POKER TOURNAMENT RULES QUESTIONS & DISCUSSIONS > Poker TDA Rules & Procedures Questions, General

Too many burned cards mistake

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Vincenzo Morabito:
In this unusual situation: -Turn- Two cards are burned by mistake and the dealer realizes that three cards have been burned in total instead of two, when the face up turn card has been dealt on the board. (So the dealer burned two cards after flop and before deal a not real bad turn)
At the floorman's question, the dealer is not sure about the burned card's order. So any of the three cards could be the real turn.
How do you manage it?
Thanks for aswering.

Dave Miller:
As I understand it, the TDA is moving away from "preserving the sanctity of the sequence of the deck."

Therefore, trying to return the extra burn card to the deck to be used as the turn as intended is overkill.

Furthermore, since you're suggesting that we don't know which card is actually the turn, picking one at random is meaningless. Since the card that was turned over as the turn is just as random as any of the three burns, you might as well let it play as the turn.

Lastly, the purpose of the burn is to protect the next card.

To return the incorrect turn card to the deck, implies that you are going to use it as the next burn. Doing so unnecessarily provides information about a card not in play. Returning it and shuffling it into the stub provides that same info.

Bottom line, let the incorrect turn play. And burn a fourth card before dealing the river - even though you know that the fourth burn card was the intended river card.

Nick C:
Hello, Vincenzo,

Your situation is always a difficult one to handle. These dealer errors will almost always alter the outcome of the hand.

Our duty, as florrpersons, is to protect the integrity of the game by making a decision that will award the pot to the player  who would have won the hand if no error had occurred.

This is easier said than done.

The good news is...this should be a rare occurrance and hopefully not something that your dealer repeats.

Dave Miller may be correct that the TDA is moving away from "preserving the sanctity of the sequence of the deck."

I found this in Roberts Rules and it is the best simple ruling for an unfortunate error.

      If the dealer fails to burn a card or burns more than one card, the error should be corrected if discovered
      before betting action is started for that round.

In Vincenzo's example it could not be determined which was the improper burn card. The problem here is, we know that the turn card is wrong.

I have experienced this in clasrooms when training new dealers. I found that the fairest way to protect any players from further financial loss would be to suspend any further betting.

Every hand is different. In a hand with little or no action, players might agree to take their chips back and deal a new hand. There could be a situation when a player has flopped the "nuts" and the turn and river would be irrelevant!

Turning a river card, that we know would never have come without the error, somehow does not seem to be the best solution.

Sammyy90:
In my casino we have cameras that can back up our decision when situations like this occur, they have enough high resolution to see a hair on the table.
So to determine which card would be the real next burn card wouldn't be too difficult.

However in my oppinion there is only 2 ways this could have been done:
1 - The dealer took down 2 burn cards at the same time instead of 1.
2 - The dealer burnt cards 2 times.
Both of the situations will present you with a "new" shown card.

Since these 2 situations completely changes what the "real" card would be I would assume its best to play out the card has been tabled. If you decide to go on a 50/50 then you are just giving more information to the table than needed (the tabled card is shown but wont play).

We always aim to have the correct board as strict as possible.

Nick C:
Sammyy90

I am curious as to how you feel about suspending further betting? I am not familiar with your 50/50 mention...can you explain?

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