what does everyone think about devising a system to beat the banker?

what i mean is this:

it isn't beyond the realms of possibility to devise a set of rules that would increase players' winnings

(eg a very simple rule 'never deal' would improve the average prize from £17k to £25k, although with this rule most players would take home very small prizes [ie blue boxes] )

so before devising the system we would have to decide what we were trying to achieve (ie what payouts we wanted to make more likely, and what payouts we wanted to make less likely)

next, we would have to make the set of rules simple enough for players to remember (i don't think you're allowed to have a laptop in the crazy chair)

and finally, the system would need to be tested against previous games to see how it performed

I agree with this, as if I ever went into the crazy chair, I'd go with a pretermined list of numbers, a predetermined system and then I would have no regrets after the game.

The basic system would be that, having taking a 'critical value' (10% of the top value) and seeing how many values there are above it.
If there are three or more: Never deal
If there are two or less: Deal at 10% of the sum of the values above the critical value.

e.g.
1p, 10p, 50p, £35k, £250k

I would deal at £28.5; but:

1p, 10p, 50p, £35k, £50k, £100k

I wouldn't deal no matter what.

Thanh's colour cluster system is actually the only logical one around. There is more chance of getting a row of blues than a mixture of blues and reds.

Try it yourself - get 11 black cards and 11 red cards from a normal pack of cards and deal them out shaped like the wings. It's suprising how many clusters there are. My record is 5 blacks in a row.