Dealer forgot to burn a card

[Lottery Larry]

Get ready to get banned again

[gusmahler]

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So how should we have handled this?

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Once action has been taken on a boardcard by any player, the card must stand. Whether the error is able to be corrected or not, subsequent cards dealt should be those that would have come if no error had occurred.

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Based on the rules quoted above.

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The section you quoted suggests that all the cards stand. However, the last sentence of rule 6 suggests otherwise. Here's the rule in its entirety, separated by sentence.

A) If the dealer fails to burn a card or burns more than one card, the error should be corrected if discovered before betting action has started for that round.

B) Once action has been taken on a boardcard by any player, the card must stand.

C) Whether the error is able to be corrected or not, subsequent cards dealt should be those that would have come if no error had occurred.

D) For example, if two cards were burned, one of the cards should be put back on the deck and used for the burncard on the next round.

E) If there was no betting on a round because a player was all-in, the error should be corrected if discovered before the pot has been awarded.

Sentences A and B together imply that the flop stands because the turn was subsequently dealt.

Sentence C says "subsequent" cards should be corrected. But the error wasn't discovered until all cards were dealt. So this sentence is inapplicable.

Sentence D is inapplicable because it deals with a specific
example that wasn't present in our situation.

But Sentence E says that, in an all-in situation, the problem should be corrected anyway. But it doesn't say how the problem should be corrected. But if you correct it according to Sentence C, you merely reconstruct the board.

The most fair way would be to follow rules 4 and 7 and re-shuffle. But rule 6 seems to imply that you just deal the same cards as they should have been dealt.

As stated above, the cards dealt were
1 2 3 (flop)
4 (burn)
5 (turn)
6 (burn)
7 river

If you merely deal what should have been the correct cards, the result would be

1 (burn)
2 3 4 (flop)
5 (burn)
6 (turn)
7 (burn)
8 river

But this result isn't fair. Someone who likes cards 2 and 3 but doesn't like card 7 will point out the missing burn card problem after the river is dealt, knowing that card 7 will be removed from play, but cards 2 and 3 stay. Obviously, there is potential for abuse. The fairest solution is to follow rule 4 ("the deck must be reshuffled if any boardcards were exposed") and rule 7 ("if the flop needs to be redealt for any reason" then the deck is refhuffled) and reshuffle the board cards together with the rest of the deck (but not including the folded cards and burn cards in the shuffle). But it doesn't seem like rule 6 allows for invocation of rule 7.

[ShannonRyu]

Thank you. This will be printed and taken to the game tonight that I go to, and where the error occured. The most common errors at this game are based on dealing. The host uses cheap decks of cards and is to cheap to buy nice ones. Tonight I am taking some of my plastic cards to his game in the hopes of changing his mind.

Thank you all for the help.

[Lottery Larry]

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Tonight I am taking some of my plastic cards to his game in the hopes of changing his mind.



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If he doesn't use some kind of cloth/felt on the table, you'll be working AGAINST your goal.

[Zetack]

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But this result isn't fair. Someone who likes cards 2 and 3 but doesn't like card 7 will point out the missing burn card problem after the river is dealt, knowing that card 7 will be removed from play, but cards 2 and 3 stay. Obviously, there is potential for abuse. The fairest solution is to follow rule 4 ("the deck must be reshuffled if any boardcards were exposed") and rule 7 ("if the flop needs to be redealt for any reason" then the deck is refhuffled) and reshuffle the board cards together with the rest of the deck (but not including the folded cards and burn cards in the shuffle). But it doesn't seem like rule 6 allows for invocation of rule 7.

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I disagree on your fairness call.

From a Pre-flop perspective there simply isn't any difference what cards come on the flop board. You could use cards 789, 15, and 19. You could have a midget pick the flop, turn and river randomly out of a the deck. You could call up jessica simpson and ask her to pick five numbers and then cycle through the deck picking out that number of cards (i.e. if there were 32 cards left in the deck after dealing out the hole cards if jessica choose 33 as one of her numbers would actually be the first card in the deck..). Whatever.

The only real question is whether you are going to value the cards that were "pre-destined" to come, or not. Since having the fated cards is important to many players, and this value is embodied at many places in the rules, I would tend toward reconstructing the board (obviously this ruling only applies because this is an all-in hand.)

Once you've decided that the fated cards aren't important, you might as well let the board as dealt stand. Reshuffling and re-dealing is neither more, nor less fair than letting the incorrect boar stand. Both boards are of equal value. Both are equally as random.

