What are your thoughts on this?
There's a listed $2/5 NL game, they open up a must-move $2/5 game

At some point, the main game becomes a "Mandatory $10 UTG straddle", the table/dealer told you this as you sat down

The main game absolutely stinks, just awful. I'm called for the Main, and told about this mandatory straddle and attempt to argue that you can't have $2/5 feeding a $2/5/10... They're different games. "I wasn't told this, can I just go back to the must move then?"

No
Why?
That's how we're doing it

Am I the As-hole?

I agree with you, but if that's the way the room is run, you just have to accept it or not play. I've seen rooms that don't enforce mandatory straddles and have seen rooms that actually won't force the players on the must-move to move to the main game with a mandatory straddle if they don't want to.

This is one of many reasons I believe mandatory straddle games are dumb and cause more problems than they are worth.

Pretty sure a lot of times they couldn't even enforce the straddle because of gaming regulations?

I agree with your other points. It's certainly worth asking if you can stay at the must move table because you don't want to play in the straddle main game but not much you can do if they say no unless you want to create a big stink that might result in the main game changing the straddle from mandatory to voluntary. I've seen the latter happen and it doesn't make for happy customers.

I'm not sure this is a hard and fast rule, but it should be. Call it my opinion I guess.

When you have a main game(s) and must move(s), no table in the chain should be allowed to change the game. (Exception for the "last" table if there is no list, but only because in this case they are basically following the steps I outline below.) Switching to a mandatory straddle is definitely a game change (where it is even allowed).

If any players want to change game types, they can petition to start a new game/list, and one or more players from the current game or table(s) can get on that list and start that game if it is called by the room.

As a matter of logistics, if a whole table wants to do this (and oftentimes there is someone at the table who doesn't, but just isn't vocal about it as long as they know it can't happen anyway), they might just leave that table in place and change it, but then remove that table from the main/MM chain. So if the main game wanted to switch, they could remain in place, and the former must move table would become the main game. But it is up to the floor/shift manager to decide if that's how they want to handle it.

You should definitely never be forced to change tables in a must move and then face a different game, e.g. one with a mandatory straddle.

Having said all the above, I don't think any of this is in any manual or set of room rules. If a room wants to operate this way, then as the above posters have said, there's not really anything you can do to stop it, except vote with your feet and not play there, or maybe get a bunch of players to all complain about it. You could also quit the game, play something else for an hour, then get back on the list for the game and hopefully get back into the must move (without the straddle) again.

If it is an optional (but peer pressure encouraged) straddle, then obviously you don't have to participate. Whether or not you should for strategic game reasons is a matter for a different discussion. Whether or not you want to play in that effectively larger game is also more a strategy question.

Yeah, this is horrible. Did you actually ask a supervisor about the straddle or are the players and dealers the only ones saying it?

I hate 2/5 MM's, which is why I don't play in rooms that have them.

This is a train wreck. The house shouldn't have allowed this to happen in the way it did. Once it happened they should have made moving to the game optional for people at the must move table and once every person there had the option to move and didn't then the table should have been made a main table moving forward with no more moves when seats opened up at the other table. In this situation anyone could ask for a table change and be granted it before anyone from the wait list was called to that table (with the UTG Straddle)

If I didn't like the players/game structure at the "main" table then I would just either leave or take a meal break and be #2 on the list when I came back (at least in most rooms). No reason to walk into hell.

The other option for the room would be to ask the must move table if they wanted to play with a mandatory UTG straddle and if all agreed then the must move table would now be the same and there would be no issues.

This is why must moves are horrible.

Main game sucks, so they add on a straddle, causing the few recs there to be dominated even more, causing them to leave…

Imo a floor/dealer shouldn’t be enforcing mandatory straddles unless they change the game type.

So, just for full transparency, I’m fine playing the game with a straddle… it was just the fact that the backup was great and the main was so bad people were going home rather than moving over. I was looking for a loophole back to the feeder game. But it IS a different game, 2/3 you have opens to $15-$20, 2/3/6 it’s $30-$40 and people all had 3-4K. Its just double the sized game, but you’re all smart and know that

I asked the floor, who at first said “Yeah that’s a mandatory straddle game”. But then after explaining to him and the dealer that it’s then a different game he agreed that they can’t make me straddle.

So now I’m the dick who won’t play their game and ”have fun”, I’m the bad guy because of their dumb rules. I sat down, didn’t straddle, table got pissy and all 8 of them stopped straddling

My usual response is that people just shouldn't sit in the straddle game if they don't want to straddle. In your case, the request to keep play at a different table has been denied so I don't think people should blame you. (but they'll do that anyway)

As a side note, I don't think that making people play in a bigger game than they want to is right from a responsible gaming perspective. Might be worth sending an email to management about it.

If the regulars in the main had any sense they'd remove the mandatory straddle until the game gets better. You want to try to raise the stakes when the game is juicier than normal, not the opposite! OP unintentionally helped theme make the right decision.

Is this Room on Bravo/PA?

Most of us here have seen that a Straddle can only be 'mandatory' if all the Players agree and if a new Player sits down then they must 'newly' agree to it.

If the Floor was going to enforce the Straddle then yes, you were technically changing games and should be able to return to the previous table.

We usually have the opposite problem with Floors. We want to convert a main game to a 'match' and the Floor wont' let us due to the MM table (which may be short) and even when there's no MM they want to 'protect' the Players who signed up for the current game but may not want to play 'match'. Of course you also run into Floors that want to force everyone down to table stakes and not let everyone keep their current stack.

Technically this is a valid Gaming complaint if you wanted to take it that far, but you do risk all the implications that come with possibly rubbing folks the wrong way.

Most of the time a new Player can sit down and 'not' Straddle .. they just get some comments for a couple orbits and the everyone moves on. GL

FWIW, that straddle might be called "mandatory" but isn't. Not only can a new player decline but every player already at the table can change their mind and stop doing it.

If the straddle was truly mandatory a new player wouldn't have the option to decline. In that case it's basically the same as a regular third blind if we're talking 2x BB UTG straddle.

This.

In most of the jurisdictions I have dealt and played in. The straddle isn't truly mandatory unless it is listed on the blind structure on the game placard at the table.

In some games people will say that it is "mandatory" but what they mean is that everyone is doing it and it is OK if a player posts his straddle late.