Basic Blackjack

Stanford Wong’s Basic Blackjack is not going to tell you how to count cards. Nor will you be best off with this book if you are trying to learn basic strategy. The title might suggest a book for the beginning player, but if a beginner were to buy this book in the hope of learning the basics they will invariably be disappointed. It is an extremely useful book, however!

Picture this scenario: You’re going on a holiday or maybe a weekend break and there is a casino nearby the place where you are staying. This may very likely have been part of your holiday plans. Either way, you decide to make a little extra while you’re away from home, but upon closer investigation you find that the casino handles different rules than the ones you are accustomed to. The payouts may be different, or the rules regarding splitting and doubling may not be what you are used to, there may be jokers in the deck, and so forth. What to do now that the basic strategy you are accustomed to applying is no longer optimal? Will you lose time recalculating your odds or hunting for new and reliable strategy tables that apply to the specific rules you are now saddled with? Will you take your bet, play at a disadvantage, miss opportunities and lose money? You could do that. You could also open this book.

Basic Blackjack includes one chapter on basic strategy, and three chapters on other useful tricks to exploit such as warps and tells, but the bulk of the book is dedicated to compiling a clear overview of all the variations of Basic Strategy you might at some point come across in different casinos around the world. There are 256 pages of information between the covers of this book, including almost 60 charts detailing adapted basic strategy to deal with all kinds of different blackjack rule variations. If you’re planning a trip to a foreign casino, don’t forget this manual!