My local game, situation as follows:

We are on the river, i have the nuts, OOP against fun player/whale typ.
Pot is 360.
I check.
Whale says allin (he has like 900ish), i have him covered. (He rarely moves his chips, often Dealer has to do it for him, same in this case, just anounces allin and throws one chip out)
Now i know his bet is only 360, so i say pot.
Whale says nothing, turn over his cards (he had second nut straight, thats like the hyper-ultra nuts for him, so he thinks he is winning, turns over his cards)
Now i wanna make sure i get all of his money, so i don't turn over my cards and ask the dealer to confirm that the whale called my all-in
Dealer is confused (normally NL dealer, so not great for PLO), whale is telling me to turn my cards over, still didn't understand what was going on, i refuse and the floor gets called over.

Floor rules i only win 360 from him (and the pot of course).
Is that insane or what?

Now i know, i have kind of a "fanbase" in here of people telling me how bad i behave all the time and everything is always my fault, but for a second can u please try to analyze this from a neutral perspective:
Did i do anything wrong?
Could i have done anything differently?

PS: And no, id didn't have any issues with that floor or the casino in general before, i am a regular customer there, all good. My feeling was the floor wanted to cover for his dealer, not admitting that he made a mistake, and of course also covering a little bit for the whale, he's a big casino player (blackjack, roulette) too.

You could have asked for clarification on the "all-in" bet.

didn't i do that by saying pot myself?
i thought that made it pretty clear that he wasn't all-in already

Clearly, you should have waited and asked how much it was to you, had the dealer count the bet, and then said pot.

Reading your hand summary, can you clarify where you think whale calls your raise.

What we have is this
You check
Whale bets pot
You raise pot
Whale tables hand

What action here indicates that the whale called your raise?

You out smarted yourself. Instead of clarifying when Whale acted ('Hey, the max you can bet is pot, but I know what you meant, so I am just going to raise so we can get all of our chips in'), you tried to be cute, and confused both the dealer and the other player. As a result, he never acted on your raise.

You win the 360+pot. next hand

I agree that OP probably could have talked the whale (and dealer) into his desired outcome better by sweetly explaining that the whale couldn't go all in and had only bet pot, and that he had re-potted it to get it all in. But maybe OP tried that, it's hard to tell.

But other than that, OP acted perfectly. He didn't turn his hand over when whale did so prematurely, he tried to clarify that whale needed to call first, and he asked dealer to call floor to help get things back on track when dealer was confused as well.

It's a little unclear what happened between calling the floor and the floor ruling he only wins 360. Obviously, the whale could fold to OPs re-pot (once it was explained to him), which would be a perfectly valid outcome and ruling, and likely what happened.

But OP makes it sound like he was forced to table his hand for only the 360 pot bet, which would be wrong. Either whale called OPs re-pot all-in, or whale folded to his re-pot and OP takes it down without having to show.

--

There is another ruling that sometimes comes into play, "action offered and accepted". Essentially, whale overbets pot, dealer doesn't stop him, and another player accepted the overbet and calls. Even though by the rules he shouldn't have been able to bet that much, you can't allow him to freeroll the overbet, so you rule that the overbet action was offered (by whale) and accepted (by OP). Essentially you allow the overbet / all-in when it's heads up.

If you had just called his all-in and then you hit showdown and he saw he lost and then tried to argue he couldn't have bet all in, that is how I would have ruled.

Having said that, you definitely can't count on all floors making that ruling. IMO you did the right thing by trying to clarify the bet amount (since you noticed it) and then repotting it yourself, even if it gives the whale the opportunity to get out of making the (illegal) all-in bet he was trying to make. I just would have tried to sweet talk him into it by explaining what was happening a little better than you seem to have, based on your description, but since we weren't there I'm just basing that on the way you described it above.

Correct, no action at all indicates that he called ... which is exactly why i assumed he hadn't and therefore asked the dealer to clarify that i raised again

How is it my fault that he instantly turned his hand over (because he was so excited thinking he is winning) ???

I guess my wish for "neutral analysis" wasn't so clear as i hoped ;-)))

Or, you could have just asked (knowing already) how much it was to call the whales "allin" bet. That would have forced everyone to count it and know what the exact amounts were. Then, after that declared a raise.

If you're the smarter one, like it, or not, it's on you to get others to understand, without insulting them. Sorry, but that's the way of the world.

No. It's not up to what you decide what is "pretty clear". It needs to be clear to the dealer, your opponent, and the table. Never leave an opening for a mistake, a misunderstanding, an angle, or a bad ruling. Did you get screwed a little bit? Sure. So sad, too bad. No one at the table is looking out for your best interest except you.

Thank you very much and halleluja ... i was beginning to think i'm totally crazy.

Right, should have explained that better.

