The value of a Blackjack hand is simply the sum of the
point counts of each card in the hand. For example, a
hand containing (5,7,9) has the value of 21. The Ace can
be counted as either 1 or 11. You need not specify which
value the Ace has. It's assumed to always have the value
that makes the best hand. An example will illustrate:
Suppose that you have the beginning hand (Ace, 6). This
hand can be either 7 or 17. If you stop there, it will
be 17. Let's assume that you draw another card to the
hand and now have (Ace, 6, 3). Your total hand is now
20, counting the Ace as 11. Let's backtrack and assume
that you had instead drawn a third card which was an 8.
The hand is now (Ace, 6, 8) which totals 15. Notice that
now the Ace must be counted as only 1 to avoid going over
21.
In Blackjack, a hand that contains an Ace is called a
"soft" total if the Ace can be counted as either
1 or 11 without the total going over 21. For example (Ace,
6) is a soft 17. The description stems from the fact that
the player can always draw another card to a soft total
with no danger of "busting" by going over 21.
The hand (Ace,6,10) on the other hand is a "hard"
17, since now the Ace must be counted as only 1, again
because counting it as 11 would make the hand go over
21.
