How would one go about finding one of these underground card rooms. I dont live in the city, just outside, but is it only if someone introduces it to you? I would imagine if you could find out easily, it would be a bad idea because other people (police) could find easily as well.

Got to be careful, we got tied up and robbed with machine guns 2 years ago in boston, i dont think ill ever go back to any club. If you hang around the casinos , you will hear people talking about local card rooms in the cities.

Best thing is to network and find a game that someone you know well is involved in. Without that, I travel a lot for business and have found several games in the US using the "bar poker" method.

Search internet for bar poker events and go attend. Since this is your home city you should be able to find a few. Might take a couple times, but watch for players who seem to know (or at least think) they know what they're doing. Strike up poker conversations with them offline, and if you hit it off with them they'll usually invite you to a game. It's simple networking from there.

Just fair warning though, it's not without risk. Be on your guard and don't express too much enthusiasm for getting into a game (like asking the whole bar/table about where you can play). Also beware if you observe the following:

1. Someone is practically selling a game to you (as opposed to casually mentioning it and then talking about something else)

2. Someone talks up a game but then starts telling you about all these wierd things you need to do to get in (like give them the buy-in in advance or some other nonsense)

3. You get past all that and the place to play turns out to be some dark rathole with no discernable human activity around it. Kinda hard to make this call all the time since a lot of UG games are in questionable places but cars in the parking lot is something I like to see, at a minimum.

4. The guy who invites you is wearing a**less chaps and has a ball-gag hanging out of his pocket.

have your location filled in on here and hope someone will pm you

and other standard rules apply; bring one buy-in inside, leave the ribeye in the truck next to the .38 and leave the wallet/rolex/fancy chain/all other ice at home.

I'm a little curious, having never playing in an underground game myself, how often do these games go bad (i.e being robbed, police showing up, fights etc etc)??

I've been playing at the same one for 3 years.

During summers as much as 5 nights a week, and busy times once every 2 weeks.

I've never seen a fight there, or a robbery.

The worst was someone punched the wall.

I got arrested a few times, pain in the ass being detained from several hours up to a day and a half, and the cops seized the money as evidence.

Glad I haven't done that again in over thirty years time...

What exactly are the charges/penalty for being caught in an ug cardroom?

I was held up when I was 18...
they took my name down and such but no real penalty for players except you just waste a lot of time while thinking "**** i am ****ed"
the people who run the place are charged with misdemeanor in 4th degree, which I believe is a pat on the wrist. I think thats followed up with like a 6 month probation? Not 100% sure about this last one. The players all get to keep their money, like cops down pat you down and take your stuff, its pretty standard bad beat but better than getting robbed. I've played in several different card rooms and none of them have ever been robbed before.

Best way to find poker rooms is to network. If you are from the tri-state area, PM me and I will see what would be the best poker room for you? Also since most of the card rooms make sure that you have to know someone first, it would probably be the only way to get into a DECENT game without getting one of those "who r u....lemme see your badge" -situations

depends on what state you're in, and whether it's the cops or your wife that catches you

my parents caught me playing on a school night during my senior year and they flipped. They came and knocked on the place and I told the manager if he opened the door it would be worse than inviting cops in. After a few mins my parents took my car home so i walked home after losing $700...30min walk.
REALBADBEAT FOSHO

A lot of this stuff you won't know until you are immersed in the scene, but I try to play at places where there is either solid security (barred doors and windows, tv monitors, security guards with guns) or exclusivity makes it hard to get invited (country clubs or home games where they don't let riff raff in.. you won't be able to get into these until you get to know the right people, and only if you have the right appearance, income, etc).

I've managed to avoid trouble myself for 6 years of live play, but I've played at 3 places that have been robbed and/or raided (when I was not there). The one that got robbed let anyone in, and often didn't even bother to keep the front door locked. Then they called the cops to report the robbery (morans), but in retrospect it was a prime target. There were police cruisers in the parking lot when the robbers got there, their tires were slashed before the robbery, bet those officers had some explaining to do.

