Thanks KFB, I appreciate a lot your comment.
After all you are one the few "coin flip" scholars (a real expert, I mean) capable to know when things could get us an advantage after the inevitable HE we are destined to face.

An important quote I particularly like is one from Alrelax that more or less sounds as:

"Do not bet what you desire will happen".

Paraphrasing it, that means that long term statistical data surely help us but at baccarat we shouldn't forget that we have to deal with many "short term" distributions easily deviating from the "norm".
Thus in those natural situations we have to set up a kind of perfect compliance over the actual results (AR) in relationship of the most expected results (ER).

Sometimes AR seem to be so deviated that any devised ER plan need a lot of hands (or shoes) to get its full power.
On the other end, the ER strenght acts constant and almost always toward the house.   

More later

as.

"Do not wager for what you desire.  Wager with what is happening"

Because, what you desire probably the highest majority of the time will not occur on your wagered hand(s).  It very well might occur while you are standing, seated, waiting, etc., and not wagering on anything, but that is how most all will get sucked in. 

Short term bursts of 'whatever is being presented' is by far the most lucrative wagers to place, IMO.

The entire point of playing is to win money.  Not to prove therory, statistics or pattern/trend triggering or anything of the like. 

Thanks Al, here is the correct quote:

"Do not wager for what you desire.  Wager with what is happening"

Of course that line of reasoning is the basic approach every bac player will adopt and without the proper experience we know the results...

So a more careful strategy would be to put within ranges what is more likely to happen with what actually happens.

In our opinion cutting off many hands from the betting opportunities is the first key point to transform a sure loser into a possible advantaged player.

The second important tool is to control the betting amount: We'll never know precisely (say in the vast majority of the times, at least) when our probability to win is valuably shifted toward our favor, even after having assessed that a same situation running infinite times will get us an edge.

Third, constantly assessing the average sd values even by a general point of view (expected results) and by what is showing up at the shoe we're playing at (actual results).

Fourth, when we have reasons to think that the production isn't so random (basically the vast majority of the actual scenarios), dilute at most our betting unless a univocal line seems to weirdly predominate what we're more likely to expect on average.

Now let's consider those points from the casino's point of view.

1- More hands a player will bet, higher will be our (casino) return as the HE constantly works at our favor.
At any rate, we (casinos) can safely rule out that a selected strategy will get a player any edge: itlr every player will lose, maybe less but keep losing.

2- Variations of standard betting amount, imo, should be limited within percentages of it (say 10% or 20%).
At a general negative edge game, it's always better to consider losing situations than winning situations.
Doubling or even tripling up (or more) a standard bet needs a very long experience and of course strong data to support such move.
We think that it's way better to win less and lose less in a particular spot than losing a lot or winning a lot in the same spot.
Of course there are some (very rare) players capable to get the best of such progressive betting, mainly because they approximate at best the spots to get a kind of advantage.

Anyway any player raising his bet is loved by casinos.

3- Sd (standard deviation) values are the watchdog of randomness but most part of the actual shoes we have to face aren't random by any means.
I've already stated that we have strong scientifical reasons to think that RNG instructed productions are not random and I've provided some examples.
Therefore, consider a shuffled machine shoe as a strong "actual" production weirdly shifted toward one side or another of the AS or S world by strong clumps or deviations.
Basically and paradoxically such productions will elicit an abnormal number of S patterns intertwined by few AS situations (despite of the 0.75 AS probability), but good news is that some shoes will produce interminable sequences of AS streaks up to the point that the entire shoe is asymmetrically shaped (a thing that we haven't encounterd once at real shuffled shoes).

Seen from the casino part, S patterns could get the players a distorting perspective that symmetry tends to overcome the rest up to the point that some shoes will totally deny it by producing long asymmetrical successions that are not so easy to detect (unless one had read my pages).     

4- Shuffle machines dislike the "average" word (finite and dependent random models do like averages) and when "average" doesn't act at the shoes we're playing at it's better not to risk any money or to ride the situations when the S patterns seem to be "too much" silent.
In any instance I'd suggest to bet toward symmetry, let such symmetrical weird long patterns go without risking a dime from our part, instead waiting for the relatively rare shoes where AS strongly overcome the S counterpart.

as.

So it's the rhythm of distribution that counts, you'll climb the ladder by one step each time with the constant risk of falling down two steps (or three steps if you adopt a 1-2 mini progression).

Of course once we are up several steps, we should focus our attention about HOW we got so high and the "how" means how many first or second winning situations we've encountered so far. I mean first or second CLUSTERED situations.

