How to play Blackjack

The hand having the highest total can win if it doesn’t excel 21; otherwise a hand having a higher total is said to overshoot or to exceed. Cards from 2 up to 10 have the worth of their face value, and all face cards have the value of 10. The value of ace is 11, but if it makes the player bust, then it’s worth 1. When value of an ace is worth 11, the hand with this ace is known as a soft hand, because no bust is possible when the player takes another card from the pack. The goal of each player is beating the dealer by means of having the unbusted, higher hand. Take into account that the player looses if he busts, and even when the dealer busts as well. In the case when both the dealer and the player have value of the points, then so-called “push” is taking place, and neither dealer nor player wins in the end. The player and the dealer hold an independent play, so for the dealer it’s possible to lose to some of the players, but nevertheless within the same game round he’ll beat all other players.

The minimal bet is stamped on the table sign and it can vary in relation to the sort of the casino and table. After the placing of the initial bets, the cards are dealt by the dealer, either in so-called “pitch” game, that is from one (or two) hand-held card deck, or more usually from a shoe which contains four and more decks. Each player including the dealer himself is given two cards. One of these two cards is held face-up so everyone around the table could see it; another one is held face-down. (The “hole card” is a name of a face-down one. In the European variant of the game the “hold card” actually is not dealt before all the players play the hands.) The dealer gives the cards face up or face down from a shoe if it’s a “pitch” game.

In the American variant of the game, if the face-up card of the dealer is a ten-value or an ace, the dealer looks at his “hole card” in order to see whether he’s keeping blackjack game or not. He checks his hand before the players start to play, but after he has offered them insurance (when an ace occurs to be the face-up card). If the dealer turns out to have blackjack, then every one of the players loses the bets he initially put, except those who also have blackjack, who push.

(In some casinos in America, the hole card is not actually checked by the dealer just until after all the players have played. Then, in the case when the dealer occurs to hold blackjack, then all the players having no blackjack, lose the bets they have put, and those who enlarged their bets by means of splitting or doubling lose just the initial bet, but additional ones return to them; therefore, the last result is precise as if before playing the dealer had verified his hole card.)

A hand of two-cards and value of 21 (ten-value card plus an ace) is usually called a “natural” or a “blackjack”, and it wins automatically (if the dealer doesn’t have blackjack, then in this case the hand occurs to be a push). A player having blackjack is mostly paid 3:2 on his wager. Some of the casinos pay just 6:5 on naturals; though this lessened payout has been generally restricted to the games with a single-deck. (Pi Yee Press, Current Blackjack News). This lessened payout for a blackjack increases advantage of the house over a players by up to 1000%.