Table 2 Final Hand: * Toonces $1100 luckygem $1120 Sunchi590 $1097.50 tirle_bj $1095 Toonces first to act. What do you bet? Results of betting below plus what I remember of the hands: * Toonces $1100 $500 13 Dealer: 9 luckygem $1120 $500 19 Sunchi590 $1097.50 $500 15 tirle_bj $1095 $480 11 What do you do?
Bet $500. Double. I like the bet of $500. You need every penny of it to guarantee second high. Small bets can't be seriously considered, because even a minimum bet surrender still leaves you exposed to trouble. So, bet the $500 and grab second high. If luckygem bets lower for some reason, you might even get first high. On to the play: tirle's excellent bet takes away the surrender play. Since tirle also has a basic strategy double, he's a big threat. Luckygem's hand of 19 is strong enough to be a problem for you as well. Hitting without doubling does little, because you'd have to make a hand of 20 or better to make it valuable. I'd double.
Hummm? I would hope for another system crash and a re-play...LOL. No Ken's right you need to DD and hope you don't bust. If you make your DD, you put luckygem is a bad way with tirle_bj waiting to DD their 11. Since I saw luckygem in the finals though I take it you didn't make it.
I felt ok about the $500 bet at the time. But after the fact, I started to second-guess. If I bet high, I almost assuredly need to win or push, and even if I do, others could choose to double to pass me if I don't or can't double. On the other hand, if I bet $10 with intent of surrendering, I win whenever Sunchi590 and tirle_bj both lose (I tie for 2nd if sunchi loses and tirle pushes) and even if one of them win, I stand a chance if luckygem bets big and wins. I'm not sure which is the likelier scenario. If you look at the results web page, you will see that I made a very bad decision. Though I would like to think it was partially due to the mechanics of playing online (a rare case where playing online makes the right decision harder). Bj_tirles bet appeared as a mishmosh of $100, $50 and $10 chips. Immediately after his bet appeared, my hand was dealt and my 20 second timer began. I would have had to calculate tirle's bet, figure out what hand everyone was dealt, and make my own decision in 20 seconds. I knew that sunchi couldn't get below me by surrendering, but I hadn't considered that if sunchi busted or surrendered, that BJ_tirle can lock me out by surrendering his 11. Honestly, I hadn't even considering tirle surrendering his 11, nor had I been able to calculate his bet to see who would win if he surrendered. As the cards were, if I doubled-down I would have busted anyway, but I felt pretty stupid to lock myself out. But like you mentioned, bj_tirle made an excellent bet to put me in a world of hurt.
tournament play Indeed, very interesting situation. It seems we have a consensus that the proper play for Toonces was to double down. Doubling thirteen against dealer nine wins almost 27% of the times. Additionally, in one percent of cases a push brings in the first place as well. Luckygem could take away couple points by doubling his 19 in a correct situation, though. What would you do if you were luckygem and Toonces doubled down? Would you always stand on luckygem’s nineteen or would you double down yourself when Toonces’s double totaled 18, 19, 20 or 21? Surrender for Tonces’s hand is not a good option simply because double down is so much better. The closest situation I can think of to make surrender a viable option would be to make his original hand 19. With other players playing near optimal strategy, surrender would be successful about 10% of the times and double down just over 12% of the times. Tirle’s hand of eleven is the perfect candidate for doubling. However, under special circumstances surrender can be the best play for his hand. There are two parts to this requirement. Firstly, at least one of the players must double down, and secondly the total of that double must be good enough to make surrender a better play for Tirle’s hand. What is the total of that double? S. Yama
How about STAND for Toonces If toonces Stand then Luckygem Stands, Sunchi Doubles (cannot be done for less) and Tirle acts based on Sunshi result. Now if Sunchi doubles and busts (7/13) then tirle doesn't have to Double (win or push 11 vs 9 is less than 77%) or Surrender, just play out the hand (hit 'til 17 or bust) and pray for Dealer to make a hand (~77%), so toonces advances with ~23%. If Sunshi doesn't bust after double then tirle doubles and hopes to win (or push in some cases) in order to overcome Luckygem and lock-in at least second. So if both Tirle and Sunchi will lose - That means dealer makes a hand, because tirle cannot lose otherwise and Sunchi lose by points (we considered for him not busting case). ~ 10% Finally Toonces chances to advance by stand are 7/13 x 23% + 10% = 22.4% Way worse than double.
