[mod: branched from this thread: https://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/2...ries-1794393/]

I have seen stories similar to this elsewhere but this is the one I saw.

16 or 17 years ago right after the Moneymaker win when poker was booming and everyone was getting into poker.

It was a small riverboat type poker room, I don't remember exactly where. Maybe Biloxi or Tunica. A $2/$5 game is going on and it is the biggest game in the room. A guy in a cowboy hat shows up and sits down. He pulls out a wad of cash that had to be $20,000 or so. He asks to buy in for the max amount (which is $500). Within an orbit it is quickly apparent that he has absolutely no idea about poker strategy. He quickly loses 3 or 4 buy ins. He is just looking to gamble. He is having a good time and it is obvious that he is willing to lose a lot of money having that good time. Most of the table is encouraging him and laughing and joking with him knowing that there is going to be a lot of money flowing.

On one hand a quiet player in a hoodie and sunglasses pushes all of his chips in and the cowboy calls after the flop. The hoodie turns over top set and the cowboy shows a gunshot straight draw. Sure enough the cowboy hits and wins the pot. He let's out a bit of a yell and everyone congratulates him. Hoodie is visibly steamed and starts to berate the cowboy asking him how he can call? Etc. Everyone else at the table tries to shut that down and laugh and joke with the cowboy. The cowboy shakes it off and generally doesn't react, but after that he plays a bit more cautious. He is still playing terribly, but thinking more. It is obvious he is figuring some stuff out. He is folding more and not putting all of his chips in the middle as much. An orbit or two later, cowboy gets involved in another hand with Hoodie. Hoodie overbet shoves the flop, cowboy thinks for a bit and calls. Hoodie has two pair, cowboy a flush draw, flush comes on the river and Hoodie explodes. He goes off on the cowboy calling him stupid, asking how he could call, berating him as a terrible player. Again everyone at the table tries to intercede and keep the cowboy happy. To his credit, the cowboy takes it all in stride and says he doesn't know what he is doing and is just here to have fun.

The game calms down and continues. The cowboy does get better and better as he figures more stuff out. He is still playing terrible, but he isn't a stupid person so he is quickly getting better.

About a half hour later (and 10 or so buy ins) the cowboy again finds himself facing a flop all in from Hoodie. Both players are effectively about $700 deep. The cowboy is deep in the tank. He keeps looking at his cards and then looks at the board. It is plainly obvious that he wants to call but he knows he is beat. One can literally see the battle going on in his brain between his desire to gamble and his new found knowledge that he should fold.

As he is thinking, the waitress comes by and gives him his beer. The alcohol wasn't free so the waitress tells him it was $6. The cowboy hands her $15 and goes back to thinking. A second later he calls the waitress back over and tells her that he forgot to tip her. He grabs all of his green and most of the red he has in front of him and places it on her tray. He leaves ~$35 in front of himself. The waitress looks a bit stunned at the $650+ tip and thanks him and walks away. The cowboy immediately says I call and pushes the remaining $35 forward.

Hoodie goes crazy and get up out of his seat and yells for the floor. The floorman comes over and everyone explains the situation to him. He looks a bit confused and doesn't know what to do. Hoodie keeps insisting that the cowboy cannot give away all of that money, cowboy says he was just tipping out of his stack.

Floorman realizes that if he rules against the cowboy, he is going to have to call the waitress over and take ~$650 away from her. He thinks it through and declares that tipping the waitress from one's stack is allowed and that there is no house rule as to the amount that can be tipped. The cowboy's $35 call stands.

Cowboy smiles and turns over his cards revealing a gunshot. He misses the turn and river. Hoodie scoops the pot with top pair. Cowboy pulls out his wad and buys back in for another $500.

Cowboy got his revenge for all of the insults from Hoodie.

The waitress went home happy.

That should definitely be against the rules

That’s a great story… the old tip the waitress til you get proper odds to call the gut shot LMFAO

I have heard stories where the waitress or dealer is related to the player, and tipping heavy is just a way of going south. In those cases, there are usually repercussions.