Anway, I don't worry about getting busted by the police much, a ticket will cost you your buy in plus whatever money you have on the table. Being robbed at gunpoint would scar me for life.

Lol!

The bar poker method should work out. Once you find one UG room, after you go to that game a few times, you can inconspicuously ask another player about other games. It seems to be a faux paux to just blurt out information about other UG games to everyone as these places will sometimes try to steal each others players. I don't recommend asking the staff of one UG game about other UG games - quietly ask another player away from the table.

I've heard of several Texas places getting raided or robbed. In the raids here, the police take the money you might have on the table or in chips but money in your pocket is usually safe - I think in one raid they did take people's pocket money too but they got it back later. Players wind up with tickets, people running the games wind up with felony charges unlikely to go very far but they do have to spend a little $ on an attorney.

In the robberies, they usually take pocket money and the last big robbery I heard about they took people's pants too. No assless chaps or ballgags were reported. The pants were unharmed and recovered outside.

http://cbs11tv.com/local/card.club.Dallas.2.790382.html

I do not go there any more - that place has been robbed at least 3 times that I know of and some security guard whose only job option is an underground cardroom standing around waiting to start a gunfight seems -EV.

Once you find your way in the door of one, it's not hard to find others.

Check Craigs List..seriously.

Go to the nearest place that legally spreads poker and try to cozy up to a dealer to ask him/her, since often they're not allowed to play in rooms where they deal, in which case they'd probably know of other options for playing.

But OP - do you really not know anyone who you could ask? Put it this way, I don't do drugs, but there are a few people I know who I could ask if I wanted to look into buying some. And if no one I knew was able to point me to someone, then I'm not sure how comfortable I'd be trying to get this information on my own.

Unless you actually know someone who plays in the game, then you're taking a risk by going, and count me among those who thinks underground rooms are not worth it from a risk/reward perspective. If you're a small stakes player, the games probably won't run enough or the players will be terrible, which I guess might not be a bad thing. But if the game is juicy, then you have to always wonder if the game is on the up and up or whether it's only a matter of time before you and the other players find yourselves on the business end of a weapon.

Morale of the story - Play online or go to a casino.

Ask your friendly neighborhood crack dealer.

my brother was dealing at a game in a small suburban community. the guy who ran it, in an effort to run up traffic, posted about it on a forum. cops trolling the forum for such posts used this information to learn of, locate and bust the game

my brother is now awaiting trial for his involvement

i'd advise you to stay away from games that recruit players with internet postings...

I used google to find underground card rooms, but most of them did not provide an address and/or phone number. One of them did provide an address, so I went there and was allowed in without any references -- I just told them I found it on the internet and that was enough for them (and believe it or not, years later, despite many other rooms getting busted by the cops, this one is still open). And it turns out there are regulars who play in many or all of the underground rooms, so once I was in that room, it was no problem to get addresses and/or references to other rooms.

I also know at least one person who found underground rooms in a new city by networking on 2+2. However, people can be very sensitive, and when I personally PMed a stranger asking for an invite to an underground card room he had written about here, he refused to help me out, and got mad when I asked a second time.

Probably a fake story and he doesn't actually know any UG games. Any UG players will NOT pass up a chance to recruit more players. No poker game has ENOUGH players, and it is AWESOME for EVERYONE, including the players, to have wider range of people they can play with during their visit to a local UG game

Disagree with pretty much all of this. Why would a pro on here help some random Internet stranger who is likely a winning player get into a juicy game? Tons of risk and no reward. Maybe if you knew him from posts for a long enough time to be confident they were not a rat or nut job, but still..

I would have no problem recommending ANY of the 2+2ers with more than 50 posts to any games that I play in. No reason to network through 2+2 if you want to refuse seeing fellow posters in real life.
Would be pretty cool for any 2+2ers to come sit with me and play, I think I would enjoy it

+1

link

this should help you find a game, don't know if will be a fair/safe game but that is a risk you will have to take