By the way, the fold discussion reminds me of something.

When betting, don't splash the pot and, really, it's much better to NEVER throw your chips, even if there are only a few of them. When you do that, the dealer has to pause to count them.

For some reason, a lot of players seem to think that it's cool and intimidating to make a very angry, aggressive motion when betting, raising, or calling. Just set your bet down or push it forward in one stack.

By the way, Wil, you are correct that sometimes douchebags react to anyone telling them about game mechanics by being more douchy.

But then they go home. And they go back to the casino some other day. And eventually, they are in a situation where the thing the person told them not to do is being done by someone else. And then the light bulb goes off in their head.

Don't confuse a person's initial, defensive, douchy reaction to a correction with the idea that such corrections are never effective.

I skipped through this thread, so pardon me if this was mentioned. Dealers should not be confused as to whether or not the button has moved. Of course, it's better if the player announces that the button has moved, but the more sensible solution is for the dealer to place the button in the same manner every time they move it. For example, with the D or R pointed toward the player on the button. If a player moves the button, the dealer can quickly assess that it has been moved by a player already.

I can see that, but I've also seen players who are idiots who've been idiots for years and years and never change.

I will say that (virtually) all good dealers agree with ytf on this. I have seen some really bad dealers that basically tell the players to move the button. When a dealer is having trouble reaching the button, it is because on the previous hand somebody "helped" them. I can assure you that no (well very few) dealers are going to take the button and throw it some place they can't reach it. It usually goes like this, someone is helpful and says "button moved" as they move the button. Now the dealer no longer has control of the button. Unfortunately, this "helpful" person has other things to do other than move the button around the table, now the dealer has to get his attention to give him back the button when the hand is over because the dealer can no longer reach the button.

if someone's in a poker game there's a pretty good chance whatever amount is being bet is significant to them
pretty good one here. i can forgive it if it's a big pot and a kind of stunner beat. sometimes a player's head isn't clear and they need a few extra seconds to make sure they're beat. there's way too much of this tho.

some players use this move to give the impression they caught a bad beat when they were behind the whole way. a funny counter to the funeral routine (that i've never used and don't recommend) is to invoke IWTSTH.

Here's a news flash: If you would only meet her halfway, she wouldn't even need the stick!

Now go ahead, tell us how much of a burden it would be if you [shudder] had to meet someone halfway about something.

At the dinner table when I was growing up, my father didn't need a stick to gather in the salt shaker. He would say, "Pass the salt, please." And if I was a little smart-ass who put it just beyond his reach because I couldn't be bothered to meet him halfway, wanna guess what would have happened?

I think there may be a legit reason some good players take a long time to muck losers that dawned upon me one day.

Now let me preface by saying this is probably the case in less than 1% of the time people do this.

There is a guy in the 20/40 stud game that I play in from time to time that takes forever to muck after calling and losing a hand on 7th, every single time. I used to get pissed because his opponent could show quads and it seemed he was trying to find something to beat it.

I now think he is just using the time to reconstruct the hand with the additional information (more helpful and more complicated in stud than hold em) before his opponent's board is mucked.

Sometimes i do this now (although I usually forget in the heat of the moment) if it's a weird hand or a beat to try to figure out my opponents thought process. Sometimes I notice something that I may of missed (like a draw when something else gets there) that justifies the play whereas I may have mislabeled the unknown opponent otherwise.

I agree with much of what I read you saying. I think we're taking different things out of the thread as a whole, so we're both right with what we're reading. My focus isn't on speed so much as efficiency, which I hope you'll agree is far more important. The smoother and more unobtrusive I can make the flow of game and the handling of the playing pieces, the more everybody can relax and focus on the actual game at hand.

But since many people want a faster game, I present this as ways that will speed things up. As you said, give people what they want. So I apologize if my own use of that shorthand was misleading. I never rush anybody, I merely try to make it so that everybody knows what's going on across the entire table at all times. My goal in threads such as these is to help people understand how their handling of the playing pieces affects the game as a whole. The better one is at handling the pieces, the more deeply one can get into the game itself.

At least, that's my view. Some share it, some are curious of it, and some are outright offended by it. And hey, that's okay.

I'm not sure anybody is making a case for not taking time when you need it. I'm talking more of the environment of the game. People like to play in clean things.

That's what I've been saying!

I agree. And I certainly hope people aren't advocating trying to correct behavior of people who don't ask. But we're in a thread open to that topic, so it's okay to tell people to fold more smoothly. That's why we're talking.

Also agree. But if you spend all your time at something, you can't help but try to make it a little better every day.

Okay, now you're nitpicking semantics.

…tho' it's a nice segue into this topic, so I can respect it. I agree with this as well. When I talk about these kinds of things I view it as this: I hold myself to a higher standard than I do my customers. I don't begrudge them not doing this kind of thing. But if someone asks me how to help make things more efficient as a whole, this is the kind of stuff I'm going to say. It just makes the game nicer and more accessible for the very people you want to sit down with you.

I recently decided just not to care any more. It's much nicer this way. And I think my announcing "button moves, blinds here, xx & xx please," every hand helps people feel comfortable that I'm on it. Still, some folks like to play with it. It's a fancy official exotic casino piece, and it's right within reach! Ooh, shiny! I had a guy today who would spin roll it a third of the way across the table. WTF do I care, it's 2am at 1/2. He tipped well, anyway.

