Algorithms action

Our algos move around two distinct probabilities:

a) what should happen on average and by which more likely ranges;

b) what is really happening at the actual shoe dealt.

If all of the time a>b, well the game wouldn't exist and if b>a it wouldn't be offered either.

Thus per every shoe dealt we have to approximate the different weight of such distinct factors and, no surprise, most of the times a=b or close to it.

Obviously the a=b scenarios are the best to look for and will correspond to an "average card distribution", the main parameter algos aim at.

Algos won't look for strong deviations at either positive or negative side of the operation, they prefer a more likely steady flow of the outcomes, albeit limited at different (so less easily detectable) rhythms of classification.

Yes, card distributions are considered undetectable, everything happens anytime and anywhere but always by a specific level of probability.
And as long as shoes (and cards) are dealt, such probability values will converge more and more to the a) point.

Shoe card distribution

Besides of the important specific shuffle production factor slightly affecting the 'average card distribution' I do not want to discuss here, each shoe dealt will follow or not certain "more likely" "back-to-back" patterns getting different but limited values.

Technically some "random walks" (that is two opposite fighting scenarios) are more limited in their apparition than what a binomial or slight asymmetrical bac model dictates.
That's where algos' edge comes from.

Remember that while playing a binomial game (even if taxed) streaks of something are the real enemy to get rid of.
Obviously no specific streaks classes are chasable better than others even though and generally speaking shorter streaks are more likely to form clustered patterns than isolated patterns.
Especially whether we take into account two or more streaks classes.

But symplifing a lot, the best empirical factor to get an advantage from is that a 'more likely' streak not happening so far shouldn't be included in our betting operation. Regardless of its general propensity to show up.
That means that providing a proper results registration, streaks of low lenght actually happened and coupled together will get very low variance values.
Naturally along the shoe's course things change, meaning that quite often a long streak will erase a previous streak classes flow.

More later

as.

Thanks Al for your advice!
Actually I do not know much about MM as most of our bets are adhering to a flat betting scheme.

On the other end it's very likely that some pros do not adopt a FB approach, maybe increasing their bets (so risking an X bankroll fraction) at spots considered profitable.

As you sayed, for sure bac pros have learnt the attitude to be (almost) totally insensitive to the natural harsh losing sequences they're entitled to face sooner or later.
Easier sayed than done.

as.

Thanks Al and KFB for your replies!!!

Professionals

It's very likely that in recent times there are more professionals at baccarat than at black jack and, for that matter, bac pros are taking an advantage at least 10 times fold than poker players as vig and tournament fees do not account for a mere 1% or so HE, being way more than that.

Consider that bj players must bet each hand, fearing to get casino's heat while raising the wagers (if card counters). In addition actual rules make bj tables much less profitable than in the past.

On the other end, poker is particularly sensitive of volatility being either the important need to face inferior skilled players and to endure a natural negative variance that can last for long.

At baccarat we can't rely upon a math edge or taking advantage of possible inferior skilled poker players, we are just forced to deal with dynamic probabilities. Whenever we wish, with the amount we wish knowing that casinos consider bac players as pure donators.

Pros get their profits after having ascertained that not every couple of considered fighting events will follow a binomial independent (unbeatable) probability.
So an infinite sequence of bets made at a given event apparition must be superior than the counterpart at levels capable to invert the HE.

The deeper we're investigating the factors conditioning an A vs B event apparition, greater will be our probability of success, so transforming a supposedly random world into a kind of unrandom and more detectable world.

Think that shoe's results include several "simple" and "complex" steps:

-Simple steps are B and P apparitions classified by singles and streaks and streaks lenght.
It's the main tool the vast majority of players use.   

-A further classification consider how many times singles and streaks come out clustered or isolated.

- Then we should assign a value about the clustering class: clusters of one, clusters of two, etc.

- Building some sub successions where some clusters are slight more likely than counterparts as the shoe card distribution can't be uniformly shaped so enticing a general more probable line.

- Comparing such general "more probable" lines with the actual shoe we're playing at, favoring a kind of asymmetrical transitory probability getting at least a +1 step.

If a proper rhythm of considering outcomes is assessed, some values will be slight more likely to happen than counterparts and that's where our edge comes from.

