As this is a limit game, I don't have a huge problem with him going south. Without huge multi-way raising and re-raising each street, he can't possibly get a rack of chips into the pot during a hand.

Jesus, this is 2-6 spread limit at Excalibur. That's pretty much a must-drink game anyway. Let the guy rathole his money, who cares.

So if you leave the table, lost $200 of your last $300 on blackjack and decide to rejoin the game, you cannot do it?

I mean I understand the rules for going south, and especially pfapfap brings up some very good points, but can you really exclude people just because they no longer have the money they left with?

What about letting it pass the first time, but make it absolutely clear that if you leave the table and decide to come back within a preset time (1hr maybe) you HAVE to buy in for what you left with. I'm sure this guy wasn't doing it on purpose, and by allowing the recreational players a bit more freedom, they will come back more.

It's a better solution than to scream for the floor and demand a rebuy, guy most have felt like total **** at that point.

I believe certain rules are imperative, but this one seems to hit those not intending to break it, a lot more than it would hit actual scumbag ratholers.

Correct.

It's bad for the poker game, but good for the casino - so in locales where the integrity of the game isn't disturbed too much by letting this happen, they ignore it.

You can't rat-hole too much in a limit game, except for situations like splash pots and football pools. As I understand it, you always want to have only $1 in front of you when the splash pot starts ....but 99 out of a hundred hands, nobody cares about rat-holing in a limit game.

Actually, that is pretty much the general standard operating procedure, except the player is nicely informed to put up the rest of the money the first time too.

Allowing players to rathole enables them to play a short stack strategy at the same table continiously.

I heard a story about a guy that would walk up and down the strip, from poker room to poker room all day, and join in low limit games where you don't have to post to come in. He would jump in at the cut-off, play until UTG, and then leave for the next room. Play all day and never post a blind.

He is probably trying to rathole chips today.

It does have an effect in limit games also. I know I get a little irked, when I don't have implied odds, or fail to get paid off when I hit, because the villian is "all-in" by the flop or turn for about the 4th time in a session, after I have seen him remove several hundred from the other players and the table.

the easiest argument is a matter of shortstackers. A guy playing for table minimum can not simply take half his stack out every time he wins and just continue shortstacking.

sort of the issue with online. No disincentive for shortstacking...

Absolutely correct... and your post above, tying it to the all-in rules, is the clearest explanation I've seen of why ratholing actually is a problem. (In fact, it's the only cogent explanation I've seen.) Thank you.

You say this like it's a bad thing.

I wonder how +EV never posting a blind is and folding 99.55% of your hands, and shoving the other 0.45% of your hands are...

I understand that other players are playing poker, and that it's not a house backed game, but for the same reason that I don't have a problem with walking up and down the strip using match-play coupons from American Casino Guide to place single Don't Pass bets, I don't have a problem with this.

Seems an ineffective use of time, but I've done dumber things for less return. [Although I suppose somewhere the child of a stripper is attending college. That might have been productive, I guess...]

Really? I'm pretty sure he was doing it both on purpose and knowing it was against the rules. Just betting that no one would complain.

People who constantly harp on the whole "chance to win back your money" really get this wrong. It's simply because the short stack has an inherent advantage at the table and you cannot give him that advantage. I don't think I'd really have a problem with a guy going south in a limit game assuming he keeps something like 10 BB on the table or even a guy going south in a big bet game assuming he leaves the table max on the table.

A guy at a 1/2 who builds up to $500 and wants to take $200 off isn't gaining an advantage on the table. A guy who buys in for $40, doubles and cuts his stack back to $40 is.

Don't take money off the table. It's just bad etiquette in my opinion. When I take my money off the table, I'm leaving to go home or I'm finding a different game. Returning to the same game with 33% of what you left with 15 minutes ago would definitely grind my gears. It makes the game less lucrative, I mean OP can't be too far out of line if at all?

Short stacks have some advantages at the table, and they have a number of disadvantages as well.

I want to have $1 in front of me when the next hand is a splash pot.
I want to have $<max> in front of me when I flop the joint and get action.

There is not inherent advantage of being short stack. The only advantage I can see is that the short stack opponent will see all five cards all the way to the river. But still, that's not a big deal because you can easy identify a short stack strategy. And more so, a short stack strategy reveals what player you are. It makes easy for other opponents to read your hands too. So, you really don't have an advantage playing short.