If against the rules and the waitress is neither related to nor friend of cowboy, how much is cowboy allowed to tip the waitress? Iyo

What if cowboy only has $2 behind can he tip her $1? How about $2 and be effectively all in on the prior street. What about instead cowboy tips waitress the $650 and then pushes all in meaning hoodie can only call the $35.

When not defined the lines get arbitrary. Arbitrary rules tend to be bad rules, except when they aren’t. I.e rule one.

I'm sure the story is apocryphal anyway.

Like Mad Max or the Walking Dead?

Or like the character in Rome and Juliet that mixes up the potions?

Yes that would be a reason for this being against the rules.

He could’ve tipped with the money in his pocket. A $650 tip during a hand is crazy, that’s almost as bad as taking chips you bet on a previous street and using them to give a tip

Perfectly fine and non ambiguous line. Except as discussed, the rules allow tipping out of the stack. This is true for most if not nearly all rooms in the us.

So again, since tipping from stack is allowed, what is the correct limit on such?

The very question acknowledges the existence of a line. Are you arguing that the limit should not be enforced if you, personally, are unable to identify it?

The definition of pornography, etc.

I don't know of any rooms that put a limit on how much someone can pull off their stack to tip or pay for food/drinks, even when they are in a hand. It's such a rare occurrence to do it for a sizeable amount and casino employees are usually going to back each other up when it happens.

The one thing they absolutely cannot do is get that money back later. The player and dealer would both be in serious trouble if it were found out that they had been colluding to let the player go south.

I have had players try to tip myself or a waitress using money that had already been bet (shoving for $182 then trying to tip $2 for example) but I said it wasn't allowed.

Actually the opposite. The op allowed any tip cowboy wanted. My query was that if a line did exist where should it be set. There is no correct line that would be right for every situation.

If a line is set, no matter how the line was determined, it should be enforced. But I have never seen a room that specified how much stack is allowed as a tip.

I do not work at a casino so I couldn’t concoct an exact number, but over 90% of your stack is ridiculous. Something like that happens you gotta go 1 on 1 with the other player or something that’s stealing

I heard the "giant tip from the stack story" decades ago and it was definitely pre-Moneymaker.

Still, true, or not, it's a great story.

Someone posted such a story from the wynn I think maybe eight years ago?

Good story though.

No, no, those are apocalypses.

No! He's an apothecary!!

I have $10 left in my stack, I buy and/or tip $9 on food (90% of my stack) and you won't allow it? You will never be able to set an acceptable limit and this happening has to be extremely rare that you should set a limit.

It would be difficult to set a line without it creating unexpected edge cases.

I would, however, be OK with a rule that said 'A player actively in a hand cannot tip out of his stack' with the caveat that a player can set aside a tip, separate from his stack, before a hand starts

If you’re not in a hand against me I wouldn’t care, but mid hand? Nah that’s a problem

Yea exactly this premise makes sense

The only way to completely preserve the integrity of the game is to disallow removing chips from your stack while you have an active hand, for ANY reason. It's not ok to me that your stack size can change during the hand. It's cheating your opponents who are making decisions based on your stack size.

Casinos probably aren't going to change it for reasons that are easy to guess.

It’s 1 thing if someone removes a dollar to give or something or asks the table to remove $5-10 in case they need for a cab, but $650? Lol

That possibly true texas gambler story reminds me of another possibly true story.

Apparently there is a lady that plays at Hollywood Park that really doesn’t like a certain dealer there. Said he always thinks he’s “the shit” and has a bunch of orbiters that talk him up/shoe shine. Probably some more personal issues at play.

Anyway they were playing and get into an obvious jackpot hand. There are three aces on the board, and he has the pocket pair. She has the ace. On the river, he bets and she flashes her cards to him and throws them away.

Idk if it was true or not but she was acting like it’s true. I’m sure we’ve all heard variations of this story. lol

That is the whole point of the derail. Rooms almost universally allow tipping from stacks. Usually even mid hand. Once it is allowed, a case can be made against any limit imposed. 95% of a $700 stack would be called excessive but what about 100% of a $5 stack? Or 5% of a $10k stack? Any limit is arbitrary and will be too high or too low in some eyes sometimes.