How to Play Blackjack: Your Ultimate Guide for 2022

Some blackjack tables have a practice of discarding the first card from each new shoe before beginning play. Rules about seeing this card vary from place to place, sometimes even from dealer to dealer.

Some show it to the table automatically, some have to be asked, and (rarely) some casinos have a policy of never showing it to the player.

Card counters would, of course, prefer to see the burn card, but generally dont regard it as a big deal if they cant, as there are usually some quantity of cards behind the cut card that they will never get to see anyway.

This practice actually wasnt designed to deter card counting. It was actually designed to prevent an unethical trick called card steering.

It prevents players (or shady dealers) from marking the top card, or from accidental exposure to players prior to the deal. If the casino wants to burn cards to deter card counting, they would periodically burn several cards in the middle of the shoe to more effectively mess with player counts.

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How to Play Blackjack: Your Ultimate Guide for 2022