However, I also understand entirely why it can be so annoying, so I back ytf's crusade.

I had never considered this, which shows how base of a level I play the game. But now that you mention it, I can think of a few people for whom I think this was probably the case, some of it also at stud.

I'll keep an eye on what the dealers do the next time I'm at my local cardroom.

Although most of the dealers there aren't particularly professional, so IDK, maybe that's just skewing my perception.

I honestly don't want to make anything more difficult for the dealer, but when you get asked to move it, you can obviously see why I would be surprised when someone says something like "dealers hate it when you move the button".

I mean, this happened in Vegas (Caesar's Palace) as well at least one time I can remember, but the dealer in question was morbidly obese with really short arms. I'm not sure how she even tied her shoes, TBH. But yeah she asked every time for someone to move the button.

To be honest it doesn't bother me if players move the button as long as they follow these two rules:

1. Tell me the button is being moved.
2. Move it at the appropriate time. Just because you folded doesn't mean the hand is over. Leave the damn button where it is until the hand is over for everybody.

While it doesn't bother me, keep in mind you aren't actually helping either. I have a pretty good wingspan so the button isn't going to be out of my reach unless you are actually trying to keep it away from me.

Now.....the one that bothers me is the guy who wants to help me collect the antes.

Except I take the button once it's been moved to me, tap it twice on the table and turn it over.

I explain (to anyone who asks or raises an eyebrow), that the button collects all the luck from around the table, so I empty it out in front of me. Sometimes the luck sticks to the sides, hence the tapping. Conveys the image that I'm a luck driven player, not the math driven player I actually am.

So that would be a 'false' alarm since I haven't moved the button, yet touched it.

If you put the button in front of me and then proceed to hit it with my cards, causing my cards to never reach me, I will move it slightly to the right to avoid this issue.

That drives me nuts as well. I don't deal. Why can't people just wait for their change?

I don't think so. I think that for almost every player, the $4 it costs if you have to fold or call an additional bet in a low stakes game is not a lot of money.

I think you can measure these things in relation to the game. If Phil Hellmuth is playing in a 200/400 game, I would still say that calling the floor to enforce a technical rule that involves $400 is not really a good use of anyone's time. Whereas if someone shoots an angle to cheat Hellmuth out of a $7,800 pot, that's different.

Basically, not calling the floor over anything that involves less than a couple of big blinds is probably a good rule of thumb.

Yes! This and if they hit the button just right, it becomes a ramp that the opponents to my left and right could easily see my cards! Good point!

what type of win rate do you think ppl achieve? for most 1 big blind (in a limit game) ~30 minutes. not a huge deal, but def worth calling string over.

Surprised me as well. Where I play, alligator armed dealers are constantly asking players to move the button.

I fold UTG so fast that I often get comments from other players "Did you even look at those?".

How do dealers feel about players acting once another player verbalizes his/her action?

I see it all the time that a player says "Call" and the player next to act waits while he cuts out the appropriate amount of chips. His action is binding, if you are folding, you can fold. Really slow players can really slow down the game if it takes them 15-30 seconds to cut out 8 reds (often one by one) during which time the rest of the table could act.

Am I just impatient?

You aren't self-centered yet have an issue with someone making suggestions about ways to make the game run smoother/faster because it's all about you and what you want....

I sense some confusion here.

Congrats!! I was thinking of starting a support group to help rehabilitate us and keep us on the right path, my first true test occurs tomorrow.

Except if you are paying attention to the game (as you are supposed to), you will see the error happen before your card gets to you.

I do this as well. I usually hold it up a little so the cards can slide under it if the dealer isn't skilled enough to toss it over the button.

Or sometimes I move it slightly to the right because I'm left handed and the button is on the left side of my (massive) stack, and getting it pitched to the wrong side of it is actually a pain in the ass.

Although I was the first person to bring it up, I'm not a dealer and my only complaint was coming from the confusion button movers cause the dealer under the guise they are speeding things up.

I could care less (sorry dealers) if someone has OCD and wants the word "DEALER" to face them or make a line towards the North Star. Or if the want to spin it or use it to do chip tricks off of.

I want you to act as soon as the player before you has acted. So if he says "call" yes I want you to proceed and not wait for him to slowly count out his call.

But in a NL or PL game make saure that you don't just act when he says "Raise" he is committed to raise .... but his action is not complete until he states an amount or puts out the raise.

And its not a race. Far too many players act out of turn based on the first motion the player before them makes. Just because the guy counted out a call doesn't mean he called. Just because he lifts his cards like he is about to fold ... does not mean he has folded.

So while I do not want you to wait for the guy who has acted verbally to finish putting out his bet......I would prefer you take your time to make sure that the guy in front of you has actually acted.

I may be in the minority here, but I consider calling a string bet on someone with no action behind an angle shot

There is another variation where the button doesn't get moved but a player causes confusion about it ...... this one is more subtle, less common but very annoying.

There are a small number of players who every time they are asked to post the Blind respond by asking "Is the button right?"

Now if they really thought the button was wrong ... then of course this would be a sensible thing to ask. But there are a group of players who ask this even though they don't actually think the button is wrong (at best they have paid no attention and don't know .... at worst its an angle shot).

Of course when someone asks this question I naturally assume there is some reason they have asked this and now I have to pause and rethink or ask the other players if the button is right.