Picture the problem like this. Before the flop is dealt you tell the players, Sorry fellas, I am going to screw up the board by failing to burn the first card. Now, you don't have the option of having me fix the board to make it correct, but you can have me either stay with the incorrect board, or after I deal the incorrect board, I can pick it up, shuffle, and redeal the board. You can have either option, but you have to choose now, before I deal the incorrect board.

Which would be more fair? Hopefully its obvious that neither would be more fair, they are of equal fairness.

Thus, I think the only decision here is whether to let the board stand as is, or to reconstruct it to the "fated" board.

[gusmahler]

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I disagree on your fairness call.

From a Pre-flop perspective there simply isn't any difference what cards come on the flop board. You could use cards 789, 15, and 19. You could have a midget pick the flop, turn and river randomly out of a the deck. You could call up jessica simpson and ask her to pick five numbers and then cycle through the deck picking out that number of cards (i.e. if there were 32 cards left in the deck after dealing out the hole cards if jessica choose 33 as one of her numbers would actually be the first card in the deck..). Whatever.

The only real question is whether you are going to value the cards that were "pre-destined" to come, or not. Since having the fated cards is important to many players, and this value is embodied at many places in the rules, I would tend toward reconstructing the board (obviously this ruling only applies because this is an all-in hand.)

Once you've decided that the fated cards aren't important, you might as well let the board as dealt stand. Reshuffling and re-dealing is neither more, nor less fair than letting the incorrect boar stand. Both boards are of equal value. Both are equally as random.

Picture the problem like this. Before the flop is dealt you tell the players, Sorry fellas, I am going to screw up the board by failing to burn the first card. Now, you don't have the option of having me fix the board to make it correct, but you can have me either stay with the incorrect board, or after I deal the incorrect board, I can pick it up, shuffle, and redeal the board. You can have either option, but you have to choose now, before I deal the incorrect board.

Which would be more fair? Hopefully its obvious that neither would be more fair, they are of equal fairness.

Thus, I think the only decision here is whether to let the board stand as is, or to reconstruct it to the "fated" board.

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I actually agree with you and think the board should stand. But I'm not Robert and I don't make the Rules.

Robert's Rules says the board must be reconstructed. The question is how the board should be reconstructed. You can either deal the board the way it should have been (using the same board cards in the same order, but burning at the correct point--this happened in OP's situation and at least two players agreed it was correct). Or you could reshuffle. The point of my post was that any option besides reshuffling can result in unfairness.

Here's OP's situation again (Actually, OP didn't say what Dude 1 had, so this is just a hypo):

Dude 1: A[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] K[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]
Dude 2: 3[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img] 3[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]

Both go all-in pre-flop

Flop: 4[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img] A[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img] K[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img]
Burn
Turn: 9 [img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]
Burn
River: 3 [img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]

Here, Dude 1 didn't notice the missing burn card until the river card came out. It's possible that he didn't notice the missing burn until then. But it's also possible that he noticed it as soon as the flop was dealt, but didn't care because the flop gave him two pair. So he didn't say anything until the river gave his opponent trips. Suddenly, he "notices" and demands the board be reconstructed.

If you just reconstruct the board the way it "should have been," the result is that the 4[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img], the 9[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img], and the 3[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] are burn cards: Dude 1 still makes two pair, but Dude 2 might not get his trips. Thus, reshuffling makes the situation fairer because merely reconstructing the board means one of the players sees what hands are dealt first before objecting. (It's still not completely fair because, in my hypo, Dude 1 still doesn't object until he saw all the cards. IMO, he shouldn't be allowed to object after the turn is dealt. But Robert's Rules disagrees.)

[ShannonRyu]

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The only real question is whether you are going to value the cards that were "pre-destined" to come, or not. Since having the fated cards is important to many players, and this value is embodied at many places in the rules, I would tend toward reconstructing the board (obviously this ruling only applies because this is an all-in hand.)

[/ QUOTE ]I think the players I play with DO value the 'fated' cards. I can respect that.
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Suddenly, he "notices" and demands the board be reconstructed.

[/ QUOTE ]In this situation, there was no 'demanding' of anything. The error was pointed out and the decision on how to correct was left up to the host/dealer/source of the problem.

[Zetack]

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I disagree on your fairness call.

From a Pre-flop perspective there simply isn't any difference what cards come on the flop board. You could use cards 789, 15, and 19. You could have a midget pick the flop, turn and river randomly out of a the deck. You could call up jessica simpson and ask her to pick five numbers and then cycle through the deck picking out that number of cards (i.e. if there were 32 cards left in the deck after dealing out the hole cards if jessica choose 33 as one of her numbers would actually be the first card in the deck..). Whatever.

