Brush up on your blackjack know-how and get ready for a Wednesday Blackjack Tournament here at the Swinomish Casino & Lodge!
Did you know that our blackjack tournament play is different from regular blackjack play on the casino floor? Regular blackjack on the casino floor at the Swinomish Casino & Lodge is played with multiple decks of cards, while tournament blackjack is played with only two decks. Look below and check out how the play styles differ.
General Blackjack Etiquette:
Even if you don’t know what you’re doing, you can play like a seasoned professional!
1. Sort it and stack it! Stack your chips in order of domination, with the largest denomination on the bottom and the smallest denomination on top. This saves you and the dealer time. The dealer will rearrange the chips before the round starts if you don’t. Dealers sort denominations to help prevent players from quickly adding a large- denomination once they won.
2. No cash on the table! Don’t leave currency on the table during game play. If you need to exchange cash for chips, wait until the current hand is finished, then lay your cash on the table. The dealer will spread it out before exchanging it for chips so it’s clearly recorded on camera.
3. Hands off the chips! Once you stack your bet, don’t touch it until the hand is over. You may double down — add another bet — during the same hand by placing a second sorted bet next to your first bet.
4. Also, hands off the cards! For regular blackjack play, the dealer places all of your cards on the table. No touching is allowed. The dealer also kindly counts your cards for you, so you don’t have to worry about the math! Easy!
5. Be courteous to other players. If they don’t ask for advice, it’s best not to tell them how they should play. If you wind up sitting next to a new player who makes rookie mistakes, just remind yourself that everyone is new at some point or you can change tables.
6. Be patient, please. Especially for tournament play, which doesn’t limit the number of players, it’s important to be patient with game play and other players. We want to give everyone the chance to play and don’t want to turn people away from competing. Last year, we had 32-plus people play in one tournament! That made it an exciting, yet busy, night! With 21 hands per round, sometimes it takes longer to finish each round.
Now you’re ready to sit at a table and play with confidence! Swinomish Casino & Lodge Blackjack Tournaments start at 6pm each Wednesday now through July, and each player must be seated at that time in order to participate. Players can buy-in for $21 at the pit starting at 9am. To help prevent a lengthy tournament, please arrive early to buy-in. For more information, visit our Blackjack Tournaments event page!
