The night. You sit down at 8 PM with 1,000. The casino closes at 2 AM. At 10 PM, midnight and 2 AM the house checks your stack: below the target and you go home. Clear 2 AM and you walk out with your money.

The count. The shoe board shows every card left above the cut card, plus the Hi-Lo running count. High counts favour you. Bet more when they do. The pit boss notices when your bets track the count.

Heat. Spreading your bets up, long win streaks and playing vouchers all raise heat. Heat decays a little every hand and more on losses. At 25 the cut card moves up; at 50 naturals pay 6:5; at 70 the table max halves; at 85 the shoe is shuffled every 8 hands; at 100 you are backed off and the run ends.

Vouchers. A natural, a winning double, sweeping a split or a win streak gets you a pick of three. Hold up to three. Every voucher expires after a number of hands: use it or lose it. Outcome vouchers ride on the next hand and pay a multiple of that hand's base bet. Shoe vouchers change the cards. Rule vouchers change the rules for a while. Cursed ones come with chips and a catch.

The rules card. One "Rules of Draw and Stud Poker" card is in the shoe. If you draw it, you choose its value from 1 to 11. It can make 21 but never a natural. If the dealer draws it, it counts as 1 and the dealer keeps drawing.

Table rules. Two decks, dealer stands on soft 17, blackjack pays 3:2, double on any two cards, double after split, split up to three hands, split aces get one card. No surrender unless a voucher says so.

Keys. H hit, S stand, D double, P split, R surrender, Enter deal, 1-9/0/= set the rules card, arrows nudge the bet.