The only real question is whether you are going to value the cards that were "pre-destined" to come, or not. Since having the fated cards is important to many players, and this value is embodied at many places in the rules, I would tend toward reconstructing the board (obviously this ruling only applies because this is an all-in hand.)

Once you've decided that the fated cards aren't important, you might as well let the board as dealt stand. Reshuffling and re-dealing is neither more, nor less fair than letting the incorrect boar stand. Both boards are of equal value. Both are equally as random.

Picture the problem like this. Before the flop is dealt you tell the players, Sorry fellas, I am going to screw up the board by failing to burn the first card. Now, you don't have the option of having me fix the board to make it correct, but you can have me either stay with the incorrect board, or after I deal the incorrect board, I can pick it up, shuffle, and redeal the board. You can have either option, but you have to choose now, before I deal the incorrect board.

Which would be more fair? Hopefully its obvious that neither would be more fair, they are of equal fairness.

Thus, I think the only decision here is whether to let the board stand as is, or to reconstruct it to the "fated" board.

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I actually agree with you and think the board should stand. But I'm not Robert and I don't make the Rules.

Robert's Rules says the board must be reconstructed. The question is how the board should be reconstructed. You can either deal the board the way it should have been (using the same board cards in the same order, but burning at the correct point--this happened in OP's situation and at least two players agreed it was correct). Or you could reshuffle. The point of my post was that any option besides reshuffling can result in unfairness.

Here's OP's situation again (Actually, OP didn't say what Dude 1 had, so this is just a hypo):

Dude 1: A[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] K[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]
Dude 2: 3[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img] 3[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]

Both go all-in pre-flop

Flop: 4[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img] A[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img] K[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img]
Burn
Turn: 9 [img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]
Burn
River: 3 [img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]

Here, Dude 1 didn't notice the missing burn card until the river card came out. It's possible that he didn't notice the missing burn until then. But it's also possible that he noticed it as soon as the flop was dealt, but didn't care because the flop gave him two pair. So he didn't say anything until the river gave his opponent trips. Suddenly, he "notices" and demands the board be reconstructed.

If you just reconstruct the board the way it "should have been," the result is that the 4[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img], the 9[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img], and the 3[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] are burn cards: Dude 1 still makes two pair, but Dude 2 might not get his trips. Thus, reshuffling makes the situation fairer because merely reconstructing the board means one of the players sees what hands are dealt first before objecting. (It's still not completely fair because, in my hypo, Dude 1 still doesn't object until he saw all the cards. IMO, he shouldn't be allowed to object after the turn is dealt. But Robert's Rules disagrees.)

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But whether you reconstruct the board as it should have been, or you reshuffle, either way the players can wait to see the board before they object. I don't see your point.

Dude 2 (with the wired threes) could very well wait until after the river to object even with the unfavorable flop taht gives two pair to his opponent, since now, if he's the only one who notices the error, he gets seven cards to try and spike his three only its even better than that, because if he doesn't hit it on the first turn and river, you're going to return him to a 50% coin flip by redoing the entire board.

Heck, suppose, again its dude 1 that notices the error on the flop, but this time instead of making two pair with his A-K, he entirely whiffs. He's gone from a coin flip to big dog to the pair of threes. But does he now jump up and say, hey, Dealer error? Well, there's an incentive for him not to do that because if he waits until after the river then he has seven cards coming to try and spike his ace or king.

Anytime you have an error on the board there are going to be incentives to either declare it or not declare it depending on whether the board helps you or hurts you. I don't think that has any bearing on what the fairest way of handling the error is once its been discovered.

As an aside, I don't think "reconstructing" means reshuffling. That would be redealing or redoing or something of that nature. Reconstructing, has to mean trying to get the original board, if possible. And, as usual, I'm going with Roberts on this one, reconstruct the original, fated board.

(I think you misunderstood me above, btw, I was saying that if you reject the reconstruct the original board approach, there is nothing inherently fairer about reshuffling than letting the incorrect board stand, not that I'm for letting the original board stand.)

--Zetack

Edit: let us note, of course, that this all-in situation is a small subset of the dealer error on the flop situations. Most of the time, the error will either be pointed out right away (probably because it hurts somebody) or there will be action on the error and it must stand.

[gusmahler]

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But whether you reconstruct the board as it should have been, or you reshuffle, either way the players can wait to see the board before they object. I don't see your point.

[/ QUOTE ]My point is that an element of randomness is gone. When you complain about the missed burn, two board cards are known to remain as board cards, while two are known to be dead (the turn and river become burn cards).

Reshuffling would return the hand to percentages they were at the time the bets were made.

