info on blackjack

[vegas40]

A player may take as many cards as he wishes until he stands or busts . If a player busts, he automatically loses the hand - even if the dealer subsequently busts. This is the biggest house advantage in the game. A player also loses if the dealer's hand is closer to twenty-one (21) than the player's hand (with neither one busting). If the player's hand has exactly the same value as the dealer's hand (and both are 21 or less), that is called a "push" and no money is won or lost on that hand. Any time the initial two cards of a player's hand or the dealer's hand add up to exactly twenty-one (i.e. an ace and a 10-card) that is called blackjack. However, it does not count as blackjack if the player already split the hand (see the definition of splitting below). A blackjack beats any other hand, including any other form of twenty-one, and it pushes with another blackjack. If a player is dealt a blackjack and the dealer is not, then the dealer has to pay the player 1.5 times his original bet. In other words, if the player bet $100 and got blackjack, the dealer would have to pay him $150.

The dealer starts each hand of blackjack by dealing two cards to each player and to himself. Of the dealer's first two cards, one of them is always dealt face up (so the players can see it) and the other one face down. The players' cards are either dealt all face up or all face down. It doesn't really matter if the players can see each other's cards, because they are only playing against the dealer's hand.