[SpaceMonkey]

For those that host or run regular games, do little things about other other people's home games bother you?

I host a regular game that's pretty organized. I played in someone else's game last weekend, and all these little things kind of annoyed me. It's a little anal and wouldn't prevent me from playing there again but would any of these bug any of you?

-Only one deck per table, not two
-Cut cards were poker sized, cards were bridge sized
-People who bust out cannot deal for the remaining players, even if the busted player wants to deal.
-When they race off chips, a player can win more than one chip!
-Blinds jumped from 200-400 to 400-800 to 500-1000

[smitty]

I don't think you being anal. There is certainly a big difference between the average home poker tourney, and a well-run home poker tourney.

[BPTDirector]

Man, you are hitting the nail on the head.

The kind of things you mention totally drive me nuts. What really gets me going is the variance in rules -

Raising for instance - in most published rule books a re-raise has to be at least the size of the previous raise - I've been places where if I raised $500, someone could re-raise $100 - the size of the big blind. Huge difference when making a bet.

Also, the blind stuff I mentioned on another thread, huge discrepancy between games - it's a crap shoot.

Chip race offs - how many ways can there be to do it right?

I've tried two decks of cards per table at my game and it does improve flow there. But when I mention it at any of my buddy's games, people gripe about it - I guess they would rather sit around and let the blind levels go up after playing about 4 hands per level.

And how about misdeals? I think that's a totally different topic altogether, I've never seen misdeals handled so differently between games - I've been in cardrooms and there just isn't that much variance.

Finally, trying to enforce a blind schedule with no timer whatsoever - so it's basically whenever the host feels he should raise them -

Maybe a RULES forum on the site would be a good thing -

Jim

[ky70]

Originally Posted by SpaceMonkey

For those that host or run regular games, do little things about other other people's home games bother you?

I host a regular game that's pretty organized. I played in someone else's game last weekend, and all these little things kind of annoyed me. It's a little anal and wouldn't prevent me from playing there again but would any of these bug any of you?

-Only one deck per table, not two
-Cut cards were poker sized, cards were bridge sized
-People who bust out cannot deal for the remaining players, even if the busted player wants to deal.
-When they race off chips, a player can win more than one chip!
-Blinds jumped from 200-400 to 400-800 to 500-1000

Here are the issues I have with the "other game" I play in (tourney style)
-Paper cards are normally worn out and sticky (they don't like plastic cards)
-we play with no denom chips...each player gets 60 chips
-blinds start at 1/2, so each player starts with only 30 big bets
-20 minutes blinds with 30 big bets is already "speed poker" but half the time they drop the blinds to 15 minutes

Here's what a like about the game
-This game moves along at a great pace with not a lot of "who's turn is it" going on. There's always 1 or 2 at the table that point out who's turn it is if the actions ever slows.
-The competition is beautiful. I don't mean from level of play but from the fact that they are ruthless in pursuit of each others chips at this game and they are all really good friends who have known each other for many years. I joined as an outsider and I was worried about the integrity of the game but their play against one another put that to rest.
-This game has a larger group of players to choose from than my game and I enjoy playing against all the different types of players.
-They are willing to play for bigger stakes than my regulars.
-The atmosphere at camaraderie at this game is the best

[Wooderson]

What REALLY bugs me about the game I usually play in is:

- they use a $50 chip. We play T4500 Tourneys, blinds start at 25/50, and for some reason the host refuses to not use a 50 chip and doesn't get why not to.
- no timer for decidion making. there are a couple of guys that will literally take 3 minutes to decide what to do (this has even happened with calling the blind!)
- old paper cards
- 30 minute blind rounds - even an 8 person game can take 4 hours... that's just too much

[chipper57AA]

I played in another groups home game a week ago and one thing really had me ticked. This was a table with 8 guys, all close friends mind you, but I was the outsider. I was in a hand heads up with one other guy. A buddy of the guy I was up against asks the guy "Let me see your cards" and the guy shows him his cards. The buddy then whispers something in the guy's ear.

WAIT A SEC! ONE GUY TO A HAND! Grrrr. I nearly made the guy flip up both his cards. Basically if one guy shows his live hand to another then everyone basically has the right to see the cards - right?

This happened a couple of times during the night. Each time I reminded these guys of basic poker guidelines and courtesy.

However, I forgave them later on. Turns out I took 1st place and their little "peak and whisper" sessions didn't help them a bit. Still - you gotta hate when that happens.

[Spaceman Spiff]

Great topic. Everyone always thinks I'm the anal rules guy, but who do they always ask when a dispute happens?

I don't play too many games outside of mine. The nice thing is, the ones I do play are usually guys that play in my game. It's amazing to see the difference in the games going back to just a year ago. I've done quite a bit of "training" of my guys and I can tell they've been training the people in their games now also.

The things that bug though:
-The green $50 chip. What!? Not only is it unnecessary, but then it screws up my game when guys think my green 25's are 50's

-Like someone else said, the random blinds timer.

-Color ups. At one game I play, they just color up instead of race. So say you're coloring up reds. As long as you have just one extra red chip, you get colored up to a green (or a non-green 25 in this game).

-Handling of chips. This is maybe out of my paranoia more than anything, but at my game, I get a little ansy whenever anyone starts milling around where I keep the chips. I pride myself on running a fair game and feel that to help ensure that, I should be the only one handling chips as far as rebuys, color ups, etc. At another game I played in, it was kind of a free-for-all. The chip case was open and if you rebought, you just went and grabbed what you needed. It's not that I really think there are cheaters in our midst, but my philosophy is to just not open the door for the cheating in the first place.

[panthershutch15]

I didn't see my biggest complaint mentioned yet!!!

-- Action moves around the table and the flop is ready to be dealt. After the flop comes with low cards usually with a pair on the board, some idiot who is out of the hand sighs out loud, then reaches through the muck to find his cards, re-checks them, and shows them to his neighbor who is also out of the hand.

I'm like, what the hell?!?!?! No need to bluff at this pot now because everyone knows that one or two of the cards you are representing is in that fools mucked hand!!!

I said something and this has pretty much stopped, but occasionally it happens again.

[dad604]

I agreed. I like a well run tourney. I hate tourney where the rules are not standard. I was in a NLHE tourney where a player can under raise. That was annoying. $500 blinds and a player would raise to $501 on the flop, that lets another player reraise. If someone wants to cheap, it is so easy to get someone to raise that $1 so you can trap someone. I really hate that one.

[JustinHEMI04]

I am referred to as the "poker cop" by all of my regulars and friends. I am so anal about things being perfect, and it translates into games that are not my own. I too get annoyed by disorganized or not well thought out games. I have a buddy that bought a 6 color set of 11.5 gram chip and he has to use all 6 colors the whole time with wierd denoms. I have to write them down. Everywhere I play other than my place uses those shitty wax cards that often come with cheap chips. That gets on my nerves. You can't shuffle them at all. And then there is all the wierd rule violations, most of which have been mentioned. Fortunately I am such a **** about rules and how things are supposed to be that they usually concede when I ***** LOL.

Justin

PS I played in a "free roll" at a local comedy club. I raised preflop 1500 and this other kid goes "I raise 100." I am like "whats the f**king point of a 100 dollar raise to my 1500... you have to raise at least 1500." He is like " thats how we do it here and it lets you know I have something."