E.g., according to two dimes, a pair of 3s is 53 to 47 against AKos. But is only 48 to 52 if one of the 3s is dead (which they would be if the board were reconstructed (ignoring the A and K on the flop).

OTOH, re-shuffling maintains the percentages to 53 to 47, which is where they were when the bets were made. It just seems fairer to me.

[ QUOTE ]
Dude 2 (with the wired threes) could very well wait until after the river to object even with the unfavorable flop taht gives two pair to his opponent, since now, if he's the only one who notices the error, he gets seven cards to try and spike his three only its even better than that, because if he doesn't hit it on the first turn and river, you're going to return him to a 50% coin flip by redoing the entire board.

Heck, suppose, again its dude 1 that notices the error on the flop, but this time instead of making two pair with his A-K, he entirely whiffs. He's gone from a coin flip to big dog to the pair of threes. But does he now jump up and say, hey, Dealer error? Well, there's an incentive for him not to do that because if he waits until after the river then he has seven cards coming to try and spike his ace or king.

[/ QUOTE ]In both cases, if a player whiffs the flop, it's in his best interest to complain right then as opposed to seeing the turn and river first (which is my main complaint of the rule, if a mistake is made on the flop, it should be corrected then, not when the turn or river is made. If he spikes the A or K or 3 on the turn or river, they could be dead if opponent notices and complains.

[ QUOTE ]
Edit: let us note, of course, that this all-in situation is a small subset of the dealer error on the flop situations. Most of the time, the error will either be pointed out right away (probably because it hurts somebody) or there will be action on the error and it must stand.

[/ QUOTE ] Which is why there shouldn't be an exception for all-in situations. In all other situations, if the turn is dealt, then the flop stands. Only when a player is all-in can someone hold their objection until seeing the turn and river.

[Zetack]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
But whether you reconstruct the board as it should have been, or you reshuffle, either way the players can wait to see the board before they object. I don't see your point.

[/ QUOTE ]My point is that an element of randomness is gone. When you complain about the missed burn, two board cards are known to remain as board cards, while two are known to be dead (the turn and river become burn cards).

Reshuffling would return the hand to percentages they were at the time the bets were made.

E.g., according to two dimes, a pair of 3s is 53 to 47 against AKos. But is only 48 to 52 if one of the 3s is dead (which they would be if the board were reconstructed (ignoring the A and K on the flop).

OTOH, re-shuffling maintains the percentages to 53 to 47, which is where they were when the bets were made. It just seems fairer to me.

[ QUOTE ]
Dude 2 (with the wired threes) could very well wait until after the river to object even with the unfavorable flop taht gives two pair to his opponent, since now, if he's the only one who notices the error, he gets seven cards to try and spike his three only its even better than that, because if he doesn't hit it on the first turn and river, you're going to return him to a 50% coin flip by redoing the entire board.

Heck, suppose, again its dude 1 that notices the error on the flop, but this time instead of making two pair with his A-K, he entirely whiffs. He's gone from a coin flip to big dog to the pair of threes. But does he now jump up and say, hey, Dealer error? Well, there's an incentive for him not to do that because if he waits until after the river then he has seven cards coming to try and spike his ace or king.

[/ QUOTE ]In both cases, if a player whiffs the flop, it's in his best interest to complain right then as opposed to seeing the turn and river first (which is my main complaint of the rule, if a mistake is made on the flop, it should be corrected then, not when the turn or river is made. If he spikes the A or K or 3 on the turn or river, they could be dead if opponent notices and complains.

[ QUOTE ]
Edit: let us note, of course, that this all-in situation is a small subset of the dealer error on the flop situations. Most of the time, the error will either be pointed out right away (probably because it hurts somebody) or there will be action on the error and it must stand.

[/ QUOTE ] Which is why there shouldn't be an exception for all-in situations. In all other situations, if the turn is dealt, then the flop stands. Only when a player is all-in can someone hold their objection until seeing the turn and river.

[/ QUOTE ]

Ok, I won't try and put my answers next to your specific points above as its getting confusing.

I don't think you understand the incentives, I completely disagree that with a resuffle after a mistake players will generally have an incentive to correct a mistake early. The incentives will usually be to let the board play out and only call out the error if, after all the cards are dealt, you haven't won.

As to the fairness issue, I'm missing your point on fairness. I think you're saying that randomness is more fair than getting the "fated" cards. I think many players would say what is most fair is that the cards that would have come without the dealer error is most fair.

However, if you think reshuffling is more fair than reconstructing the board to get the fated cards, I still don't see why you think that's more fair than just going with the board as (mistakenly) dealt, since that is equally as random.

I'm enjoying the discussion, by the way, no criticism of your views is intended.

--Zetack