TDA 2022 was released recently with copies available here .. https://www.dropbox.com/sh/9cw9g30fh...Z5Z0I8LKa?dl=0 ..

Hopefully this link comes through, it's a dropbox with various options to download for free.


IMO it looks like only Rule 39 and related RP-5 received the brunt of the modifications .. any thoughts?

39: Irregular Flops and Premature-Dealt Cards
A: 4-Card Flops. If the flop has 4 rather than 3 cards, exposed or not, and regardless of whether the door card is presumed known, the floor will be called. The dealer then scrambles the 4 cards face down, the floor randomly selects 1 as the next burn card and the other 3 are the flop (See also RP-14 Randomness).

B: If there was no burn on a 3-card flop, exposed or not and regardless of whether the door card is presumed known, if no action has occurred, the 3 cards are scrambled face down, one chosen as the burn. The flop will be the other 2 cards plus the next card off the stub. If any action (even one check) has occurred, play proceeds with the initial 3 cards. Only one card is burned for the turn.

C: For prematurely dealt cards, see Recommended Procedure 5.

D: Reshuffling During a Hand. To protect game integrity, anytime the stub must be re-shuffled during the play of a hand, the cards must be shuffled face-down and unexposed. Examples include premature cards (Rule 39 and RP-5), disordered stub (RP-4), extra draw or stud cards (RP-10-H), etc.

RP-5. Prematurely Dealt Cards
Board and burn cards are sometimes dealt prematurely, before action on the preceding round is finished. The general procedures for these situations are:
A: Premature flop, leave the flop burn card as the burn. Return the premature board cards to the deck stub and reshuffle the entire stub. Re-deal the flop (without another burn) from the newly shuffled stub.

B: A premature turn card: leave the turn burn card as the burn. Return the premature turn card to the deck stub and reshuffle the entire stub. Re-deal the turn (without another burn) from the newly shuffled stub

C: A premature river card: leave the river burn card as the burn. Return the premature river card to the deck stub and reshuffle the entire stub. Re-deal the river (without another burn) from the newly shuffled stub

D: Premature card in stud: the premature card is returned to the stub, the stub is re-shuffled (See RP-17, reshuffling), and a new street is dealt from the newly shuffled stub without another burn.


I've bolded the portion that will probably create the most dust .. Where a premature Turn will no longer preserve the natural River. Whereas there were two methods of preserving the River previously, it is no longer the 'Recommended Procedure' per the new rules.

Comments? Mods feel free to move this to the best forum for response/debate. It affects mainly tournaments but the cash tables are also affected by TDA. GL

So instead of running the river card as the turn and shuffling back the premature turn for the river, they are going to shuffle the turn card back in and the river card remains unchanged?

Sounds fine.

This also eliminates the other option that some rooms were using .. They would burn and place the River face down on the Board before the reshuffle that generates the Turn card. GL

I have always learned to keep the deck as original as possible no matter what error happened.

So if I deal the Turn before action on the Flop was closed, I´ll burn the next card and deal the River card face down. Then putting the Turn card into the deck, shuffle again, and deal the Turn after Flop action is done. Open the face down River card after Turn action has ended. Deck stays as it was besides one card.

Why is this wrong now?

what's the point of burn cards if you're just putting the actual card face down on the felt?

Well the 'face down' River method wasn't even TDA approved in 2019 as they were using the 'River is the Turn' method. The face down method has two related issues .. one, there's a card on the table 'exposed' so it's not covered by a burn card .. and two, there's a card on the table exposed so it could be interfered with via a bad muck or other issue that would taint/expose the card.

I prefer the 2019 method, which delays the reshuffle until action on the Turn is complete thus reducing the possible exposure of the stub via a muffed shuffle. I also like the idea that the natural River is still part of the Board.

With this new method you also have two opportunities for the exposed card to reappear on the Board, whereas in either of the previous methods that card only has one chance.

You'd have to see if there's a transcript of the TDA meeting to try and conjure up the reason for the change beyond basically having the same procedure for both Turn and River. GL

Doesn't this method allow you to have the exposed turn card be the new turn card after reshuffling? Where before the premature "natural turn card" cannot be the new turn since you shuffle after dealing the "natural river" as the new turn card.


I think I like it this new way better, having all remaining cards available for each street. But I am also not superstitious person who cares about "natural rivers" or stuff like that. AFAIC, its a random card and it doesn't matter how many times the deck is shuffled before the card is dealt. I wouldn't have a problem with shuffling between each street, except for pace of play issue.

There's no right or wrong. It's all arbitrary. The point is to simplify the rule and make it so that the same thing is done for premature cards in all games on all streets. Or at least I think I saw a notable TD say that on Twitter.

The natural river dumbassery was an arbitrary choice to satisfy the weak and superstitious.

1. The burn cards are an extra layer of security against cheating and marked cards.

2. Extra chance to expose a card. This would be a really bad card to accidentally expose.
Kind of like a matching the stacks decision. No one will notice if it all goes well but its not worth the risk if it goes wrong.

