From: hack@arabia.uucp (Edmund Hack)
Newsgroups: rec.gambling
Subject: Re: Signalling your partner to the count
Date: 31 Jul 1992 18:18:51 GMT
Organization: Lockheed ESC, Houston

In article <1992Jul30.200931.786@miavx3.mid.muohio.edu> jfeldhouse@miavx3.mid.muohio.edu (Jim Feldhouse) writes:
>Kind of related to my last question, but different.
>Lets say you are playing blackjack with your girlfriend
>(could be boyfriend, SO, whatever).
>
>Your other hasn't yet mastered counting,  but they have
>Basic Strategy under their belts.  Meanwhile, your counting
>the cards as you sit next to each other.
>
>How do you think signalling your partner to raise there bet
>in favorable situations would work out?  N squeezes bet N
>times normal amount, maybe.  Anyone ever try something like this?
>
I have found (in my very limited experience) that having someone else
that you talk to while playing cuts heat.  This is especially true if it
is your SO.  I had a long stretch at a major strip casino where I was
betting $5-$25 with the count or spreading to to $10 hands.  My wife
was playing $5 bets and occasionally going to $10 or so.  At least 2 of
the rotating dealers knew I was counting, but some tips kept them quiet.
I also had a few sessions with a buddy of mine where we played, I was
counting and we had no heat. Of course, both of us were drinking beers.
It seems that playing with a SO is atypical of card counters.  The only
subject that I avoid talking about at the table is my job.  My buddy and
I were discussing sports bets a lot while we played.  The main thing is
not to look as if you are really concentrating on all that is going on
at the table.  Ogle the waitresses.  Look at the Keno board. Fiddle with
your drink  (I munch on my ice a lot.) Try to look like the other
clueless idiots at the table. (Side note: to see the really clueless,
gamble on a cruise ship.....)

Signals could be as simple or as complex as you wish.  In Million $
Blackjack, Uston gave examples of how his teams signalled the count to
each other. They used hand on the arm positions, combined with things
like scratching and touching parts of the head and torso.  They also had
a set of hand and chip signals for hit/stand/double/split.  I'd be wary
of playing with a teammate at the same table for any length of time,
especially if you are winning.  If the eye or the pit are on the ball,
they'll notice the pattern.  I did play one session where another
counter was at the table with me, but since he was betting stacks of
green and black and I was betting red, they didn't pay any attention to
me.  He was having a bad run, so they didn't boot him as far as I could
tell.

>Raising you bets together would probably be a dead give away
>to something fishy, but who knows, maybe if one of you is
>an extremly attractive female distracting the chauvinistic pit
>boss it wouldn't be noticed.
>
This helps.

>Perhaps the counter could bet level and just have his partner
>(hopefully the less suspicous looking) change there bets.
>
Could work.  The only problem is that unless you can signal strategy
variations, you'll only have basic strategy plays. This is in fact the
system Uston moved to, the "Big Player" who was called into a favorable
shoe, bet big and got strategy help from a counter who bet level at the
table minimum.

Of course, Uston ended up getting booted from the casinos. Part of his
problem was that some of his team were, ummm, unsavory.  (A part time
coke dealer, a street hustler, a couple of "working girls"....)

-- 
| Edmund Hack - Lockheed Engineering & Sciences Co. - Houston, TX
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