That has nothing to share with the B general propensity and its related pattern situations.
What we need is to approximate at best the actual card distribution getting some spots more likely to show up than others.

See you next week.

as.

Unlike what so many believe, preach and swear by, the longer you stay at the tables, the more you play and/or employ the repetitive mechanical wagering beliefs, etc., will only add up to guaranteed loss.

This statement sounds as the pure proof that baccarat remains an EV- game, isn't it?

as.

Hi Al!

I reckon that 99% of the bac players try to follow trends, hoping that something will prolong until one unfortunate event will stop a possible winning streak.

Let me know how many 5/5+ streaks come out on average at every given shoe dealt.
I guess they are showing up by a nearly 2/32 probability, the remaining situations belong to a 30/32 intermediate world.

Obviously a very experienced player is capable to grasp the subtle spots where things would come out clustered or not, it's a very difficult task to achieve and that's why 99.9% of bac players donate their money at the tables.

as.

Consistently winning at baccarat is very hard, let's say (almost) impossible.
In fact there are no ways to beat itlr a fair coin flip succession (EV=0), let alone a taxed A/B succession where winning bets are payed 0.9894:1 or 0.9876:1.

Itlr at baccarat winning sequences will be almost equal than losing sequences but the payment will be always and invariably unfair.

Yet only apparently baccarat reproduces infinite coin flip successions for each shoe featuring slight dependent events that do not correspond to a perfect binomial probability. And by now the B propensity is not taken into account.
This is the only tool to focus our attention about.

In fact each outcome has a slight relationship with the previous results, very often not detectable but sometimes getting values capable to erase and invert the HE.

In other words, general more likely lines will surely be taken, providing the actual card distribution doesn't deviate too much from such expected values and, more importantly, when we can build subsuccessions tending to negate the perfect independency of an A/B model.

One of the best examples I can give is about streaks lenght.
Streaks lenght is one of the simplest and more reliable tool to approximate the actual card distribution of a given shoe.

Naturally BP Big Road streaks cannot give valuable hints to set up a plan upon and neither are the common derived roads. (Actually they do but being burdened by a lot of volatility).

In fact what we need is a plan capable to get more "expected lines" than we can, at the same time putting this plan in relationship of the actual shoe distribution.

That is the streaks lenght distribution is one of the best tool to assess if our future bets will be in touch of the rare EV+ field or simply belonging to the more probable undetectable whimsical world we can't do anything about.

Approximating a distribution doesn't mean to bet randomly and 'hoping for the best', just getting a hint about how the clustering effect may or not be working in the shoe's portion we're interesting at.

Remember that even at BR and common DRs, heterogeneous streaks (e.g. streaks of consecutive different lenght) cannot show up at the entire shoe. Unless very very unlikely long streaks come out at the same considered succession.

In some way, when a long streak shows up it's because something went wrong at initial two-card math favorite situations, in fact long math favorite two-card favorite situations constitute a way limited part of the whole results' scenario.

And since long streaks must catch up a more likely shorter streaks world by coming out clustered, we should put a stop when a long streak shows up, so waiting for a more likely streaks class/classes coming out clustered. Very often dictating us to consider a shoe as an "unplayable" shoe.

Say that after having built a given subsuccession we're considering doubles, triples and 4 streaks.
We'll merge such different streaks into the more likely possible categories: 2-3 and 3-4.
5 and 5+ streaks will be considered as "enemies" and actually most part of them deny the two-card math propensity.

Since we need to approximate the outcomes distribution, we'll consider 2-3 and 3-4 clusters and the 'isolated' 5/5+ streaks apparition.

It's now that the clustering effect (being a by product of more likely card distributions) makes a role as the number of 5/5+ clustered streaks will be more restricted than the number of "long" 2-3 and/or 3-4 clusters.
With some experience anyone could see that a supposedly "more likely" category (2, 3 or 4) that hadn't show up so far, shouldn't be included into the playable classes.

Finally, back to back shoes NOT providing a decent number of 2-3 and 3-4 streaks clusters are very unlikely to happen.
On the same line, 5/5+ streak events coming out clustered are again very unlikely to happen.

Providing a proper registration of the outcomes rhythm.

as.

Back to the BP hands problem.

