Online Blackjack With Six-Card Charlie

• Published: June 19, 2014
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Some online blackjack variants incorporate an innovative feature called the six-card Charlie rule. This feature not only makes the online blackjack variant interesting but also compels the player to think differently. This article describes the salient features of the six-card Charlie rule.

A six-card Charlie hand is a hand of six cards dealt to the player, whose hand value is not over 21. Such a hand wins automatically. The dealer’s hand is not played out. In most online blackjack variants the six-card Charlie payout is 3 to 2. The six- card Charlie rule increases the average return to the player by 0.16%. Novice online blackjack players may not be very excited by this increase, but for expert players who wager long hours this counts for a lot. This advantage is not compensated for by tweaking any other rule in favour of the online casino. Therefore if you can master the revised optimum strategy for the six-card Charlie rule you can expect an average return close to 99.7%.

The optimum blackjack strategy becomes more aggressive with the six-card Charlie rule because you have to greater risks in order to try for the 3 to 2 Charlie payout. In normal online blackjack variants you will stand on hand values of 14 or 15 rather than risk busting. But with the six-card Charlie rule when you have a hand value of 15 with five cards dealt you have to hit to take the chance of getting a six-hand Charlie. The leading online casino software providers incorporate strategy cards for six-card Charlie blackjack variants. Therefore you need not memorise the cumbersome optimum strategy. These strategy cards are different from the normal ones because they are also have to factor in the number of cards dealt to the player.

Some online blackjack variants use the five-card Charlie rule. Since it is easier to get a Charlie with five cards than with six cards, this rule increases by average return to the player by about 1.5%. This has to be compensated by tweaking rules in favour of the casino to bring down there final average return to the player below 100%. The most common option applied is to reduce the blackjack payout to even money. Some online blackjack variants enable the dealer blackjack to win over the player blackjack. All these take away from the excitement of the game and therefore the five-card Charlie rule is not very popular.