Really - can a fair game be this bad ?

[painter1]

Date: 2005/07/06
Time: 22:28:15
Duration: 0:30:27
Pontoon
# bets - 135
Total bets - 770
Results = -235

I lost $235 placing $5 bets at Intercasino in 135 hands.

This really sucks.

 

[KasinoKing]

The 'experts' will probably answer that it a very small sample, so it can be that bad, especially if you didn't play 'perfect strategy'.

If you hit yourself in the head with a hammer, it would hurt. If you hit yourself again in the same place, it would hurt more. If you keep doing it the pain will get worse and worse every time...
Don't you ever know when to stop???
OMG $235 blown in just 135 hands of crap? That's even bringing tears to MY eyes!

 

[kelvinlym]

It happened to me too.

Early in June I played only Pontoon, got my $90+90 bankroll up till $500+ after meeting WR.

Then late in June decided to play again a bit before withdrawing, went bust after about 150 hands or less.

This month deposited again and went bust before I could say Pontoon.

I flat bet all the time and only play perfect strategy mind you.

 

[raol]

Date: 2005/07/06
Time: 22:28:15
Duration: 0:30:27
Pontoon
# bets - 135
Total bets - 770
Results = -235

I lost $235 placing $5 bets at Intercasino in 135 hands.

This really sucks.

Assuming you played perfect strategy, pontoon has an house egde of 0.17 % and I have an unconfirmed figure of 1.44 for the standard deviation.

For 135 hands, that gives an expected loss of 135*0.17 % = 0.23 units and a standard deviation of sqrt(135)*1.44 = 16.73. You lost 47 units, 46.77 below expected value, i.e. 46.77/16.73 = 2.8 standard deviations. The probability for a loss of 2.8 SD or worse is 0.26 %.
Link Removed ( Old/Invalid)

Unlucky, but nothing to scream out "RIGGED" about. If everyone would post when they experienced such an event this forum would be clogged up.

 

[mitch]

Pontoon has a low house edge but a very high variance. This is because the key hands are those that deliver quadruple wins. More of these than probability in any particular session will tend to give you excellent results less gives you poor results.

It is far rarer for a Pontoon session to come out near probabilty than say Bj or Roulette. Play long enough however and your overall results will be near to the house edge. You will need to play longer on average than say Bj to see this however.

Mitch