- The system—also known as the Plus/Minus system—was originally introduced by Harvey Dubner as a remake of Edward Thorp’s slightly more involved Ten-Count blackjack card counting system. This system isn’t widely used by professional blackjack players, but for casual players or those just starting out, it’s quick and easy to learn.
- World's Easiest Card Counting Systems by Fred Renzey. Editor’s note: When this Card Counting article originally ran in the April issue, it contained several typographical errors, none of which were the fault of the author.
Ray/Funky Chicken - I saw the early disagreement about the numbers too, but after looking into the OPP for the last few days I think FC is correct about OPP being about 80%+ as effective as Hi-Lo.
I talked for two hours Sunday with a player friend in LV who has already played it 'live' in casinos. He walked me through the complete method and the spreads he used, etc. ....then Fed-X'd me everything he had on it.
I spent Monday and Tuesday analyzing it and playing it for about twenty hours here in my office (hand dealing and CV) to get a feel for the 'flow' of it. Some observations:
- It is incredibly easy to learn and use. Probably three/four hours maximum for anyone who has counting experience....then another few hours to get 'comfortable' with it.
- The accuracy of the betting decisions was much higher than I expected from a method so easy. I tracked it vs Hi-Lo and Red7 and and the ramp decisions were essentially parallel........And this supports Funky Chicken's numbers above and my friends belief that it plays to at least 75% of Hi-Lo.
Just sharing some thoughts on what I observed......Hope it helps someone.
Regards.....Grifter
Simple Blackjack Card Counting
More Complex Card Counting Systems. As long as card counting has been around, there have always been people trying to improve and refine different card counting techniques. However, we have learned from experience that the simpler your system is, the easier it will be to practice.
Bryce Carlson’s Level II System from ‘Blackjack for Blood’
The Omega II card counting system first appeared in Bryce Carlson’s book, ‘Blackjack for Blood’ in 2001, so in comparison to some other systems you could say it is one of the newer ways to employ card counting.
This system is high on accuracy and is said to have a moderate difficulty level, as it’s a little more complicated than a more standard hi-lo system. As such, this might not be an ideal system if you’re trying card counting for the first time, but certainly one you could move on to having gained some experience.
Best Card Counting System
This system is a balanced one, meaning that when you reach the end of the deck(s), the count should be zero. This makes the Omega II system highly accurate.