I think there is a difference between a dealer using discretion to correct a small mistake or allow a single minor infraction to go with, perhaps, a reminder of what is appropriate. Example: I was playing last night, on the flop, first player to act bets $8, next player says "15", a dollar shy of legal raise and he realized his mistake immediately. I would have been fine if the dealer had allowed him to add the extra buck and the rest of the table would have as well.

That's different than dealing red/black cards to everyone to vote on a rule change that a player can always correct their bet amount if they make a mistake. So, I agree with a level of discretion for the dealer in certain circumstances but oppose allowing the players to determine, by vote, what issues are up for debate.

Would you feel better if I said that the original speed limit was actually 55 but we've already granted you the 10 mph just so you have some margin?

What if we all agree that doing 70 in a 65 zone is fine because it's so close. What happens if you go 71? You have the same problem, you just moved it by 5 mph. How can you be upset if you go even 1 mph over the speed limit, remember it is a limit and you're free to travel at slower speeds to give you some margin. Nobody is forcing you to go exactly 65.

One of the reasons I only play in legal poker rooms and never in home games is because I want to play in a place where rules are enforced fairly and no one gets special treatment. I'm willing to give a break to inexperienced players, more so if the stakes are small, but as I climb up in stakes and the money becomes more significant, I would prefer that the rules become more formal. If that bothers the fish who will drop a ton of money, he can either learn to behave or he can go find a private game that will tolerate his behavior. I know that is not how other people will view poker, but I place a greater value on fairness than I do on personal self-gain. Even at the poker table, I refuse to be the sort of sociopath who thinks that selfishness is a virtue.

And that is already somewhat built in. You see the guy who is just speeding a little bit gets pulled over and told I'm not going to give you a ticket ..... But slow down.

And at the poker table the same thing happens the minor infractions get a warning .... But after the warnings pile up it then you have to do something more....

As I said before, there is value in having the rules be enforced without having to be the guy who calls people out publicly for violating the rules. To use the speeding example - there is value to me in having someone else enforce the speed limit without me having to flash my lights and honk my horn to pull a "citizen's arrest" on anyone I see speeding.

Of course if rules are being broken and I see no other good option for myself I will speak up, but especially if it's in the middle of a hand I prefer to remain silent and have the dealer and floor enforce the rules of the game due to possibility of accidentally revealing tells/strategy or seeming like the "bad guy" in a situation.

Not to sidetrack, but in most rooms, if the declared amount (or amount of chips placed out) is more than 1/2 of a legal raise, the player must complete the bet to make a legitimate raise.

The rules of poker are fairly mature and fair minded to allow some flexibility without allowing rampant cheating. They don't need to be heavily modified by the floor, dealers, or a body of voting members of players.

I am surprised, drawing a conclusion based on the way that you phrased your anecdote, that the raise was not allowed

I've found that most people who are in favor of the "English only at the table rule" are those that have never played a casino game in a location where English isn't the local language. Imagine a friend of yours invites you to the local casino, but when you get at the table, you're not allowed to speak English at all. You can't even ask your friend a question if you're confused. How much fun are you having?

Allow people to speak what they want after they are out of the hand. It becomes apparent if someone is talking about the hand repeatedly just from the gestures and patterns. The floor can kick them out for colluding if it is occuring.

It used to be a rule that you couldn't check/raise. I don't think anyone thinks we need to revive that rule.

I disagree about allowing them to speak during a hand just because they are out if a hand. I'm sorry but English speaking players often need to be told not to speak about the hand during play so I don't know why you would think foreign language players wouldn't be speaking about the hand. And you can never assume that no one else can understand them.

However I agree that they should be allowed to speak a foreign language in between hands. My room does not allow it. Management believes it's harder to get them to not speak during the hand if you allow them to speak between hands. I disagree .... I think giving them that chance to speak would alleviate their need to do it during hands.

Where I play, I know they implement that rule in tournaments but, perhaps, in cash games it has to be a full raise or it is considered a call. The player didn't press for a different ruling so he seemed resigned to the rule. Perhaps if he had pressed his case or asked for clarification, he could have been allowed to raise but he is a reg and immediately realized he screwed up his bet size so maybe he already knew the local rule.

I'm not going to quote everyone but there's still a ridiculous conflation of "The Rules" as a monolithic entity.

Yes, people should be warned when breaking any rule. But for minor rules, what is the problem with warning indefinitely, or for a very long time?

The whole red card / black card thing was meant as a way to address those who don't want to be the "bad guy" in calling the floor. e.g., Dealer warns a few times and then says, "I'm calling the floor if you don't cut it out." Someone says, "No, don't call the floor," and dealer takes a vote. If the floor isn't called then dealer continues simply warning.

Talking foreign languages during a hand? Call the floor. No disagreements there.

But talking foreign languages outside of a hand, perhaps quietly / whispering? Meh.