This “new method” is how premature turn cards were handled in my area prior to the poker boom. No one had any issues with it.
Putting a river card face down on the table with action pending is a very bad idea for the reasons mentioned above.

Have we gotten Allen Kessler's opinion on this yet?

I've zero intel on the context .. but this was his Tweet verbiage and it's unclear what red lines he is referring to or just the process in general.

Why do you allow @savagepoker
to bully you with nonsense no one wants?

Allen was immediately called out by some tweeters and Matt Savage also directly asked for some dialog, stating that he (they, TDA) present and discuss Player concerns and then modify as needed .. so to speak. Allen never responded that I found as of yet.

In today's GTO 'random is random' mindset it was viewed better to have a consistent method on both Turn and River rather than preserve as much as possible of what would've been the future.

Previous method ..
1) River is the Turn .. so while a street early, the card is still guaranteed part of the Board.
2) River burn never comes out on the Board
3) Stub is not shuffled until after Turn action complete (not necessary yet) .. less chance for an issue however small it may be

Revised method ..
1) Exposed card now has two opportunities to hit the Board (reappear)
2) Natural River burn card may now hit the Board

GL

I used to think the natural river rule was stupid, and I still think the main reason it was implemented was because of superstition, but someone once presented a pretty good argument here why it was better.

I don't remember all the math given, but basically giving the previously exposed card two chances to come out made it almost twice as likely to come out on either the turn or river, thereby giving an advantage to any player whom that card would help (even though he's likely to feel the opposite because he would have gotten that card if there had been no mistake). Having the "natural river" come out on the turn doesn't really accomplish anything, but giving the exposed card only one chance to come out makes it about as likely to come as it would have naturally before it was known for a fact to be still in the stub.

I'm likely not explaining it that well, so maybe someone else could explain better or find the earlier posts about this issue.

You're explaining just fine IMO, there was a mathematical breakdown of this spot somewhere on this site. You definitely can say that it's slightly less likely to come back out now that there's two more cards in the stub than before (natural River and River burn), but it's still a known entity and we're offering two chances for a repeat appearance.

As noted above we do 'accomplish' a couple of things via the 'River is the Turn' method, it's just a matter of what's important to you. Without any transcript of the TDA discussions I have to lean on the idea that they just want the procedure to be the same whether the issue arises on the Turn or River.
1) The natural River card will be on the Board if action continues, thus preserving as much of the 'random' that was supposed to happen
2) The natural River burn will have no chance to be on the Board
3) There's no forced (additional) delay of the hand via the 'automatic' shuffle before the Turn. Why delay the hand any more than necessary since the hand may end before a River even needs to come out.

I don't really lean on superstition much, but I think it best to limit the amount of 'undoing' that is made of a spot if possible .. especially when the spot was created via 'mistake'. GL

This might come as nitpick but I am working on translating TDA 2022 and I needed some help so I come here.

What do you reckon the term "Door Card" means? Never heard of it in Hold'em. Same meaning as "Window Card" i assume?

Also, in those two cases where this term(4 card flops, 3 card flops with no burn) appears, only knowing the window card doesn't help in determining what the wrong card is. So maybe Door Card is not Window Card?

Of course the TDA tells us NOT to use these info but still curious they adopted this term rather than "sequence of the cards" or something like that

Door and Window are the same in my area of the poker world. Window is more popular IMO since you kind of look through the Dealer's hand as they flip the cards over and start to spread them. No matter .. it's the first card you see, typically the bottom card, when the Flop is spread.

Typically the door/window card is the first card off the deck, so you could deduce the order of the cards coming off the stub and 'back them up'. The TDA doesn't allow any presumption of this in the Rules. In the case of a 4 card Flop it's assumed that two cards came off the stub at one time, but not knowing if it was the first, second or third peel off the stub prevents the assumption that the door card would've been first off, since it could've been the second.

IMO it's very likely that the door card in 39-B would've been the burn card, but they don't want to make that assumption since a Dealer may fumble the cards while turning them over. Hence the procedure to wash and pick a burn and then add the third card as next off the stub.

Hope that helps .. GL

It might be referring to stud, not holdem. In stud games, your door card is your first card dealt face-up. A starting hand in stud is two down cards, then one up card. This up card is called the "Door Card".

The section mention a door card is specifically talking about a 4-card flop. I believe the term door card originated with stud and was borrowed to refer to the first visible card in flop games, used in a way that is synonymouswith window card.

I think I like the new way better. Even if the exposed card is statistically more likely to show up (presumably because we know it is active, and not in the muck pile?), it must be statistically closer than if there is 0% chance of it being the turn, like the old way.

I'm just waiting for the inevitable blow up from a player when a floor enforces this rule though. As rare as it is for a card to be exposed early, it often leads to angry players depending on who the early card would have helped or hurt. Now people may end up arguing with the floor that the card shouldn't be be shuffled back in.