Positive and negative patterns lenght

Generally speaking at baccarat betting toward "too long" positive sequences constitutes the same mistake as betting against "too long" negative sequences.
In fact a long term profitable plan must take into account the way more probable intermediate occurences as there's no way to know when harsh negative patterns will stop, let alone when branded positive patterns should overcome some "limits".

As humans we try to stop our plan after one, two or more negative occcurences then restarting the action after one (or more) fictional winnings, but when we simultaneously consider two or more mechanical plans, we'll see that sh.it is more condensed than we could imagine of. Invariably sequenced by more probable steps.

Think deeply of what I'm talking about now.

Casinos love long streaks and long homogeneous patterns as they give players the false assumption that those situations will overcome the negative "less detectable" counterpart.
Actually it's the main tool why HS rooms are built upon: hoping that players will feel "lucky" at some point. In the meanwhile casinos will collect. Well beyond the math edge.

Since HS players are pure donators and the reason why baccarat is the second best game casinos have to separate money from their customers (despite of a tiny math edge), we ought to think that playing against their hope is the recipe to win some money.

Algorithms cannot magically erase or invert a negative HE, they just provide spots where "luck" is more restrained than what players (and casinos) hope for.

And there's a rule that casinos particularly like: more hands are wagered, less dependency acts so enticing a kind of undetectable world.

This has nothing to share with the HE: casinos do not want to get $50 or so per every $5.000 wager. They want us to lose our bankroll faster than possible, confiding that the "unlucky" world will harshly overcome the "lucky" less likely counterpart.

Yes, mathematically each bet, no matter how's deeply investigated, will be EV-.
Actually and for the reasons already traced, it can't.

Say we're applying a given mechanical system: itlr singled and doubled situations will be balanced by the opposite longer negative situations and vice versa.
Naturally it'll be more likely to get clusters of 1/2 than getting consecutive clusters of 3+/3+s.
Then isolated 3+s situations than isolated 1/2 events and so on.

Now pretend to build two simultaneous diverse registration lines getting the same properties but getting a different rhythm.
You'll be surprised to see that a math "undetectable world" won't be so undetectable and again singles and doubles apparition will overcome the remaining possibilities.

See you in a couple of days.

as.

Hi KFB, thanks again!!

0-value cards are very important in almost any side bet construction (a relative exception is the decisive 6-0 two-card B point) as they entice the draws of either side.
So increasing the number of cards utilized to form a final hand (see above).

More likely F-7 card combinations are:

- 0s and 7s
- 0s, 3s and 4s
- 0s, 5s and 2s
- 0s, 1s and 6s

0s and 7s account a nearly 4x probability to form a F-7 than any other three card combination and obviously two 0 cards are needed.

In some way and simplyfing, best situations to look for are when the final portion of the deck is poor of 8s and 9s and rich of 0 value cards and 7s.
Those are very rare opportunities to encounter but involving a wonderful edge.

as.

Side bets follow a conditional probability related to the actual deck composition, so the HE continuosly change as long as "important" cards are burnt or not from the shoe.

So Lucky 6 is particularly sensitive of 6s, then 7s/8s/9s; F-7 is sensitive of 7s and 0 value cards, then 2s,3s,4s,5s and 6s. Etc.

More key cards (different ranks) influencing a side bet apparition make it to be less attractive as we do want short gaps between two hits.
Then more cards are needed to form a final hand eliciting a winning side bet, less likely we'll get short gaps between two hits.

And besides the actual shoe composition, everybody knows here that 6 card hands constitute a minor part of the total outcomes.

In fact and discarding the P 6 standing point vs a B drawing hand, F-7 always needs 6 cards to form a hand.
Ties are affected in the same way as the more likely ties are coming out by 6-card hands.

Actually the Panda bet wins quite of the times by a 5-card hand and in fact gap hits of decent lenght are relatively common.   

Lucky 6 wins the vast majority of the times by getting a B 6 initial point vs a P drawing hand, a scenario that can't be bypassed for long by the deck and involving a 5-card hand.

Obviously it's more likely that a side will get a given point in two cards than in three cards (and then to surpass other favourable/unfavourable conditions). 

The number of cards utilized to form hands and its distribution is of paramount importance, think that only in 31.6% of the cases both sides draw a third card.

