Lucky Blackjack is not really a regular blackjack variant because the player is not dealt any hand at all. Therefore as in regular variants the concept of comparing the player’s hand with the dealer’s hand does not arise. The dealer’s hand is dealt in the usual manner and the player has to guess the outcome. It has been developed by Playtech and is available at all Playtech online casinos.

The cards are valued as in blackjack and the hand values are obtained by totalling the card values. There are seven betting options available to the player. He can bet on the dealer ending with any of the five hand values 17, 18 19, 20 and 21. He can also bet on the dealer busting or getting a blackjack. The player selects the chip of the desired denomination and places a wager on one or more of the seven betting areas. The player can place bets of different denominations on different betting areas if he chooses to do so. After the wagers have been placed the player clicks the Deal button. The dealer’s cards are then dealt as per the rules of Lucky Blackjack, which have been incorporated in the software. The dealer is first dealt two cards. If this results in a hand value of less than 17 then another card is drawn. The dealer keeps on getting cards till his hand value is 17 or more. Since the dealer cannot end with a total of less than 17, totals of less than 17 do not figure in the betting spots. If the dealer’s hand value is greater than 21 he busts. The dealer can also draw a two card blackjack.

If the player has a bet on the actual outcome it results in a payout. All other bets lose. A winning wager on 17 results in a payout of 5 to 1; a winning wager on 18 results in a payout of 6 to 1; a winning wager on 19 results in a payout of 6 to 1, a winning wager on 20 results in a payout of 4 to 1; a winning wager on 21 results in a payout of 12 to 1; a winning wager on Bust results in a payout of 2 to 1 and a winning wager on Blackjack results in a payout of 19 to 1.

In Lucky Blackjack the house edges on all the bets are not identical and the strategy is to avoid the bets with high house edges and wager on the bets with low house edges. The probability of the dealer busting is about 28%. Based on this the mathematically fair payout should be 5 to 2. Therefore the actual payout of 2 to 1 results in a very high house edge and this is the least attractive bet in Lucky Blackjack. Similarly computer simulations show that the house edges on the bets for the dealer ending up with a hand value of 17 or of 20 are too high to be attractive. The remaining four bets have house edges of around 5%. These are too high compared to the normal blackjack games but comparable to online slots. Hence if a player decides to wager on Lucky Blackjack he must bet on the dealer having a hand value of 18, 19, 21 or blackjack.