A few bad blackjack strategies

There are a lot of bad blackjack strategies around. Here is an overview of just a few of them:

1) The "new bust" strategy: The novice player seems to have worked out that he loses money when he busts, so he tries to avoid busting at all cost! The plan is to stand on any hard 12 or higher, and simply hope that the dealer busts every time. But the dealer simply doesn't bust often enough to make this profitable, and it is far better to hit your hand correctly.

2) "Mimic the dealer": The player imitates the dealer out of the belief that the dealer must be right. The problem is that the player will never split or double down, since the dealer never does this. This leaves huge opportunities for profit behind.

3) The strategy to "assume the dealer has a ten": The player assumes that the dealer will always have a ten as his hole card and play accordingly. In reality this will only occur in about 33% of cases. This increases the house edge to over 10%.

4) "Stand on soft hands" such as an ace-4. Of course the ace can be played as a 1 or 11, so even if you draw a ten on your next card you still won't go bust. New players will often be too scared to hit another card as they fear the will bust. Understanding the power of the ace is an important concept and standing on soft hands is a huge mistake.

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