Hi, sorry if this is a bit of a stupid question but i play in a home poker game every Sunday amongst friends and a hand happened last week where nobody really knew what to do.


The hand had reached the flop, and the first guy to act had went all-in, the dealer was day dreaming at the time and accidently turned the turn card over. Now there was still 3 people to act in the hand and the guy next to act was definetly going to call the All-in, the rest were folding. The first guy who had went all-in had pushed with a pocket pair and the guy who was going to call was waiting on a flush draw and of course the turn card made his flush. I know some of you might say of course he would say he was definetly gonna go all in after seeing the turn! but it's a really friendly game so we believed him and plus he was kinda short stacked anyway. They agreed on just splitting the pot because we had no idea on the ruling.

Any help would be much appreciated!

The Action that should have taken place was to take the turn, put it back in the deck, reshuffle the deck and wait until action is finished and redeal the turn.

Here's how most casinos do it:

Set aside the turn card, but do not mix it with the muck. Finish the action on the flop. Burn again, and deal what would have been the river as the new turn. Now shuffle the premature card back into the deck, and cut the deck but do not burn before the new river (the cut of the deck serves the same purpose, and three burn cards total appeases the superstitious).

It's also okay if you just shuffle it back in immediately, as nas061000 said, but most casinos don't do it that way.

the way this would be handled in a casino is not that way.

You would pull the turn to the side, finish the action. now burn and turn. Only after any action on the turn was finished you would reshuffle the early card into the deck and then put up a river,.

Oh, and let's cut the "but the odds are different now!" argument before it starts.

Without knowing a specific card is in the deck, on the turn it has a 1/47 chance of showing, and on the river it has a 1/46 chance, for a total of 4.3%.

But if you know the card is in the deck, the odds change because now you can remove your opponents' hole cards from your calculations. On a ten-handed game, keeping that specific card out and only shuffling it for the river gives it a 1/28 chance, or about 3.6%. Not exactly the same, but close.

If we shuffle it back in immediately, that one card now has a much greater chance of coming, which significantly changes the odds. 1/27 and 1/28 combined is 7.3%, which is more of a change than the reduction to 3.6%, and again we have the knowledge that the card is available to come out in the first place.

Still, the player drawing to a flush has a 100% chance of getting there if the dealer hadn't screwed up. Hopefully this guy learned about paying attention to the hand when he's dealing.

First, he doesn't have a 100% chance of winning- maybe the misdeal saves his stack!
use that for the next whiners, trip report how it works for ya....

Secondly... fyp at the end.

Cheers for the replies, i guess that is the best solution, although hopefully we won't encounter this problem again

Suppose player B is on a flush draw, he's approximately 35% to complete his flush by the river.
(9/47)+(38/47)(9/46)
If a flush card is sitting to the side waiting to be shuffled back into the stub, the odds of you completing your flush by the river is 33.5%
(8/46)+(38/46)(9/47).

That's why I prefer to shuffle it back in immediately, no burn, and turn. None of us are good enough to give up 1.5% regularly.

Forgive my ignorance, but I didn't take any statistics classes. Why are we multiplying cards that don't help us against cards that do? Is that the adjustment for the knowledge that one of your outs is most definitely in the stub, which is a lower count than the entire deck? Mind giving a little primer?

If a 2% edge is something that you regularly are on the wrong side of, or close to.... how well are you doing regardless?

LL, that's a good point. But if we are giving up equity, we're going to be less successful. If you're playing in tough game, where a successful night can be traced back to a few key hands, you don't want to give anything up in those hands. If I'm player B, on the flush draw, why should I lose 1.5% of my edge because the dealer wasn't paying attention?

The procedures in place should make it fair for everyone involved. That's why I prefer to have the turn card immediately shuffled with the stub.

The turn card probability is given by the 1st fraction. If we hit, we win, therefore there should be 9 out of the remaining 47 cards that will give us our flush. There's also a chance that we don't hit our flush on the turn (the other 38 cards out of the 47), but then hit it on the river (9 out of 46 remaining cards). For the latter, to find out the probability we win on the river, we multiply those fractions together (consecutive events).

Another way to look at it is to find the probability we miss our flush (on the turn and on the river) and take the complement of that.
1-(38/47)(37/46)=0.35ish

Eh, if you're in a tough game, then I'd rather avoid the "peeking at the deck" perception that could arise, from someone getting to reshuffle the deck in order to SAVE 1.5% of getting the same card.

And this shouldn't come up THAT often, where that lost % is going to make a difference. I mean, if the game is having THAT much problem with dealing properly.... I think you have more important and damaging things to worry about, right?

Yeah, I was trying to look at it from that perspective, but couldn't figure it all out.

Okay, so, how do we factor the knowledge that the entire deck has 9 of our cards, but we know the stub (which is a lower number than the 47 or 46) definitely includes one of them?

THIS! This is what you should do. This is the way the casino handles it. The reason being is you want to keep the hand as close to the way it should be.

I don't understand. Assuming there is no cheating going on, doesn't this even out because sometimes your going to be on one side of it and sometimes you'll be on the other side?

This is a very good point!

I am having trouble following this. If you deal the natural river card on the turn and then add the premature card into the deck, shuffle, and deal the river nothing changes mathmatically. The premature card that is dealt on the turn would have had no chance of coming on the river if the hand was dealt without mistakes. This is why you deal the river card as the turn before reshuffling. Because that card is meant to be on the board. Now you take that card you put aside and reshuffle as it should only have the opportunity to come on one street only not two streets.

You've forgotten about the chance of the natural TURN card, coming on the TURN, if you shuffle back in now, rather than the river... I think?

His logic is tht the natural turn (I hate that term) could not have come on the river because we know know it was in the spot of being the turn. However this logic fails because if we use our knowledge of what would have happened we know that the natural turn did not have a 1 IN 47 CHANCE OF BEING THE TURN IT HAD A 1 IN 1 CHANCE. so using that logic his argument fails.

i didnt read anyone elses response.

this is the ruling that i would make (and is made at my local casino too):

then turn card should be shuffled back into the deck. NOT the burn card, which will remain burned. the remaining undealt cards (not the muck) + the dealt turn card, should all be reshuffled and cut, then action should continue as normal (ie: the action would be on player 2, facing player 1's all in bet. if player 2 had already folded, then his hand is dead, and the action is on player 3, facing player 1's all in bet.)

Which casino is that?


What, no burn? If you're going to reshuffle, then I would suggest leaving the deck alone, take away the early turn card, COMPLETE the flop action... THEN shuffle/deal.

Agreed. The purpose of the burn is to conceal the next card coming. Re-shuffling before action and letting the deck sit there defeats the purpose. Re-shuffling after action and cutting before the next card satisfies it.

Besides, often people fold out of frustration at the unusual situation and a re-shuffle isn't necessary in the first place. This is another reason to put out the original river as the new turn, because you many times won't have a new river anyway.

Another reason to wait until the last card to re-shuffle is that we don't want people having too much control over the deck, especially not in the middle of a hand. You're expecting a random card, and we have one ready to go, so may as well put it out and handle the outlier on the next betting round, if there is one.