Scenario: six remaining players in a tourney negotiate a chop that involves dividing up the prize pool and leaving X to play for, winner-take-all.

1. Before any payouts occur, are any of the 6 free to change their mind and reneg on the chop?

2. One player is knocked out and paid. Are the remaining 5 players free to renegotiate the terms of the chop?

3. Three players remain; one is knocked out after making a decision (by his own estimate) strategically correct for a winner-take-all game but less so for moving up to a higher payout.

Immediately afterwards, one of the remaining two players suggests a chop. Is the player who was knocked out correct or justified to demand that they not be permitted to renegotiate the chop?

1. I think this should depend on exactly what we are talking about. If it is instantaneous.... like the players says "yeah OK ...wait wait no never mind" I don't think we should be considering that agreement to chop. But I think there comes a point where its clear everyone agrees and thereafter nobody should be allowed to rescind unless all agree.
In a casino setting I would use the point that the floorperson or tournament director confirms all have agreed as that point. In a home game scenario its obviously more nebulous. In no event should he be allowed to rescind after a hand has been played under the new terms (unless all agree essentially making a new deal to go back).

2. Yes. The remaining players are free to make whatever deal they all agree to. teh only people who need agree are people remaining in the tournament.

3. No he is not. He no longer has an interest n the prize pool so is not party to the decision. His strategically based action did not become incorrect by their later decision simply because had he not made that decision they may not have agreed to a chop.

I will note some caveats to 2 and 3....

If in reality the remaining players has a pre-existing agreement that they would alter the payouts once the other guy got knocked out .... that is collusive and a player has a valid objection to their actions .... but i don;t think the remedy is necessarily to tell them they can't now chop (because they will anyway.

If this is a league points situation I think you should rules in place to protect other players from collusive chops designed to manipulate the point standings.....

Sandman summed it up nicely; I'm chiming in cuz I am honestly confused by how this went down. I am assuming your tourney had a posted payout schedule. A chop is generally an agreement to alter that schedule, and give everyone their money/points right there on the spot. If there is a set-aside for 1st, then you play for that. So if I imagine there were 100 points to be chopped, 80 were split up and 20 set aside, are you saying that once there was a knockout, the remaining five players decided to give each of themselves a point from the set aside and play winner gets the last 15? And on and on with more knockouts?

I think I see the 'legality' of this, as sand said only who's left in the tournament have a stake in what's left to play for, but from a practical POV I hate it. First up, it'll drag out the end of the tournament; as a host, I want it to wrap it up and send em home or get to playing cash games. Second, my immediate thought went to collusion between friends. Depending on the stakes and the differing relationships between players, this area of home games can get murky. My preference is to avoid it altogether, and I would have held them to the terms of the original agreement.

I've run a friendly, low-stakes game for years, and collusion issues come up from time to time. I honestly think it's mostly cluelessness more than bad intentions, but it still can upset the atmosphere of an evening. Some of it you can allow cuz we're all friends or friendly, but other times, if a situation is avoidable, I'd say side-step it.

I would add this .... If Player A agrees to teh first "chop/save deal" and then complains after being knocked out that the remaining players made a new deal after he was knocked out .... he should be asked what right he had to make a deal without the consent of all the people who had previously been knocked out of the tournament if he now thinks that the others dpn;t have that right after he was knocked our.

I feel the same as psandman.

Any negotiation to change payout structure may give already eliminated players cause for concern.

For newbies, they are likely to feel cheated for not knowing what may happen. Newbie gets knocked out 2 from the money, and then bitches that they would have played differently if they knew about the bubble/save deal.

Trying to stop players from doing so seems like a losing effort. I think there should be more effort made to letting players know that there may be deals, and how they are likely to be enforced.




** Personal commentary - Both situations have happened to me in casino's and non-raked friendly tourneys.

I was very upset after getting knocked out in 7th, when 5 places paid and then they decided to pay 6. I felt like I was the only one who didn't know it was going to happen, and would have (maybe incorrectly) changed strategies to last longer.

In NJ Casino tourneys, when I chop, I insist on taking a higher place, with a higher payout than the money I will get. Then I only give the excess money to the person facilitating the chop. I do stick around, but never want to wondering if there will be a short, or ever being concerned that someone is going to walk with the cash. To the collective credit, there has never been an issue, but the TDs have been clear about not being involved.

Forgot I had posted this. Anyway, as you could likely tell, I was the one knocked out. I asked 1 and 2 to see how the answers would square with 3, but my own answers were yes, yes and no.

You all make fair points to the contrary, but I felt slighted by the potential for collusion. I don't have any specific reason to suspect pre-planned collusion, but the general atmosphere of games in this area includes a lot of soft play.

People constantly have to be told they can't agree to check it down in pots where a third person is all in, I'll regularly get squeezed out of pots preflop or on the flop by bets or raises only to watch the people involved agree that "there's enough in there" and check it down.

I've personally been something of a rarity at these games for a while now. I'm not originally from the backwater ****hole where we play (4 hours from the nearest real casino), younger than 95% of the players, and don't know anyone socially outside of the game. I never check it down and almost never chop tourneys. They're all friendly enough people, but I can't help but think being an outsider makes it just a little easier to not feel bad about grimming me.

edit: there is a league system involved, but only the prize money was subject to the chop.

It looks like your only contrary answer is to the first question. Am I correct? And if so, you haven't explained your reasoning for that one.

In a way, your feelings on this don't matter. You can raise your issues and argue your points, but you're playing with an old guard four hours away from your nearest casino. If you meet resistance, you have to drop it and adjust.

I play in some games where players openly discuss the texture of the board, and I play in games where that is strictly forbidden. In every game, you are playing within the same set of rules and customs as everyone else there.

If deuces are wild, you can't look at it as a game that would be straight if only deuces weren't wild — that's not the game you're playing tonight. That's a different game played at the casino four hours away.

I am 90 minutes away from the Ohio and Indiana casinos rooms, so most of my play is home games, mostly cash. I host my own weekly group and attend other games occasionally. I have found that rules and structure are very close most of the time , but each game usually has something or a few somethings that vary as to structure or group dynamics. If you are stuck with this ( as I am) it is best to simply go with the flow and not openly object too much. Either don't attend or adapt. I would rather play.

I have also found that if you are not "that guy" about stuff and go out of your way to fit in to how they do things, your status as an outsider will fade. Soon enough you will be part of the group talking about other "outsiders". Good luck.