This is a reason why a "naturals" side bet (4 cards) won't be never offered again, either by its strong vulnerability by card counting and, more importantly for the sake of the argument, because of its incredible predictability by just tracking the gaps between two hits.
(On that hypothetical bet even a 30% HE wouldn't be sufficient to deny acute players' profits).

Therefore for any new hand dealt the odds to get a 6-card hand are 2.16:1 and it's reasonable to think that such probability will more likely move by singled and doubled appearances than in superior sequences.
Thus, for example, the Player Dragon Bonus bet mostly likes when 6 cards are utilized to form a hand (hands more probably intertwined by other hands getting an inferior number of cards used) and we know that itlr such probability is restricted by the average card impact and probability values.

See you later

as.

Side bets are for suckers. Yet some side bets are better than others

Besides the Dragon bonus bet made at Player side, being burdened by a 2.6% negative HE, every other baccarat side bet will crush you by more than a 7% HE.
The next less profitable bet is the F-7 bet.

Tie bet considers a 14.36% HE, Pairs are getting around a 11% HE.

People liking to bet Big Tiger (BT) or Small Tiger (ST) side bets should know that the average presentation is respectively 1.66% and 3.72%. Their payment is 50:1 and 22:1.

Needless to do the math, Big Tiger involves a 15.25% HE and Small Tiger a 14.33% HE.

Cumulatively the "Lucky 6" bet (getting 20:1 and 12:1 payment) involves a 16.68% HE.

There are many other side bets frequently not offered at common tables, so I'm not illustrating them.

Anyway the HE is not the primary issue we should be worried at.

In fact most side bets are "undetectable" meaning they need a lot of favourable conditions to be met, almost always by a coincidence of favourable parameters.

For the sake of this argument say we'll progressively wager a given side bet until we get a profit.

I guess everybody will think that the best bet to make is the Small Tiger bet, as 6-0 Banker situation vs a P drawing hand is a quite common situation to get through.
Moreover a B 6/0 situation vs a P drawing hand is entitled to win a bunch of situations where P gets a 6 or a 7 third worthless card while B getting a 0 card as a third card. So raising the payment.

More later

as.

Exactly 8OR9!!!

Thanks for the link.

I start to think that in the Singapore case the cheat surpassed the supposedly "baccarat formula" power and related syndicate.
After all a method capable to overcome the odds in such a way should be sold at millions without risking the legal issues for many HS players would be interested to purchase it.

as.

According to the numerous articles dedicated to the fact, there are some both unsound and interesting aspects.

First of all, why choosing Singapore do set up the plan, only Vegas would be worse.
Around the world there are casinos, at least in the short run, which are not worried about anything or close to anything.

Then, the plan was built by too many unnecessary risky steps.

If they were counting side bets, people use way better and unrisky plans to do that.
Moreover the new optical shoes show the cards dealt in the display so large that one peer could track cards at a far distance. And certain phones can register or utilize advanced softwares.

But I discard the side bets attack as in one article was cited that they were tracking both the value and the suit of any card. Then their profits were too huge to be reached just in a week of play, considering average edge and variance.     

The interesting part is that they placed their bets only at shuffle machine tables and of course the 'baccarat formula' calculated by an excel sheet opens the doors to a kind of magic "baccarat is scientifically beatable" world.
As well as those of the jail and of law courts in their case. 

as.

If I had to test an approach the least option coming to my mind would be to use Evolution shoes.

At that site cards are so badly shuffled that it's very difficult to get hints about a "general" line of thought.

I suggest to test shoes coming from "shuffling machines" and/or preordered shuffles as someway we need the "randomness" factor to act for implementing more constant situations.

as.

If baccarat outcomes would be "humanly" detectable, the game would have disappeared a long time ago.
So we could conclude that the human power over the results is inferior than the normal (uncontrollable) fluctuations and of course there's still the HE burden.

So our mind can't get long term valuable hints about those undetectable situations typical of this game as we're facing a machine.
Moreover players' minds are biased by the current bankroll status, so hoping beyond the real probabilities to promptly recover a deficit or to try to get 'sky's the limit' profits around any corner.

And patterns our mind is looking for are quite different than baccarat patterns, so we need to deactivate a kind of "normal" ancestral process.
Only a third part tool can do the job for us, one giving a lesser damn about money, current financial status or other bighornshit as being lucky or unlucky for that session.

