Ask the Wizard: Shuffling and Dealing at Online Casinos

Shuffling and Dealing at Online Casinos

I notice that some internet Casinos give you 2 cards right away one on each hand before you begin to play each hand, unlike a live casino which play the split, one hand at a time. Is this a house advantage dealing two cards before beginning play on the split hands? - Karter from Calgary, Canada

Mathematically speaking it doesnít make any difference. Jan. 20, 2001

I recently started gambling online and like your site more than any other gambling site I've found. Somewhere I remember you wrote that every online casino you'd seen shuffled the decks after every game. By game to you mean hand? Also, if they shuffle after every hand, doesn't this minimize the benefit of card counting? Is there any significant benefit to card counting in that case? - Greg Foley from Brighton, Massachusetts

Most online casinos shuffle after every hand. However the six-deck game at Unified Gaming casinos shuffles at a random point in the deck. I have heard of other casinos that also penetrate more than one hand into a shoe but I don't recall which ones. If the cards are shuffled after every hand there is no use in card counting, other than applying my composition dependent basic strategy exceptions. Dec. 31, 2000

What do you know about the randomization process that online casinos use to simulate shuffling? How closely does it approximate the actual manual shuffling of cards in a casino? And finally the obvious: wouldn't it be fairly simple to write a randomization (shuffling) program that would give the house a bigger edge - sort of stack the deck? Enjoy your site. Thanks. ñ Jim Byrnes from Cincinnati, USA

I know that one software company randomly picks two cards in the deck and reverses them, and repeats this numerous times. Since learning of this technique that is also how I shuffle in my random simulation programs. As long as any method of shuffling is done enough times all methods are equal. In other words a random deck is a random deck. Manual shuffling is more vulnerable to a biased shuffle and consequently some players try to exploit this by shuffle tracking and card clumping. There are numerous ways an online casino might cheat but a bad shuffle I don't think is one of them. I speculate that in certain situations they remove certain cards from the deck to favor the house. Dec. 24, 2000

When playing online blackjack, how do you tell when the deck is shuffled? I play Microgaming casinos (which you report as using 1 deck), but I do not know if each time I play if it is a new deck, and there are no signs of knowing when the deck is shuffled. ñ Brian of State College, USA

Most online casinos shuffle after every hand. Others shuffle at random times but do not indicate exactly when to the player. I have noticed Microgaming casinos flash the word "shuffling" about one hand in four. However if you track the cards between these announcements you will sometimes see the same card twice, which is impossible in a single deck game, assuming you believe them about when they shuffle. As far as I know they actually shuffle after every hand but for reasons I do not understand only indicate a shuffle occasionally. If I remember correctly Cryptologic casinos do indeed indicate when they are shuffling their eight deck shoe. Nov. 19, 2000

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