Spanish 21 Lessons
Spanish 21 is a variation of blackjack, considered to be the world's most popular casino card game. The glaring difference between the two is that Spanish 21 makes no use of the 10 cards, which should appeal to casino gamblers and blackjack players who love a good challenge. You have a higher house edge, but more attractive payouts, bonuses, and rule modifications to provide a reasonable balance.
How to Play Spanish 21
Spanish 21 is played similarly as blackjack, but the rules are not the same. The tens are removed from the game, which is very disadvantageous to the player because it moves the odds in favor of the dealer. 
To compensate, Spanish 21 adds new rules that are more favorable to players and new ways to win bonus payouts, resulting in some of the best bets you can make when casino gambling.
A game of Spanish 21 makes use of six or eight Spanish decks. Each Spanish deck comprises 48 cards—52 cards in a standard deck less the four 10 cards (one from each of the four suits). The process itself is like that of blackjack, in which the player and the dealer are each initially dealt two cards. The basic moves are the same: to hit means to add another card to your hand; to stand means to leave your hand as is, without adding another card; to split means to divide your two cards and make each one the first card of two new hands; and to double down is to alter you bet mid-play, after you have been dealt your first two cards, if you think that your hand has a good chance of winning.
A blackjack means a two-card hand that totals 21 (an Ace plus a 10-point card, which means a King, Queen, or Jack) and automatically wins the game. The game proceeds until the player's hand is busted or has been asked to stand. Spanish 21 game rules are based on liberal six- to eight-deck blackjack rules, as follows:
The player's 21 always beats the dealer's 21.
The player's blackjack always beats the dealer's blackjack.
A player may double down on any number of cards. (In blackjack, you may only double down after two cards, and then get no more than a third card.)
Usually, after splitting Aces, a player may hit and then double down. (Some casinos do not allow this.)
A player may re-split up to three times, including Aces.
Usually, a player me re-double down up to three times. (Some casinos do not allow this.)
Late surrender is allowed, including on the first two cards. The player may pull out of a hand by forfeiting half his bet, but only if the dealer does not have a blackjack.
Double down rescue is allowed. If, after doubling down, the player is dissatisfied with his non-busted hand, he may surrender the doubled portion of his bet and keep (rescue) his original bet.
All 21 bonus hands do not count if the result of doubling down.
Usually, the dealer hits a soft 17. (Standards blackjack rules are that the dealer must hit a 16 or lower, and must stand on a 17 or higher.)
Spanish 21 Basic Strategy & Card-Counting
Basic strategy and card-counting are very popular forms of blackjack strategy, which sure makes it tempting to deduce that they can work just as well for Spanish 21. Not if you wish to hang on to your money and sanity.
Card-counting is a strategy in which you aim to keep track of the cards that have already been played from the shoe—literally, by counting cards—in order to gain an advantage over the house. As more cards are played from the shoe, the more you narrow down what cards are left, and the more you can anticipate the cards that you will be dealt and what sort of hand you might make.
Alright, you can start card-counting, attempt to lower the house advantage in Spanish 21. Alas, that is one high house edge you are dealing with, due to the absence of tens, a lot higher than in blackjack. You have got to be one very optimistic gambler to expect to swing the odds to your favor in a game that is practically designed to thwart the card-counters. With its higher house advantage and 25% fewer probabilities to make a blackjack, Spanish 21 is a game of negative expectations. The effects of card-counting are too miniscule to offer any relevant edge in playing hands with positive expectations.
Blackjack basic strategy is a mathematical method of assessing an action given a situation in a particular game. It theorizes that, given the variables governing game play—like the number of decks in a shoe or specific table rules, it is possible to determine what moves are statistically profitable to the player in the long term. If followed to the letter, basic strategy is believed to lower the house edge to less than 1% in blackjack, and this is mostly because the game's steady, smaller number of house rules and card combinations do not exactly force big changes on basic strategy.
Spanish 21 does force those changes. The 10-point cards are 25% fewer: sixteen 10-point cards in a standard 52-card deck less the four 10 cards (one from each of the four suits). Certain 21 bonus hands add more mathematical variables, as do additional house rules and card combinations. For example, you are allowed to double down after seeing any number of cards, unlike in blackjack where you are limited to doubling down merely after the first two cards. If you have 3-3-3-2 for a four-card 11, you can double down. And if you don't like the added card, you can still back out by asking for a double down rescue, which permits you to surrender one bet while pulling back the other. With other hands, you can ask for a late surrender.
Because of the gap caused by the differences between the two games, Spanish 21 has opened up the possibility of having an extreme set of game rules; of having an uncommon combination force you to devise an uncommon strategy. Blackjack and casino gaming author John Grochowski has said that Spanish 21 is "essentially blackjack with an extreme set of rules." Hence, the inception of Spanish 21's very own basic strategy.
Related Pages:
Spanish 21 |
Spanish 21 Game Sites |
Spanish 21 Game Strategy
