Blackjack and the Skillful Player

Learning to be an excellent blackjack player is not as easy as A-B-C. Being able to play at the expert level doesn't take a few minutes, hours or days to perfect, rather it takes years. One can become a skillful player easily (though not professional or excellent) and have a chance against the game by having knowledge on easy to follow rules.

For blackjack to become either a complex game or a simple one, it is definitely up to the player. Techniques such as card counting can be used to have an advantage over the house. The only factor here is your willingness to spend a lot of time discovering stuff about blackjack, applying the techniques found in the research, and playing till your hands ache. Practice makes perfect, after all.

There are strategies developed for a beginning blackjack player that can be used by those who have played it for a number of times only and have the need to know the tips and tricks of blackjack. The four simple rules are very easy to memorize by the newbie player because it takes less than an hour to remember. The basic strategy in blackjack was developed to maximize the winning chances of the player. This strategy is a group of hit/stand rules as well as betting rules that are not complex but still needs time and a lot of practice for consistency.

Here are the four simple rules in order for the player to become skillful in blackjack: One is to NOT split pairs that are not a pair of aces and eights. Another rule is this: the player must keep on drawing the cards until a hard count is obtained (17 and above), or a soft count has come up (18 or higher). That is if the up card of the dealer has the value of 7 and above. The next rule to remember is that if the value of the dealer's up card is 6 or a lower value, the player must continue drawing cards until the value of 12 or higher is obtained. The last rule to apply is to make sure that the first two cards totaling to 10 or 11 is doubled down once the dealer has a card with 9 or a lower value.

The player following these four simple rules would be taken out of the "loser" category and moved up into the "skillful player category." Keep in mind that even the expert players of blackjack have had their bad days too.