Friend is on a cruise ship, they have a poker table. Cash game. Four players see the flop. Friend is first to act and bets $35. Call, call. Last player to act goes all-in for $54.

Friend then ships it all-in for $210. One of the players who called the $35 says "you can't do that" . Friend says yes I can. Dealer says yes he can. Floor is called and they say yes he can. $35 caller gets pissy, racks up and leaves.

I'm 99 percent sure that the pissy guy who got up and left is correct, and my friend, the dealer, and the floor are all wrong. My friend sent me this link to explain why he thinks he's right, but I think this just deals with preflop scenarios considering blinds, and isn't applicable to this postflop situation.

http://neilwebber.com/notes/2013/07/...-raise-all-in/

So who is correct? My friend, the dealer, and the floor? Or pissy guy, and me. Thanks!

By definition, the floor is correct. In some rooms, though it is less common, anything greater than half of a full raise reopens action. You are correct, though, that most common rule sets, (TDA and RRoP) would not consider action re-opened, and your friend would be only allowed to call.

You are correct, using most rule sets. Last player needed to have (and go all-in) for $70 or more to re-open betting to your Friend.

That link you provided explains what would happen if there were another player to act after the $54 all-in, but before you. You bet $35, the all-in player went all in for $54 (or $19 more). The next player wants to min raise. He needs to put in 35+35+19=$89 to raise.

For kicks, what would happen if that player had between 55-89 and also went all in? If he goes all in for 69 or less, then your friend, the original $35 bettor, still cannot raise. If he goes all in for 70 or more, then your friend can raise, because the highest all-in amount has now met the threshold to reopen action to your friend.

Don’t really run into this very often, but I believe if there’s an all-in raise, to be able to re-raise, the all-in bet would have to be 1.5x the size of the original bet. At least that’s how I understand it at places I play at.

Original bet $35, so if the all in is greater than $35 + $17.50 = $52.50 then other players could raise that bet. In this case $54 puts him just over that.

Normally it’s 2x the original bet, but all-in’s are a bit different depending on where you play. Bottom line, if every employee is saying it’s allowed in pretty sure it’s allowed... just saying.


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Although there is a 50% rule that pertains to certain situations, all-ins aren't one of them, at least according to TDA, RRoP, and most rooms. However some rooms incorrectly apply the 50% rule to all-ins, and since house rules trump all...

Since we are talking cash, here is the relevant rule from Roberts Rules of Poker

"All raises must be equal to or greater than the size of the previous bet or raise on that betting round, except for an all-in wager. A player who has already checked or called may not subsequently raise an all-in bet that is less than the full size of the last bet or raise. (The half-the-size rule for reopening the betting is for limit poker only.)

Example: Player A bets $100 and Player B raises $100 more, making the total bet $200. If Player C goes all in for less than $300 total (not a full $100 raise), and Player A calls, then Player B has no option to raise again, because he wasn’t fully raised. (Player A could have raised, because Player B raised.)"

But, again I caution you, there is no such thing as a universal 'Rules of Poker'. While TDA (tournament) and RRoP(cash) are the most common and authoritative, it is very common for each room to have their own minor deviations. The 'half raise reopening action' is less common, but certainly not unheard of.

As Lattimer indicated, you are almost certainly wrong.

The 50% rule doesn't apply to all ins that don't meet the minimum raise amount. It applies only to non-all-in raises that don't meet the minimum raise amount, and it tells you whether that player is forced to take chips back and call, or forced to add more chips and min raise.

for example, in this case OP's friend bet $35. If the next player had put in $45 in an attempt to raise, you would check to see whether he put it more or less than 50% ($17.50) of the amount needed to make a full raise. 35+17.50=52.50, and 45 is less than that, so he is forced to take back the extra 10 and just call 35. If he had put in 55 instead, now he put in more than 50%, so he must increase his bet amount to 70 and make a full minimum raise.

This all assumes NLHE. In Limit, there is indeed a 50% rule which works as you say. So if we were somehow playing 35-70 limit holdem, and your friend bet 35, and the next guy raised all-in for 54, then because it is more than half the amount needed for a full raise (52.50) that would count as a raise, and your friend could raise again to 35+35+19=89. If the all-in were for 52 or less, he could not raise, he could only call the 52 (or fold). (If some other player instead wanted to raise the 52 bet, he would instead "complete" the raise, and simply raise to 70.)

Unless you play limit, it is recommended you forget all about the 50% rule, it will just confuse you for NLHE.

Thanks all for the replies. What I'm concluding is:

If the cruise ship has a house rule that says an all-in of over 50 percent of a bet re-opens action, then it re-opens action.

However if they have that house rule, then it's probably based on a set of rules that were originally meant to apply to limit hold'em, not no limit.

And finally, it's probably likely that the cruise ship had no such half-raise house rule, but rather my friend was persuasive, the dealer was remembering some old limit hold'em rule, and the floor (not being totally certain) went with the dealer to support his staff.

Nailed it.
Where do you play at? I think you are just misunderstanding the rule, because I personally find it hard to believe there are more than a couple of rooms anywhere in the world that use the rule the way you describe. I'm open to being wrong about the number however.

For NLHE the all in must be equal to a full raise to reopen the action.

Pissy guy is 100% correct, amateur staff on cruises is not at all surprising.

A lot of California rooms were using the 50% rule for No-Limit as of 2008. Have not seen it elsewhere, and don't know if it is still common there.

As many have said ITT, house rules trump all, and RRoP is just a suggestion, but most likely scenario is the one OP posted in post #8. I seriously doubt this ship has any house rules and suspect that they think they are using RRoP. Hell, they might even think they are using TDA, since so many small/part-time rooms don't even understand the difference between cash and donkament.