Originally posted in LLSNL, Venice10 suggested I repost it here.

Situation: Playing 3 handed in a live low stake tournament in a card room where all players must be 21. "Villain" in this situation is young looking, with two older men who already busted railing him, one supposedly his brother.

Hero is joking around with V and makes a crack about how he doesn't look 21 years old. "Brother" starts saying, "he's not even 21!" loudly several times before he gets uncomfortable and shuts up.

3 handed, M getting ugly, chop is inevitable (3rd player would definitely be willing), do you say something to the room manager? Kid is at best breaking house rule and at worst the law. Plus it creates opportunity for 2-way chop.

Thoughts? I know my answer here, interested in other opinions.

I shut up.
I play.
I might say something to the management after payouts are done, etc.
Probably find out he is 27.

MYOB and play poker.
Kid's age is between him and the room (or state).

This. I don't care if people commit victimless crimes.

But.. but.. the children...!?!?!?

Snitches get stitches.

But even if you report him, he might not get DQed if he's got a fake ID.

What are the odds him and his two friends could beat you up?

If the brother is saying this ... it probably is not actually true. Its the brother busting his chops for being young looking.

You could do it passively-aggressively by waiting until the floor is near the table and ask loudly "Hey, were your friends serious? Are you under age?".

As for the ethical question, I dunno. I guess it would depend on my state of mind at the time. If I got really pissed at the kid for some reason I might do it.

Question: Would you speak of his brother was the one playing and this possibly underage kid was on the rail? No, then stfu here. You don't get to rat out a potentially underage player just because you think it will benefit you in this tournament and give you a bigger share of the chop.

There's also close to a 0% chance that him being under 21 would be he's just DQed and you guys then get to chop the money between two players. Gaming would likely have them hold the money while they figure out what to do.

If he cheated youd be obligated to say something. In this case let it play out and warn mgmt to check id's better in the future.

When this has happened online, everyone placed before the DQ'd player moves up a spot. So if this played out similarly, all of the pay bubbles would get a bump and the top two would negotiate for first and second place money.

I have no idea if that is actually what happens in live tournaments though.

In live tournaments it is often not possible to determine who the bubble was because they get up and leave when they are eliminated. If it was a regular the staff may identify him but if he was a casual player not known by name to the staff its harder.

And moving other people up in line is problematic because very often there is no way to notify them. If they provide a players card when signing up/cashing you actually might have contact information.

If you speak up with 3 left, you open yourself up to the floor using the Borgata solution and rule that this kid tainted the entire tourney by interacting with multiple players, with an illegal player having knocked out legal players, so they will cancel the tourney, and give everyone a refund. But since some people have already cashed and left, they will have to use the remaining prize pool to pay the refunds. So better to keep quiet and take your winnings.

This was a low stakes tournament. I'm assuming the odds of them deciding this needs to happen are basically 0, and even assuming the gaming commission got involved and told them they had to refund people, the casino wouldn't know who to refund.


This is also based off of the low stakes tournaments I've been in here in WA, but I don't remember needing to fill out paper work or get my ID scanned to enter a daily...

It's up to the casino to to police underage players , not you. He likely has a fake ID and the room would just let it go and not put themselves at any risk. Just forget it and
play the tournament.

sorry, I should have put the smiley face/sarcasm face on my post to indicate I was kidding, but didn't. My bad.

For the record, we're all in agreement here. After we all chopped I actually told kid's brother he was an idiot for saying anything. Kid didn't tip the dealers, though, which is lame, because he was the lowest stack and the chop benefited him the most.

It didn't even occur to me that anyone would do something else until telling the story a day later. Thought it was an interesting food for thought topic.

BTW if you are going to say anything the time to do it is when the kid has made a bet that puts you to a tough decision .....

Wouldn't it be illegal to knowingly gamble with someone underage?

Maybe? But I doubt it.

First, OP doesn't know it. He thinks it. Second I don't think you can get into any legal trouble for it. If they did discover that the kid was under 21, I could see them also throwing out his brother (or anybody that came with the kid), but I don't think any legal action would take place. I could be wrong though.

The legal problems would be for the cardroom and the staff, which is why I would talk to the manager after the event.

If you're not going to say anything when you first hear it, you're probably better off not saying anything at all. The poker room manager is probably going to be pissed at you for waiting to tell them and risking fines and/or penalties.

What if this was a very big tournament with a much bigger payout---what if, first place was $1.4 million, second place paid out $500k, but third place paid out $200k. What if you knew he was underage but had a really good fake ID. Do you say something?

If they are under the age of 18, it would certainly be stupid. A contract with a minor is not enforceable. Basically, the minor can free roll any event. If he or she wins, they collect. If they lose, they can hide behind their minor status and declare the contract non-binding.

As for the rest, the question would be who was responsible for determining everyone was of age. As a practical matter, it is not realistic to have every player check every other player's eligibility. The poker room has that responsibility. At the same time, I can see where if you brought your younger 16 year brother to the poker room to play, you would be just as liable as if you bought him a fifth of whiskey to drink.

The amounts shouldn't matter. We're arguing principle here. Of course almost everyone's integrity has a price, and at some point they'll sacrifice their principles. But that point is different for everyone, so not worth discussing.