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Is there a 5 card rule in blackjack?

Chances are, you had a rule whereby if you collect five cards in your hand without busting, you automatically win – unless the dealer has a blackjack. The rule about five cards is so common in family games that most of us assume it must be a standard element of the blackjack games enjoyed in land or online casinos.

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When you were growing up as a kid, you probably played blackjack, or a variant like Pontoon, at home. Chances are, you had a rule whereby if you collect five cards in your hand without busting, you automatically win – unless the dealer has a blackjack. The rule about five cards is so common in family games that most of us assume it must be a standard element of the blackjack games enjoyed in land or online casinos. But that couldn’t be further from the truth. You simply don’t see the rule played in any brick and mortar casinos, and you’d be hard-pressed to find that variant anywhere online.

What is 5-Card Charlie?

While it’s always nice to get two good starting cards in blackjack or to take one card and get closer to 21, sometimes you get dealt another low card and then another. Normally this is not great because it can leave you on a total like 13, and you have a dilemma about hitting again or standing. However, imagine that you could win the hand simply by taking another card, so long as you don’t bust? In 5-Card Charlie, getting five cards wins the hand, even if you have something poor like 15. It gives you an extra incentive to take another card. Naturally, there is a downside to this rule. Some players with a mediocre hand might be tempted to take another card just so they can make five cards – but end up busting instead

Why is 5-Card Charlie not popular in casinos?

As with all games in a casino, they exist to make the establishment a profit. Casinos are there to make money – if they don’t, they close. And if they close, you will have nowhere to get some gaming entertainment. Because of this, the casino has a house edge in every game, and it’s why we are happy to accept it. There is a house edge in blackjack, for recreational players at least, of about 4%. This can be reduced to below 1% if you follow a fairly simple and solid blackjack strategy. But when you introduce an extra rule like 5-Card Charlie, it affects the house edge. You might only make a five-card hand once in 50 rounds of blackjack, but it’s enough to tip the scales more in the player’s favor. And as we’ve seen, the casinos don’t wish to see that happen. It’s for this reason alone that 5-Card Charlie is not played in land-based casinos. If you are lucky, you might find the variation in an online casino. But if you do, check out any other rules at the table because it’s likely another slight variation of the rules, like the number of decks or whether the dealer stands on soft 17, will offset your advantage. It’s a shame because the blackjack five cards rule adds some extra excitement to the game. It gives you something else to shoot for if all seems lost. Somehow busting while going for the fifth card is not quite so annoying as being dealt a ten and a four, taking a third card, and busting.

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What does being called soft mean?

Someone who is soft is not very healthy and strong: Look at you! You need more exercise. You're getting soft. More examples.

soft

The tattooed veteran has a soft spot for roses -- and an even softer spot for the families of fallen soldiers. From CBS Local She's one of the kindest, most soft-spoken people you'll ever meet. From NBCNews.com

It has aggressive themes buried under its soft packaging. From Huffington Post

We just have a soft goverment and a soft majority. From CNN

Relationship building is a vital "soft skill" that gets you ahead in all areas of life. From Huffington Post People tend to think of pink as a soft and delicate color, but not our pink. From Huffington Post If we plan this correctly, these batteries could serve as a soft backup in the event of general power failure. From Fast Company Try giving your teeth a break by cutting back on the sugar and soft drinks. From Huffington Post When running barefoot, runners land on their softer midfoot, and use shorter strides. From TIME It's hard to sort of step forward and do something like that without appearing soft on crime. From NPR These examples are from corpora and from sources on the web. Any opinions in the examples do not represent the opinion of the Cambridge Dictionary editors or of Cambridge University Press or its licensors.

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