card viewing etiquette
 

I asked to see a person’s card’s after a big no limit hand and he responded that I should not be allowed to see them unless I thought he was colluding. He felt that me asking to see them was very rude. I was just wondering what the B&M etiquette was on this since you can always see online.

PS I did search for this and couldn't find anything. If this has been discussed a link would be great.

Re: card viewing etiquette
 

It is rude and a breach of ettiquette. Don't do it. The rule is in place to prevent cheating not so you can get free info or satisfy your curiousity. Asking to see a mucked hand for those reasons is scummy and rubbing salt in the wound of someone who lost the pot. Don't be that guy.

Jeff

Re: card viewing etiquette
 

To the OP:

You are far from the only person who finds this strange. I imagine almost everyone who makes the transition from online to B&M wonders the same thing.

The actual rule is crystal clear: "Any player who has been dealt in may request to see any hand that is eligible to participate in the showdown, even if the opponent's hand or the winning hand has been mucked."

The problem, as you discovered, is that there is an unwritten tradition of asking only if you suspect fishy business - which, in turn, means that if you exercise your legal right to see, your request will be viewed as a veiled accusation of cheating.

The rules include the absolutely useless further remark
"However, this is a privilege that may be revoked if abused." This presumably is there so that the defenders of tradition can prevent a custom of "all hands shown down get shown" ever taking hold. It doesn't offer any guidance at all about what constitutes 'abuse' of this privilege. In particular, "asking to see your opponent's hand every time he calls and mucks" does NOT appear on the list of improper actions that leads to warnings and worse in the etiquette section of Robert's Rules.

In short, the written rules and the unwritten rules are completely at odds with one another. No alternative, really, except to deal with it. If you are playing in a room where Robert's Rules are in effect and someone takes offence, you might ask the floorman to politely read the "any player may..." rule for the table - but he also will, most likely, politely tell you of his room's position on the unwritten rule and tell you whether or not your continued asking will be viewed as abusive.

Re: card viewing etiquette
 

The spirit of the rule is that it be used to combat collusion. It is meant to be used when you suspect that two or more players are colluding together. It is not intended for you to get free information about your opponent's hand.

Re: card viewing etiquette
 

If that was somehow reflected in the wording of the rule, I think we could all accept "bettor shows, everyone else mucks or beats." Poker is an interesting game, either way; most of us who play B&M and online have tried it both ways, and gotten used to having to play two different ways depending where we are.

The problem is that there is nothing in Robert's, and nothing on the wall of most cardrooms to educate anyone as to the spirit of the rule. We all have to learn one at a time, either from the forums or from some ornery old man cursing at us for accidentally calling him a cheat.

Admittedly there isn't an easy way to reword the rule - in part because we don't want the wording to be so strong that asking to see cards becomes an outright accusation and grounds for defamation suits. (Not a joke: the laws of contract bridge actually WERE reworded several years ago because someone who received an adverse floor ruling sued the bridge league, claiming false accusation of cheating damaged his reputation and caused loss of income as a pro. Now in bridge there is a very unwieldy law that says "if a player could have known, at the time of his infraction, that it may work to his side's benefit" he is subject to the same score penalty as someone who deliberately bids or plays out of turn to gain unfair advantage - and no two tournament directors anywhere agrees on how to apply this law.) Based on that experience, I really don't see a satisfactory middle ground between "all hands that call the final bet must be faced" and "only hands attempting to win the pot must be faced".

I have no strong views as to which of those two rules would be better for the game. Obviously you do. Fact remains, in most rooms the words on the wall allow something many players think is wrong to do.

Re: card viewing etiquette
 

[ QUOTE ]
The spirit of the rule is that it be used to combat collusion. It is meant to be used when you suspect that two or more players are colluding together. It is not intended for you to get free information about your opponent's hand.


[/ QUOTE ]

Re: card viewing etiquette
 

Please, please do not use this rule. Personally, I rarely care about showing my hand, but bad players put a lot of stake in not showing down the crap that they play, and demanding to see their hand humiliates them and makes them less likely to call with garbage in the future. This rule was a bad idea from the start, and the online sites just aped it b/c that's the way that casinos do it.

Here's what tommy angelo and Mike O'Malley think about this issue.