Che,

In LHE the biggest advantage a short stack has is temporary, when they are out of position and especially when they are in the blinds. Similar to NL short stack strategy, the blinds can often get it in pre-flop/leading out the flop while they are ahead of opponent's ranges or when there are multiple opponents in and the short stack has an equity advantage. It can make calling with a draw unprofitable on the flop for opponents (limited implied odds) and very profitable for the short stack (pot odds apply to two streets).

However, this situation changes once you are on the button. In position in LHE it is imperative to have enough money to maximize your win, especially when you have a monster.

Playing with a short stack in LHE is crippling over the long term because in effect you get blinded off.

1. Correct.

2. Yes.

3. No. Of course he did it on purpose.

4. No.

5. No.

As I'm thinking about it now, he must have known you aren't supposed to do that since the guy 2 seats to his left hit 4 q's during the third quarter of the football game, he got a chance to spin the Excals money wheel and landed on $35. On certain 4 of a kinds you get to pick a multiplier from a hat, the guy picked the 10X multiplier so he won $350 on the spin, he also won $300 more with the 4 q's being the high hand of the 3rd quarter and the guy was paid the $650 in red chips that stayed in play, in his stack.

The ratholer guy also was playing with his chips during the game so I didn't think it was his first time at a poker table.

I thought it was pretty funny when the floor chick said well he does have a $100 in front of him, totally ignoring the rules in her own room.

In small stakes games you get people who don't know the rules and stuff but nothing excuses the floor from doing THEIR JOB! If the floor doesn't enforce the rules correctly then they pretty much just answer the phones and chat with the dealers who aren't in the box.

This floor was just a total idiot. I hate people like this. They ruin poker rooms.

You have every right to make sure that the floor enforces the rules. I know you want to continue to play in that easy game but I would have asked the floor for her name and employee number. Saying something like this might piss her off, but it will light a fire under her *ss and might scare her into doing her job.

At 2-6 spread limit it depends how terrible or touristy he is.

If you force a tourist to do this remember their is another poker room 5 mins walk away and about a jillion 5 mins cab away. The dealer / floor know this.

If he's +EV to the game and a nice guy I might let it slide, just to keep him donating. Likelyhood is he'll rebuy anyway.

Your logic makes no sense ..... the guy next to won money on a jackpot that got put in his stack, so this guy must have known that you can't leave the game remove money and come back 15 minutes later with less? It doesn't follow at all.

I would suspect the player knew he couldn't take money off the table unless he left, but like many people thought that he could create a loophole by leaving the game and coming back. That is often the response I get when I tell a player they can't remove chips from play .... w"well what's to stop me from cashing out and then rejoining?"

I know that it can be argued both ways but sometimes people like to lock in profits. I've never done this (take money i just won off the table) and never would but if you are playing, whats the point on having $1k on the table when the 2nd highest is 500. I know i will get flamed for this but i don't think a player should have to keep all of the money out there.

fyp

It's easy to identify a short-stack strategy. It's tough to play against it, unless everyone else at the table has a short stack too.

A short stack can play perfectly against big stacks, and there's not a thing the big stacks can do to exploit it. A big stack playing perfectly against a short stack is open to exploitation by the other big stacks.

This is so elementary and basic that I am at risk for banning simply by explaining it to you, because of what the explanation implies about what I think about you.

If that wa snever going to change ..... you were always going to have mor ethan your opponents..... then this would make sense take of the extra ..... but you see how thats not always going to be the case.

The second biggest stack wins $100 in the next hand now you don't have $5000 more than him anymore....

Rules should be applied consistently. Otherwise anyone can use the wrong application as a precedent in their favor.

What AlanBostick said. Miller has written some interesting stuff on this. It's mathematically provable that a short stack has an inherent advantage at a table full of deep (normal) stacks.

Aside from the point that that 2nd highest guy can win $450 off someone else in the next hand and have $950 suddenly there's the simple matter that it's far easier to make a rule that says "Don't take money off the table" than to make rule that says "Don't take money off the table unless it really doesn't matter under some complex formula".

That said though I'm normally a stickler for the rules I've been in home game situations where I've endorsed people being allowed to go south because the likelihood of it making any effective difference was tiny. Ie the game is going to break in an hour and 1 guy has 5 times the next biggest stack and wants to sell some to a player that just busted and wants to rebuy.

im sure the fish love guys like you.