This post almost made me feel bad for attacking you as an angle shooting numbnuts. You made a legitmate mistake, weren't sure of the rule, and simply wanted it clarified. totally innocent, right?

Then I remembered these;

and this one is my favorite
considering this attempt at backtracking into innocence
Not to mention, as I've said a few times already, when you titled this thread, you clearly knew that what you did was a bit scummy. Now, after being assured by people that it was maybe more than a bit scummy, you are trying to act as if it was all innocent ignorance. It's been 3 days and 4 pages since you admitted violation of the spirit of the rule, did you forget those earlier posts? Or are you just hoping that we all did?

You would force your opponent to raise, but not to the amount he intends because you want to decide a new definition for a string bet and enforce it when it benefits you?

This thread is not even about angling any more. You are a cheater. That's just wrong.

If you had a set of aces, you obviously would not have asked the dealer to have him pull his bet back and would have let his ILLEGAL STRING BET stand. Your selectively invoking rules for your own benefit when there was no bad intentions from your opponent makes it an angle.

Congrats. You saved $6 by being a douchebag. Feel proud.

1. I--and the dealer, and the villain--made a legitimate mistake in thinking that he had made an illegal stringbet (IOW: I believed his out-of-turn raise was NOT binding).

2. The only reason I wished to enforce this illegal stringbet was to save me money.

How can you possibly see a contradiction here?

How the heck am I supposed to know what his intentions were in making a string-bet? Doesn't it make... oh, 10,000 times more sense to ask for a ruling every single time my opponent cheats by string-betting?

OP, your calling string bet on the guy was perfectly acceptable. Don't be dissuaded by the moral police on this board. They are misguided by some bizzare notion that poker is a love-fest, where everyone needs to be nice and sweet and honor what someone's "intent" might be during a hand. That notion is dead wrong, which has been discussed (albeit not agreed to) at length in previous threads.

A couple points. First, an angle shot (not "shoot", for f*cks sake) is doing anything to gain an unfair advantage during a hand. It is NOT, as gets repeated so friggin' often in here, a "strict interpretation of the rules to force someone to act a certain way." Give me a break. Give up on that definition of angle shot (you know who you are); it's just plain wrong.

The rules of poker exist to avoid anarchy at the table. Sure, there are times when a player may in fact intend to do one thing, but breaks a rule and his intent can be reversed. That's the nature of having rules, in most any sport or game. And it's particulary the case in poker, where we're all trying to get the best of the other guy. OP, don't ever be affraid to enforce rules, even to your advantage. Poker is a game of extracting money, by any fair means, out of your opponents, and enforcing rules is generally acceptable. In the case you described, it's definately okay.

In OP's case, the guy acted out of turn, so his action was not binding. When it did get to him, his bet was a string bet, simple. OP calling string bet and forcing him to take the raise back was an easy objection. The lesson to be learned is for the the string-better to pay attention to what he is doing and not break the rules, or he may get called on it.

This is the point of contention. Many here feel that this is not acceptable to be selective on these things based on whether you stand to gain from it. It's not unanimous, but it is the majority view. So repeating this doesn't help you.

I'm happy to discuss this and share views. I didn't invent the term, but in having conversations with people here, this definition is one with which I've come to feel comfortable. Until now, nobody has questioned it, but I'm open to improving my view and expression.

Perhaps my terminology is off. A rather common (and accepted?) description of angle-shooting is as follows:

I suppose my focus on using the rules to force others is what I see as the "unfair advantage" you describe. I see a lot of people using "angle shot" to mean more than the above quoted passage, so perhaps I put too much emphasis on angle shooting being a manipulation within the rules as a way to drive the point home.

Do you have a suggestion on how to differentiate between what is covered by the definition I use, and what you consider angle shooting?

Do you feel the OP's actions were to gain an unfair advantage during the hand?

I'm not being argumentative here: these are legitimate questions. You have issue with what I've been presenting, and I hear you. Help me make it better.

That's literally amazing, imo.

Actually if you're going to call a string there it'd most likely be ruled a call.

This might have been a clue from your original post. Any other statement that his intention was unclear is disingenuous at best, willful bending of the truth more likely.

You have your answer to your original question. Listen to your conscience and the many voices that you asked to respond. If you don't like it, fine, but you are not going to change any minds here and further arguments just make you look bad when you change your statements.

As for the argument that this decision is hurting the party who acted out of turn: What he got was to force out the third hand with a raise that he didn't even have to make. The injured party, therefore, is the player who folded expecting the raiser to be forced to leave the second bet in. It should be left in as a raise, otherwise people can force out hands by making a raise out of turn, then taking it back after the sandwiched player folds. A raise without actually putting the money in is +EV for the angler, and would get all to common without holding the action as binding.

It has already been agreed that the decision was wrong, so I'm not sure what is left to discuss, aside from where some peoples' moral compass point.

In your first question you are baffled as to how you can discern your opponent's intent. In the second question you have cut right through your confusion and have assumed that his intent is to cheat.

If you are truly concerned about not being able to discern intent then by all means call string bets every time. Including when you think you are ahead. Maybe over time you will realize (as I have) that virtually all string bets are procedural errors rather than cheating and you will stop calling them except in the rare cases when you are unsure (and regardless of whether it advantages you or not).

Otherwise, stop trying to justify yourself from a moral standpoint. If you want to continue selectively enforcing the rules to your advantage then you get to live with your conscience telling you that you just did something wrong.

