It counts as 11 unless that would bust the hand.

What are jack, queen and king each worth?

Number cards count as their number; the pictures are all tens.

What is a two-card 21 called?

It beats any other hand, even a three-card 21.

What is the traditional payout for a player blackjack?

Some tables now pay 6:5 or 1:1, which sharply raises the house edge.

How many cards are in each deck used for blackjack?

Between one and eight decks are shuffled together.

What was the English precursor of blackjack called?

The first rules were printed in Britain in 1800 and reprinted in America in 1825.

Which Golden Age novelist's story contains the first written reference to twenty-one?

'Rinconete y Cortadillo' features card cheats in Seville who play veintiuno.

In which city are the card cheats of 'Rinconete y Cortadillo' based?

The story was written between 1601 and 1602.

Around what year was American vingt-un renamed 'blackjack'?

Historian Thierry Depaulis traces the name to Klondike Gold Rush prospectors.

According to historian Depaulis, the name 'blackjack' came from which mineral?

Prospectors associated it with gold and silver deposits and transferred the name to the bonus hand.

During which gold rush did prospectors start calling the game blackjack?

The rush ran from 1896 to 1899.

In the popular myth, a 10-to-1 bonus was paid for an ace of spades plus which card?

Depaulis found no historical evidence such a bonus ever existed.

In what year was 'The Optimum Strategy in Blackjack' published?

Baldwin, Cantey, Maisel and McDermott laid the mathematical foundation for beating the game.

Who wrote the 1960s book Beat the Dealer?

He verified the basic strategy with Baldwin's hand calculations and an IBM 704.

What is the dealer's position on the far left called?

Dealing runs from first base to third base on the far right.

How many options does a player have on the initial two cards at most?

Hit, stand, double down, split and surrender; only hit and stand remain after a third card.

What happens when a player doubles down?

'Double for less' lets the player add less than 100 percent at some tables.

What does a player give up when they surrender?

It ends the hand immediately and is not allowed after splitting.

Which hand signal means 'hit' in a face-up game?

Scraping the cards on the felt is the equivalent in handheld games.

Pointing with two fingers spread in a V signals which decision?

Doubling down uses one finger; surrender is a horizontal line drawn behind the bet.

What is the casino's video surveillance nicknamed?

When a hand signal disagrees with a player's words, the signal takes precedence.

Up to what total must the dealer keep drawing cards?

Whether the dealer hits or stands on a soft 17 varies by table.

What is a 17 that includes an ace counted as 11 called?

Games where the dealer must hit it are abbreviated H17; stand-on games are S17.

What is a tie between player and dealer called?

Bets are returned without adjustment.

Which dealer up-card lets players take insurance?

The side bet, of up to half the wager, pays 2 to 1 if the dealer has blackjack.

What does a winning insurance bet pay?

Basic strategy says never to take it; the dealer has blackjack less than a third of the time.

What is taking insurance with a blackjack of your own called?

The player swaps a 3:2 payout for 1:1 but gets paid even if the dealer also has blackjack.

Roughly how much do basic-strategy players lose on their action over the long run?

That gives blackjack one of the lowest house edges in the casino.

Paying blackjacks at 6:5 instead of 3:2 raises the house edge by roughly how much?

A 1:1 payout is worse still, adding about 2.3 percent.

Under the 'Reno rule', doubling down is allowed only on which hard totals?

A similar European rule restricts doubling to 10 or 11 only.

What does the acronym OBO stand for in no-hole-card games?

Doubles and splits are pushed if the dealer turns out to have blackjack.

What does using fewer decks do to the house edge, all else equal?

Casinos compensate by tightening other rules on single-deck games.

In roughly what share of hands does a blackjack occur?

Which is why altered natural payouts hurt the player so much.

Roughly what edge can card counting give the player?

Against a basic-strategy house edge of about 0.5 to 1 percent.

In the Hi-Lo count, which cards add one to the running count?

Tens and aces subtract one; sevens, eights and nines count zero.

In which US state is using an external device to help count cards explicitly illegal?

Counting in your head is legal, but the casino can still ask you to leave.

Casinos in which resort town are forbidden from banning card counters?

Ken Uston's 1979 lawsuit led the New Jersey Supreme Court to rule only the Casino Control Commission could exclude skilled players.

Which advantage technique tracks 'slugs' of cards from one shoe into the next?

Arnold Snyder's Blackjack Forum articles brought it to the public.

Which blackjack variant removes all the tens from the deck?

Jacks, queens and kings stay in, and the liberal rules include bonuses for 6-7-8 and 7-7-7.

In which variant are both of the dealer's first two cards dealt face up?

In exchange, blackjacks pay even money and players lose ties.

In Blackjack Switch, what total for the dealer counts as a push rather than a bust?

Players can also swap the second cards between their two hands.

What is the popular British member of the vingt-un family called?

The name is probably a corruption of vingt-et-un.

At which venue is the Blackjack Hall of Fame located?

Seven members were inducted in 2002 when it opened, in San Diego.

Which Hall of Famer popularised the concept of blackjack team play?

His book Million Dollar Blackjack described the 'big player' system he learned on Al Francesco's teams.

Who co-developed the first wearable computer with the author of Beat the Dealer?

Tested in Shannon's basement in 1961, it was used on roulette, not blackjack.

Which 2003 Ben Mezrich book about the MIT Blackjack Team inspired the film 21?

Mezrich later admitted many characters and stories were composites.

Who plays the professor Micky Rosa in the 2008 film 21?

The real MIT team was always run by students and alumni, never a professor.

At which Las Vegas casino do the brothers count cards in Rain Man?

Charlie wins $86,000, and the film helped spread the myth that counting is illegal.

In what year did the MIT Blackjack Team's first formally capitalised 'bank' start?

The stake was $89,000 from investors and players, run as a business by Bill Kaplan.

What was the name of the MIT team's million-dollar 1992 limited partnership?

Its successors, the Amphibians and the Reptiles, played on until about 2000.