To cut a long story short, most part of our edge and providing a decent bet selection (with the guidelines already traced) come from a careful evaluation about first winning attempts distribution on the shoe we're playing at.
Therefore when there were few or none, stop to bet toward winning the first step but even about winning the second step as the asymmetry works slightly better on the patterns giving us first wins.

Being this the case, that enable us to set up a difficult but quite profitable "counter strategy" where instead of chasing separately the second W attempt (or the first W attempt, but it's more risky), we might bet not to get the general asymmetry we're looking for. Just for one winning step at both cases, of course. 

This move is particularly worthwhile when shoes are RNG distributed.

Anyway baccarat results, whatever distributed, tend to take a "clustered" line than an overalternating line.

It's up to us to approximate at best how long a cluster lasts or when a cluster of any kind is more likely to show up after a sort of overalternating succession happened.

More later

as.

Suppose the core of a shoe (it's a real shoe) went as:

A-A-A-S-A-A-A-A-S-A-A-S-A-A-A-S-A-A-S

A=14, S=5

Assuming A=+1 and S=-3, we didn't find any A favourable gap (14/15).

Nonetheless such distribution will get some precious hints to make "educated guesses".
And in reality such shoe is a perfect shoe to deal with, providing to take care of the quality factor.

For example A clusters= 5, A isolated= 0.

Then S isolated= 4 and S clusters= 0.

So a "perfect" exploitation of this shoe would be to bet toward A clusters and S isolated, meaning will get 9  wins and 0 losses (before vig).

Notice that we have wagered 9 times out of 73 resolved hands.

Anyway the scope of playing baccarat is not to prove complicated distribution features but to win money, so we could easily secured a profit well before the end of the shoe.

Accepting a decent profit without chasing more wins must be correlated with a specular action made at those (rarer) shoes presenting many opposite situations, that is A isolated events and S clusters.

In that the former A and S shapes will help us to define our future course of action as we've seen that most part of symmetrical events are coincidental (and/or coming out from an unrandom shuffle).

Practically, whenever we see that the S/A ratio is too high than expected we ought to think that the production is affected by too math volatility and/or unrandom features.
That means that here we have to be very careful to chase the asymmetry for a couple of reasons:

1- math advantaged situations that went "wrong" in spots we consider as "more likely" are consumed without getting us an edge (actually producing a damage);

2- unrandom shufflings markedly polarize the A or S sides by values being quite distant from a real random production.
In reality it's true that generally speaking S clusters will make more room to subsequent A clusters, yet we prefer to place bets when S patterns come out by distributions fitting REAL random requisites and not from RNG softwares that totally negate a perfect randomness by definition.

Those considerations helped to build the concept of "playable and unplayable shoes" with many categories in between (mainly playable, moderately playable, mildly playable).

There's no such a thing a player can get the best of it by wagering ALL shoes dealt, even by betting few hands per shoe.
The real purpose of playing baccarat is to be ahead of something after EVERY shoe PLAYED.
And since not all shoes are "beatable" (that is offering us a kind of advantage), we'd better prepare to stay put and wait (or ask) for another shoe.

Betting good money after "bad" (that is unexpected and/or weird events) tend to increase house profits so reducing at 0 our possibilities to win itlr.

That's why is so important to join tables having some players already seated or to jump at other tables open.
No action and the casino in question do not like to deal free hands? Good, do not bet a cent.

Consider the actual bac A/S ratio shifted towards the right in the same way black jack counters take a negative count.
With the important difference that at baccarat you are not forced to bet anything and changing tables is way easier. (Not speaking about the "no mid shoe entry" policy).

as.
 

BTW, when you are losing do not think you made wrong moves or got unlucky.

Luck doesn't intervene at baccarat but for a 1% impact and wrong moves are restricted into this list:

a- Betting too many hands;

b- Keep staying (and betting) at an unfavourable shoe;

c- Raising the wagers while in the negative territory and mostly negative situations;

d- Start betting side bets in the hope to quickly recover the deficit.

My comments

a- It's the biggest mistake every bac player makes.
Profitable opportunities come out quite rarely: long positive sequences are rare to happen, but long negative sequences can't end up (lol).
Obviously and besides the joke I'm referring to the constant HE to be overcome.

b- Once we didn't get a profit after the mid part of the shoe, it's better to consider it as unplayable.

c- If your plan itlr doesn't win by flat betting it won't by a kind of progressive wagering. If you'd think that some progressive betting spots are more likely to win, so capable to invert the HE, well bet only those spots.

d- Side bets wagering is a delicate issue, curiously the only field to get a math edge at baccarat despite of their huge negative edge.
But if you're not card counting or getting a very huge experience in dealing them, catastrophic results are around the corner.
Anyway it would be silly to break even (EZ bac tables) or getting half of the winning bet (no commission Tiger tables) when a key bet is placed at B side.

as.