Blackjack Memory: Burning Out a Boomtown Game

One of my bread-and-butter places for low-to-middle stakes single-deck play was Boomtown near the Nevada/California border. It is near Reno, but is actually in the town of Verdi.

A promotional bonus appeared. I don't remember the exact details, but it involved having a scratch-off card. I seem to remember that the idea was to get all of the suited blackjacks for a particular suit (example: A-k, A-Q, A-J, and A-10 of hearts).

I forgot what the bonus was, but it seemed substantial to me at the time, and I put in a lot of hours and days taking advantage of what seemed very likely to be an quite-enhanced playing environment.

I eventually made a mistake that--while a mistake--ringingly validated my notion that the game was "rich."


I logged on to the BJ21.com chat room, and mentioned the game. The founder of BJ21.com, Stanford Wong, immediately "glommed on" to what I had posted about the game, and had me clarify what the rules were. He then said I should expect huge numbers of players to descend upon the game within about 3 days.

Well, that certainly answered my question about whether the game had a good statistical advantage or not.

About three days later, the blackjack teams arrived, making no effort to hide their play. They bet stacks of blacks ($100 chips) and played at a very high rate of speed. I remember in particular one short Asian guy of rounded build who lust mowed down hand after hand, one-on-one with the dealer. He tipped well, but certainly not a crippling percentage of his expected winnings.

I played the part of the amused and puzzled local. I would say, "What is it with all of these major players all of the sudden?"

Gradually the word started circulating among the dealers that the casino was taking big losses. One of the dealers said the casino lost $35,000 the previous day to the counters.

Needless to say, the game was "burned out" in a hurry. I don't remember how long it took, maybe three days before the management realized what was going on and pulled the plug on the game.

I learned a big lesson from that episode, which was to not mention a good game on the internet.

Part of why I mentioned the game at all was that I overestimated the blackjack intelligence network. After having enjoyed the enhanced playing conditions for many days, probably weeks, I mentioned the game just because I partly believed it couldn't be that good, or it would have been assaulted by then.

I was wrong. It was entirely possible that I was one of the only players who understood how good the game was. It is also possible that I was far from the only card counter who had tapped into this game, and there were a number of lone wolves such as myself quietly enjoying the game's big advantage. What was for sure, however: the news of the game hadn't been known to the Class A blackjack team level.

A few years later, such as game would be "mowed down" much more quickly. I had made it right under the wire before the internet revolution would make such games no longer offered (or if offered, not for long at all).

I did receive a small compensation for mentioning the game on BJ21.com. Stanford Wong gave me a one-year free subscription to Current Blackjack News, and (I believe) a subscription to his blackjack alerts, which were e-mails alerting players to short-term great games, such as the one at Boomtown.
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