Mathematician and actuary Michael Shackleford, the Wizard of Odds, took a long look at the new game Spread-Bet Blackjack, which debuted at the Global Gaming Expo in Las Vegas this year.
- The reason that the house edge is relative to the original wager, not the average wager, is that it makes it easier for the player to estimate how much they will lose. For example if a player knows the house edge in blackjack is 0.6% he can assume that for every $10 wager original wager he makes he will lose 6 cents on the average.
- I shouldn't have mentioned pushes because I suppose they're already factored into any BJ edge calculator. The wiz has a couple extended rules / rules variation pages which take more rare rules and give you the +/- house edge value. So you can use the calculator for what you can, then add these other ones to the total.
Presumably, this adds 15% to the house edge, unless the wheel was adjusted to account for it. Wizard once said this side bet had an 8% house edge. That game displayed multipliers instead of flat amounts like this one does. Adding the 15% for not pushing on an ace puts the house edge around 23%.
The game is a standard blackjack variant, which offers three different side bets. The Wizard reveals that the bets can be placed at the same time as the regular blackjack wager, and pays out by adding the number of the player’s cards. Those who get a 2 or a 3 are paid 50:1, those with 4 to 5 get paid 21:1, and those with a 6 to 9 are paid 5:1.
There are two major variations of this game. The first one is relatively straightforward, and the edge to the house is 10.44% for the 2 or 3 bet, 9.13% for 4 or 5 bet, and 7.69% for the 6 to 9 bet. The second game sees a Royal Blackjack dealt to players as a push. The 2 to 3 bet edge is 6.88% for this game, 5.57% for the 4 to 5, and 4.13% for the 6 to 9.
The game was shown off at the Global Gaming Expo, which took place at the Sands Expo Center in Las Vegas earlier this month.
Shackleford is the namesake behind his Wizard of Odds website, which is a sister-site to Online Blackjack. There he reviews different casino games and gives insight into the different odds and strategies to give players the best odds possible for lowering house edge.
No timetable for the release of Spread-Bet Blackjack is available as of press time, nor is a list of casinos that it’ll be offered at.
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