Blackjack Attack ― Playing the Pros?Way

The tools you need for a “blackjack attack” on casinos

Blackjack Attack is the most voluminous reference work on casino 21 in existence. Not only is it more than 500 pages long, it also contains more than 400 tables and charts.

Plenty of blackjack books start from the beginning, from the rules, customs, and etiquette of the game all the way to a glossary of its terms, with how to use basic strategy charts, how to count cards, and how to get away with being a pro. Blackjack Attack doesn’t follow that path. Certainly, the less experienced blackjack player will find much food for thought. But this book targets a more advanced reader, one who is already familiar with the basic concepts and seeks a higher level of sophistication.

The work is, in part, a compilation of 13 years of articles published in Arnold Snyder’s Blackjack Forum, including the now-legendary studies on the “Illustrious 18” most important playing-strategy departures, the “Floating Advantage” true-count phenomenon, and lifetime and trip risk-of-ruin formulas. It also includes brand-new material that has never before appeared in print.

As the subtitle of this third edition—“Ultimate Weapon”—suggests, crammed into this volume is an incredible amount of cutting-edge blackjack information, including contributions from some of the keenest minds in the area of blackjack research. Together, Don Schlesinger and these experts have broken new ground in several ways. For example, recent improvements in simulation technology, with perfect accuracy and at incredible speeds, have permitted the kind of exhaustive study that forms the content of Chapter 10, “The World’s Greatest Blackjack Simulation.” With the entire set of 8-deck charts, plus optimal betting ramps, unit sizes, and other useful metrics, it’s a mini-book all its own. Four brand-new risk-of-ruin equations, presenting so-called “double barrier” goal-reaching and time-constraint concepts, and an enlightening testing of the formulas’ accuracy through the simulations of Norm Wattenberger, provide stimulating new research for the reader.

The third edition also features the addition of a new Chapter 9, the enhanced SCORE (Standardized Comparison of Risk and Expectation) article, which provides the definitive methodology for comparing the attractiveness of various blackjack games and card-counting systems; an entirely new Chapter 12, as a mythical blackjack team takes a “Random Walk down the Strip,” utilizing John Auston’s genial software application, BJRM 2002; a new Chapter 13, reflecting the latest innovative research in the areas of optimal shoe-departure points and risk-averse strategies; a new Appendix D, featuring completely revised and expanded tables of effects of removal for playing and betting, which improve on the work of the legendary Peter Griffin; nearly 100 pages of precise expectation tables, basic strategy charts (the most accurate in print), and effects of rules variations on basic strategy expectations; a revised bibliography and an expanded index; and so much more.

In short, this “Ultimate Weapon” third edition of Blackjack Attack furnishes virtually all the tools that the traditional card counter must have at his or her disposal to levy a full-blown attack on the casinos.

Don Schlesinger has been involved with blackjack as a writer, lecturer, teacher, and player for more than 40 years. He holds a BS degree in mathematics and an MA and M.Phil. in French from the City University of New York.

A former teacher of mathematics and French in the New York City school system, Don changed professions in 1984 and, until 1998, enjoyed a successful career at one of Wall Street’s most prestigious investment banks, where he was executive director. Now in semi-retirement, he continues to pursue business ventures in the financial community.