Qh-5s-5s FLOP

1-3 holdem game.Everyone bought in for $40.Game begins and third hand flop comes Q-hearts,5-spades,5-spades.


Big argument about what to do.Since game had basicaly just begun I wanted to just start the game over(divide all chips at table till everyone had $40)and replace deck with correct one.


Finally after heated arguement everyone cashed out (leaving chips in pot to the host)and departed.


How should this have been handled?

If this happens in a public cardroom the hand is declared void, all money put in the pot that hand is returned, and a new deck is brought in. However, it does not affect the play of previous hands used with the fouled deck.


Also, in public cardrooms a new deck is spread face up (in order) and is inspected by the dealer and all players can also look. Thus if there is still an error in the deck, everyone had a shot at it. That should stop this problem from repeating in the future.

well a simple way to handle this is to always start with a fresh deck, even in a home game and inspect it, even if it's not a fresh deck always inspect it

Everybody gets their money back on that hand, obviously.


If fives or spades were decisive in either of the previous two hands, I'd agree to void them as well. Otherwise, if I trusted the dealer/card provider, I'd simply get a clean deck and keep going.


If you believe it was an innocent mistake, however, it's stupid to bust up a game over it. I'd acquiese to whatever the majority wanted (whether a compelte re-start or simply moving on). If you believe dishonesty was involved, you should cash out what you have and leave, regardless of what everyone else does.

Trying to re-create previous hands is a tall order. I think that like the NFL, it's now too late to review the last play, since we snapped the ball on this one.


A guy once told me he flopped four fives. Turn card was a five. D'OH!!


Bobby

We had a similar story once...three players in on an omaha hand. Flop: Q88. One guy has quad eights,

two people have eights full of queens...there was quite a bit of disappointment after the hands were revealed.


We have a really informal game, and we usually use two decks at a time (a red one and a blue one) to keep the game going faster. One is shuffled while one is used. Well half the time the dealer doesn't pay attention to what's going on, so when the time comes for the flop, the players just yell at the dealer to throw some cards down...this time they got the wrong deck.