Baccarat successions

Bac sequences are affected by a kind of "dynamical" bias related to the actual shuffling but is quite difficult to be grasped as it isn't mathematically shaped.
So we have to approximate what most likely will happen by not taking specific patterns as triggers. And implementing other features.

Since we know well that a single mechanical approach won't do the job (for the actual variance issues), we could utilize two simultaneous approaches slightly differentiated but both exploiting some common triggers until quite strong deviations will happen. Then both will stop their action.
To get a long story short say I'm referring to long consecutive BR streaks (for example).

Obviously there's the problem to know which approach to use and we've seen that generally algo A performs better than B.

The choice of privileging algo A vs B came out from having ascertained that many shuffling machines provide a huge quantity of constant valuable patterns.
So if you are in doubt to pick up a casino to risk your money at, definitely choose a machine producer. Sooner or later you'll be able to spot the proper rhythm to place your bets.

Since such machines were deeply investigated by statistical experts that assured their random production by presenting complicated formulas, we may infer that algo A likes the randomness.
A paradoxical conclusion.

On the same token, preordered shuffled shoes should follow the same randomness aim, we have no reasons to think otherwise.

Since we never know about a given production, we better be ready to use the backup algo that in the vast majority of the times will take care of the job when the main algo seems to fall prey of the variance or just because it can't do any good for supposedly unrandom models.

To get an additional hint about how both algos move say they are particularly sensitive of the doubles positive appeareance...

as.

Thanks KFB!

Your comments seem to confirm our conclusions and we're very glad about that because we think you are one of the 2-3 best scholars ever met in the forums circus. 

If hands are not predictable in any way (and math tells us that), betting a lot of hands makes the casinos' fortune; if some hands are partially predictable (and some studies suspect this), betting many spots just dilute such advantage up to the point to directly fall into the EV- ocean.

Since the almost totality of baccarat players consider any shoe as a source of possible profit, casinos are pretty certain to extract a lot of money from them by levels far greater than the HE.

Algos are smarter than those players as they were built upon the average probability of getting profitable shoes, neutral shoes or unprofitable shoes in relationship of general values compared to the actual source of results, the initial patterns shape, the intermediate patterns shape, the asym/sym hands current ratio, etc.

Moreover they are instructed to put the brakes on even after a single losing spot, that is waiting  longer than what a human normally does.

And more importantly, they are totally insensitive to previous shoes' results and about the actual bankroll as they simply do not care a bit.

OoOoOo

It's true that everything can happen anytime and independently of the production source, yet itlr some values are slightly more predictable than others and they are quite dispersed along the shoe course.
But this propensity is not constant per any shoe dealt, so forming a distribution's curve slightly but more and more oriented toward the positive right side yet suffering some negative and sometimes harsh natural deviations.
In our opinion, such propensity is due either for a substantial defect of randomness or for a very very close perfect randomness reproduction. Two different random walks operating.

Once again we ought to remember that casinos' interest is to offer perfect random shoes where the HE and normal deviations will get their full value, thus giving no hint to the players.
But even unrandom shuffled shoes could be a threat for us as they tend to produce too whimsical result lines that not necessarily belong to more predictable patterns. But those 'unrandom' shoes provide several steps corresponding to a 'random' model. It's just the different rhythm that cares.

Basically and regardless of the two algos utilized, there are three different situations each shoe will provide:

a) Long shoe, that is a shoe filling many columns (so forming many singles and/or doubles with few or any long streak(s);

b) Medium lenght shoe where the single-double/superior streaks ratio is about 1 or close to 1;

c) Short shoe, that is the opposite a) situation, where few columns are filled and there's an abundance of consecutive streaks and/or lack of singles.

As KFB pointed out, it's slight less likely that after a given number of hands dealt a) and c) categories will all of a sudden shifts from a to c and vice versa.
On the same token, b) more likely category to happen MUST stay at a more or less same level of probability for superior times than the a/c classes, so producing many same lenght or almost same lenght streaks and again the clustering effect is of paramount importance.

Since any shoe is a world apart, such three different categories move in direct relationship of what happened in the previous hands of the same shoe, privileging the old clustering effect.

See you in a couple of days.

as.