Over the years, many people have created Blackjack simulators to examine
complex techniques. Generally, these sims can only be used by the developers
themselves as they have little or no user interface. The trick is to create
a very generalized interface that can be used by non-programmers to specify
complex conditions and techniques. Such is the attempt in this software.
ST consists of three parts: The shuffle, the method of attacking the
shuffle and the data collected.
The Shuffle - Shuffle code already exists in CVData. It is highly
configurable allowing enormous variation in the skill of the dealer.
You can describe levels of randomness in each step. 200 steps are allowed
and an entire rifle & restack, strip or stepladder is one step.
Two changes have been made in this release. When riffling two equal
stacks, dealer right or left handedness is selected randomly. Also,
the riffle itself is changed. Prior to this release, you specified the
percentage of card falls that are 1, 2, 3 or 4 cards. A perfect riffle
is all one card falls. But, dealers are not perfect. In this release,
the percentages can vary during the riffle. As the cards are riffled,
the angle of the cards against the dealer's thumb changes. Cards near
the end of the riffle are riffled less precisely. You can now specify
the card fall percentages at the start and end of the riffle and they
gradually change as the riffle progresses.
The Attack - The focus is on detailed specification of many
techniques as opposed to handling every technique. At least at first.
The more common techniques exist now and further techniques will be
added as requested. One or two track zones can be specified. The counts
are merged. Independent zones will be examined later. One or two play
zones can be specified depending on the "richness" of cards
in the track zone(s). Each play zone has a cut point, start, length
and optional pseudo-length. Two methods of play are allowed for each
play zone. Either fixed betting through the zone (a poor method) depending
on the value of the TZ or betting by count. When betting by count, a
large amount of flexibility is provided in calculating the IRC. Also,
different playing and betting strategies can be specified in each play
zone. Errors can be inserted at every step. In fact, the main purpose
of this function is to simulate the effect of player errors on ST. Errors
can be vastly more costly in ST than in straight card counting. An extended
NRS calculator is included to aid the user in setting the specifications.
The Data - The standard CVData 53 tables of data are created
during ST simulation. Two additional columns have been added - the average
running and true counts by hand depth. This can be used to verify the
effect of the cuts. Also an additional three tables can be created for
a total of 57. Three tables of statistics are normally kept by hand
depth. Normally, there is one row per hand depth. If this new option
is selected, the data is displayed as one row per quarter deck of depth.
This is not the same because hands have variable lengths. The option
is useful when examining shuffle tracking results.
And More Data - Normally all hands are displayed in the True
Count, Running Count and Hand Depth tables. 54 tables of data is a good
start. However, when looking at shuffle tracking results it is often
far more valuable to examine selected hands. Using a dropdown list you
can request that only hands in a specific play zone, both play zones
or no play zones be collected in the sixteen tables displayed by True
Count, Running Count and Hand Depth. This provides the ability to run
millions of shuffles and focus purely on the activity within the play
zones. The cost of errors becomes immediately visible with this data.
Of course all the data is also available in the Report Generator and
Web table generator.
Added in the latest release -
- The shuffle has been doubled in speed.
- Shuffles can now have 200 steps. Note: A two pass riffle & restack
and stepladder is only five steps. But in fact I did get a request
to increase the steps from 50.
- Multiple, independent track and play zones now supported for shuffle-tracking.
In fact, you can have two pairs of married trackzones and the software
will pick the best and set up the playzones accordingly.
- Shuffle map feature added from CVShuffle to CVData/ST.
Note: CVData/ST does not support shuffle tracking practice, shuffle
or cut analysis. For these functions, see CVShuffle.
CVData/ST
is an add-in to the CVData Blackjack Simulator. That is, it requires CVData
and adds additional functionality. The primary reason for separating the
function is to keep a reasonable price for CVData while adding the ability
to perform simulation functions required by few people. 