Well, i remembered the last "discussion" i had on this forum regarding heated situations and arguments at the pokertable so i stayed mostly quiet, tried once to explain my point but floor wanted to to hear it from the dealer, and since he obv didn't get the problem in the first place the decision so to say didn't go my way.

This is exactly what happened, and yes, again you are correct, give him the option to call or fold (he most likely would have called anyway), but forcing me to show for 360 is nuts.

Yes, know about that ("action offered and accepted".), but choose not go tht way because it didn't want to make the whale mad (he definitely wouldn't understand) and also wasn't sure if the dealer would know about this or rule that way, that's why i choose to re-pot.

The point you make about "sweet talking" is very good advice, didn't think about that. But that's also because the situation was so obvious to me, that i thought by re-potting it's perfectly clear that his bet wasn't an all-in bet

thx

very very very good point sir ...
i guess i'm not very good at that.

Also, "all-in" is not a valid bet in a pot-limit game. An argument could be made that you acted out of turn.

I don’t think I want to play in a room where “all-in” in a PL game doesn’t at least mean pot. [HU I am actually a fan of action offered and accepted if that’s what the players want]

Not holding somebody to pot if they announce all-in sounds like an angle shot supported by house rules.

Is "pot" a valid bet in a no-limit game? Sure, people could use it as an angle - if you let them. But as with all angles, don't fall for it.

If you say "pot" in a NL game, you will at least be held to a bet or raise — probably a pot-sized one — and told not to do that. Any other response would allow the angle.

"Just don't fall for angles" is the nut worst anti-angle policy, and I suspect that you know that with your experience.

this is a very bad argument (no, actually 2).

very often players don't know exactly how much is in the pot, especially fun players, so they say all-in, and it's widely accepted in every place around the world (and i played in a lot) that this means a pot size bet.

and since this is a fact, i am definitely not acting out of turn

You could have just said “I don’t like OP, so ruling against him is always fair” and be done with it. I just don’t think that benefits the discussion.

;-)))
+1

(Oh, and i didn't say that, although i thought the same thing, because i'm "learning" ... ;-))

How the heck would you be held to a pot size bet or raise in NL? Who is going to count the pot since that information is not available?

Maybe some places you will be held to a bet or raise but if so either you will have to specify a value or it will be a min. bet or raise. But in most rooms you will be told “pot” has no meaning and action is still on you.

That information is, in fact, available.

Humbly requesting that we stop with whatever this is.

He didn't call your raise, and you know he didn't call your raise, yet you tried to get the dealer and then the floor to rule that he called your raise. To me, it sounds like you are trying to angle the whale into paying out a bet that you know he didn't call.

What I would have done? First, I make sure the dealer knows my action. If I clearly say "I raise the pot" and make sure the dealer hears me say that, it's going to very hard for a floor to come rule that I just called his pot size bet. As soon as I realized he thought I called, I would tell him that I raised, not called. As a general rule, I do everything in my power to avoid floor decisions, because you never know what ruling you are going to get even in spots that should be clear-cut.

You haven't done a great job telling the story, but piecing together your replies, apparently the floor came over and ruled he owed you 360. That would seem to indicate that the dealer wasn't aware that you raised. What did the dealer say during the floor visit? This floor interaction is actually the interesting part of the story and you completely omitted that part for some reason.

As pointed out the time to correct things is when the V makes an invalid action of all in where that is larger than the pot. There are multiple ways to do this but doing so before you act is the key. You may already know all of this but getting the dealer at least up to speed should be your move. Then let the dealer get V up to speed so he realizes what is going on. Maybe you can get him to call or maybe not but at least you have a chance to stack him.

As to all in meaning pot in a PL game everywhere, that is just not true. Both saying all in in a PL game and saying pot in a NL games have no real meaning and are common angles. I don’t think V was pulling an angle here but it is an angle many pull. I know generally it all works out but most places will revert to the specifics of the rules should controversy arise. At a min you are allowing the floor to decide. When that happens all kinds of things can happen. Better to keep the floor out by getting clarification before acting.

Uh no it is not. The dealer cannot tell you how much is in the pot in NL game. He cannot count down the pot. It is a OPTAH violation.

Even if you know the amount and put it out, how does dealer verify amount is correct without telling the caller the pot amount when he asks how much is the bet?

Saying “pot” in NL is a known angle. I have seen it attempted but I have never seen it held as a valid bet.

Explain.

Do you know of any major casinos where that would be considered an invalid action?

I'm not saying that's a situation I've seen super often, but the couple times it came up the dealer always announced something like "the bet is pot, player has chips behind".

Maybe I'm totally wrong here but I was always under the impression all-in in a PL game meant pot if the stack was larger than the size of the pot. Dealers/floors please correct me.