Exactly what my point was. Dave has crossed the line well into the realm of cheating. He has completely warped the accepted rules of the game.

There is no universe wherein a raise to $25 would be forced while a raise to $50 would be disallowed in that spot. It blows my mind that Dave can both hold such an opinion AND actively try to justify it. Stop, there's no excuse. You can't have it both ways.

You're a cheater.

I originally wrote:
So I'm a cheater for being unaware of the rules and asking the dealer for a ruling. That's a pretty insane moral compass you have.

No. String-betting is always cheating, regardless of intent. It's a violation of the rules of poker. Cheating doesn't require malice aforethought.

Except we aren't talking about that. At all. Nice strawman.

So you would have done the exact same thing holding AA? Or do you mean "every time I suspect my opponent has made one, when I prefer that he not be able to raise"

I believe you are wrong.

I break the rules of poker as well. There are times when I have acted out of turn. By accident. I have been called for string bets in which I threw chips out in two separate motions. Are you equating these with cheating?

I think there is a big difference between inadvertently breaking the rules and cheating. To my mind "cheating" is a deliberate act to subvert or break the rules. And this is backed up by dictionary definitions as well.

As you will notice the definition of cheating below implies knowing the intent of the person being accused. To accuse a person who string bets of cheating without taking into account their intent is both wrong and self serving.

As an example of definitions for "cheating" I went online and found this:

cheat (cht)
v. cheat·ed, cheat·ing, cheats
v.tr.
1. To deceive by trickery; swindle: cheated customers by overcharging them for purchases.
2. To deprive by trickery; defraud: cheated them of their land.
3. To mislead; fool: illusions that cheat the eye.

v.intr.
1. To act dishonestly; practice fraud.
2. To violate rules deliberately, as in a game: was accused of cheating at cards.

Every athlete of the past 20 years who's used the "I had no idea what was in those supplements!" line in response to testing positive for steroids will certainly agree with your interpretation.

8 of the 9 players at our table followed the "NO STRING BET" rule. The Villain's ignorance/carelessness does not exculpate him here.

you are being obtuse at this point. i am in a tournament, the blinds go from 50/100 to 100/200. I say 'raise' and throw in 250, not noticing the blinds went up. I am not 'cheating'. I made a procedural error.

did you enjoy the McDonald's value meal you got from your $6 you angled?

You are comparing string bets to illegal supplement use when the more valid and RATIONAL analogy is that a string bet is like a pitcher balking or hitting the batter with a pitch by mistake. Those actions don't make the pitcher a cheater.

You are off your rocker and still trying to justify your inherently scummy move.

This is laughable. And amazingly you fail to mention that it is not just my interpretation but the dictionary interpretation of cheating as well.

My interpretation does not exonerate these athletes. Some of them may actually not have been cheating but are being held accountable for having illegal substances in their bodies. Because it is so difficult to know an athletes intent and because it is so likely that an illegal substance found in their body was in fact a sign of cheating there is a zero tolerance now in most sports and the athlete is punished.

In your case the guy who "string bet" had previously stated his intention to raise. It is not like he gained a huge advantage between the time he put out the first stack and then put out the raise. He already had a whole bunch of time to evaluate everyone's reaction. If he was trying to shoot an angle he would have just put out a call.
String bets are rare. It may be that the 8 players you mention will never string bet again in their lives. More likely they will. And even more likely they won't be cheating or angle shooting.

My thoughts are that you started out with your heart in the right place but your head won't let you get there. This would have been a great opportunity to learn from your mistakes and apply the learning to your future playing. Instead you seem to be more concerned about being wrong or being perceived as being wrong. I am done trying to help you.

So I'm guessing this thread isn't going quiiiiiiiite the way you'd hoped.

My definition of angle shot is short and sweet; it's anything a player does to gain an unfair advantage in a hand. The key words are "unfair advantage." Words like ungentlemanly and unethical should be left out, because they are subjective -- especially in a game of poker!

As it happens, I am of the school of thought that rules enforcement to gain an advantage is NOT an unfair advantage. I say that because I feel I take the time to understand the rules, while others may not, and therefore I can use that, fairly, to my advantage. There are exceptions, but in general, that is my position on the matter.

So, equating using the rules to advantage with taking an angle shot, is wrong in my opionion. Again, angle shots are gaining an unfair advantage. Enforcing rules is not unfair. Therefore, enforcing rules is not taking an angle shot.

Having read the thread through, I'm now more confused than I was to start with!

Trying to cut away at various misunderstandings, is there a consensus on whether the following is acceptable:

1) At a casino, your opponent makes a string raise you don't want to call. You have no reason to believe the string raise is anything other than accidental. You ask the dealer if the player made a string raise.

?

2) Does the answer change depending on whether you would actively enforce the string raise if you had the nuts?

I only saw this for the first time a few weeks ago.

It sounds from later posts like there was a long discussion about this so perhaps I should just stay well clear, but I don't see how Cantu could have known Losev's intention wasn't to pump fake (he moved a load of chips in, looked at Cantu, then cut out a smaller number), and therefore wasn't he well within his rights to ask for a ruling?

(FWIW I thought the ruling itself was fine, though it was pretty close)

Was there a different consensus reached in that discussion (leaving aside Cantu buddies!) ... I mean about whether Cantu acted reasonably, not whether the ruling itself was OK ?