« Table tournaments | | Betting »
Dealing what’s in the cards
All right, you’re situated at the table, you’ve made your bet in the betting box, and your heart is pumping like a jackhammer. The dealer flashes you a warm smile, wishes you good luck, shuffles the deck, and asks you to cut the cards. (Check out the sidebar “Cuts and burns: Ensuring shuffling safety” for what you need to know about cutting the deck.)
If you’re playing a one- or two-deck game, the dealer holds the cards in his hands and deals you two cards face-down. You can pick up these cards, but make sure you only hold them in one hand.
However, the majority of blackjack games today use six or eight decks. In these cases, the dealer deals your two cards face-up from a shoe (a boxlike device that houses the cards).
Whether your cards are dealt face-up or face-down really doesn’t matter — dealers follow strict rules, and seeing the values of your cards doesn’t influence them. Dealers’ hands always start off with one card exposed and one card hidden, regardless of the number of decks