Of course there's ambiguity. Do we set a decibel level? What if it's a language that someone understands and translates? I fully admit that my proposed method isn't foolproof. But then neither are the rules - what if it's two Scottish or Singaporean people who are speaking English but so heavily accented they aren't universally understood?

I have confidence that a group of reasonable adults can come to a reasonable agreement on minor issues. And of course if people don't want to be reasonable adults you can always tesort to strictly enforcing every minor rule (good luck with the Singlish lol I swear it's a foreign language).

Sidetrack continued, in many rooms, that raise to $15 described by sactown would be a legal raise. They describe playing $1-2 and the initial action was to $8, a difference of $6. That would make the increase to $15 'legal' unless the room has a rule that the next raise had to double the previous action.

As to the original question, the dealers are there to enforce the rules that exist either due to local decision or due to gaming regulation. The players should be considerate enough not to place a dealer in a position of violating those rules. Rabbit hunting is something that is not going on often enough to be a problem and some dealers will 'inadvertently' show what would have been the river in exchange for a tip provided that the requestor is not a a-hole.

English only during a hand makes sense but makes no sense when there is no hand in play.

This was on the flop so the $8 was not a $6 raise.

I play mostly MTT, so maybe the ruling is different or room dependent, but I was under the understanding that TDA would rule an underraise more than 1/2 the size of a legitimate raise as a minraise.

my bad...I misread and stand corrected.

Honestly the dealer sounds like he's tired of dealing to players who continually argue about what the rules 'should be' and are confused and annoyed by the fact that the place running the game determines the rules rather than an ad-hoc table vote.

I watched this happen at Foxwoods at a 2/4 limit table with 2 Jamaicans and 8 OMCs. OMCs kept calling the floor because they couldn't understand the Jamaicans. Eventually the floor just ruled no talking while cards are out period.

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the best part about the non english talking stuff is that cheating is happening under 0.5% of the time, lawl.

olds are scared of things though.

lmao just read the post above mine, its like im a wizard or something. exact scenario above where theres like 0.1% chance of cheating but OLDS.

Old people at the table are only happy when everyone else is just as miserable as they are.

If by cheating you mean two guys come in with the intention to help each other by speaking to each other than I agree with you.

However the common occurrence is that the players are giving each other (or a third party) information that they shouldn't have because they don't choose to think about why what they are saying is a problem.

Think about how often some chuckle head says something they shouldn't in English..... Why do you think foreign language speakers don't do the same thing?

In a hand or outside of a hand?

People communicate surruptitiously all the time outside of a hand in English: Neighbors whisper. Pros text each other.

I'm talking about while a hand is in progress whether they are in the hand or not. I've already said I don't think the rule makes sense when no hand is in play.

Maybe I'm considered 'old' now, but I am not comfortable if another player with cards talks to somebody else (with or without cards) in a foreign language.

I agree with psandman that most players don't mean any harm or are even aware they are violating a rule by what they think is 'table talk', especially in multiway pots. One situation that certainly everyone here has witnessed multiple times is 3 players to the river, first one checks, second one bets and third one tells him "I think you missed your draw".

I've seen that or something similar happen not only by players speaking English but also in Vegas by two guys speaking German. Third player clearly didn't mean to violate any rules, otherwise he wouldn't have used the English term "flush draw" as part of a German sentence, but that was enough for a couple players to go nuts even though they weren't even in the hand. That whole situation is just totally unnecessary.

FYP

As for an English-only rule, it is generally uncontroversial that talking about a hand in progress is verboten. Given the shortage of polyglot dealers and the number of languages out there that may be spoken, especially if the poker room is located in the US, a country that has been made great by being a magnet for immigration, it is so difficult to police a rule against talking about a hand in progress in a non-English language that it is just easier to ban all non-English communication while cards are out.

I have played in a foreign country where the rule was that locals could speak their language at the table unless a foreigner was playing, in which case the rule was English-only.

If they don't have cards, the rule doesn't make much more sense than when nobody has cards. A little, perhaps. But there is no prohibition against people saying stupid stuff in English, and no prohibition against people surruptitiously communicating things.

I'd consider it a stronger rule - and one worth enforcing - if the rule were something like "you can't talk about an active hand in any language."

"English only" ends up sweeping up tons of non-concerning conversations and missing blatantly concerning conversations.

There s a prohibition against speaking about the hand in English even for players not in the hand. If they are saying stupid stuff that isn't about the hand that is fine.

If a person is talking about the hand I will address it. If it continues I will get the floor involved.

But if it is in a foreign language I have no way to know when they are violating the rule and when they are just talking about perogies and snow and ****. Even if the two in the conversation are both out of the hand ... We do not know that there is no one at the table who can understand them.

And I would agree with this in principal but in practice it would require dealers to be able speak every language to enforce it. Thats just not practical. Eventually we will all have babel fish in our ears or universal translators and it won;t matter .... but today .... we don't