Baccarat is a casino card game that is played by players, not the dealer. The goal of the game is to get a player’s bet as close to 9 as possible. The game is easy to learn, with a minimal amount of decisions made by the player.
Players place bets on either the Banker, Player, or a Tie. Once the bets are placed, the dealer will deal two cards to each of these positions and the hand that is closest to nine wins. The game is played with a standard 52-card deck shuffled together and each card rank has a specific value. Two-through-nine pip cards have a value of their number; face cards and 10-pip cards have a value of zero.
The rules of baccarat vary somewhat from one game to the next, but there are a few common elements that are found in most games. Baccarat is generally played with 8 decks of cards in offline casinos and 6 decks in online casinos. The fewer decks used decreases the House Edge for the Banker bet and makes the Player and Tie bets more expensive for the player.
Advanced baccarat players often use patterns to reduce the house edge of the game. These pattern systems look for double win streaks in the shoes, which help to determine when to bet more on the Player or Banker side. In addition, players can avoid the unfavorable Tie bet, which has a 14.1 percent edge for the casino.