Banned Players (2 Viewers)

One near-ban, avoided by telling the guy to knock it off:

Player would arrive 40 minutes early, and sit in his car smoking a joint in my driveway. OK, whatever. But about 20 minutes before the game started he’d rush inside, head straight for the bathroom, and take his daily dump. Took a long time too.

If someone has to go #2 during the game, obviously the bathroom is there for it. But if you know you always need to go right before the game and not do your business at home… Gross.
He couldn't hold em
 
I was banned from an underground game. The host was raking $10/hand, way over tipping his wife that was dealing the game as well. I was still beating the game so I didn’t say anything but after a month when he decided $10 wasn’t enough and went to $15/hand I texted him to ask why he was screwing us over so much lol. I was told the rest of the group felt I wasn’t a good fit and was no longer welcome at the game. :LOL: :laugh:

There are people I won’t invite anymore. One player in particular that had been a long time member of our poker/social network is banned for being an asshole to everyone. He begged me for an invite and I finally gave in for a limit night, he no called/no showed. Limit night is only 7 handed to start so losing a player like that really sucks.

Another similar person I won’t invite because he is a pervert stalker and would never want him near my family. Several women in our group have said they feel uncomfortable when he is at a game. More than enough reason for me to ban him.
 
One near-ban, avoided by telling the guy to knock it off:

Player would arrive 40 minutes early, and sit in his car smoking a joint in my driveway. OK, whatever. But about 20 minutes before the game started he’d rush inside, head straight for the bathroom, and take his daily dump. Took a long time too.

If someone has to go #2 during the game, obviously the bathroom is there for it. But if you know you always need to go right before the game and not do your business at home… Gross.
Right? Take your crap at home or the next time visit someone’s game I’m tugging pre-sesh.
 
I bought Pink sippy cups, and washed them, I then put the out for all to see, someone asked 'What are those for?', I explained 'Any MF'er that spill shit will only be allowed to drink from the pink sippy cups'. To-date: No spills :wtf:
Paging @bergs...

Do you guys have any rules (hard or soft rules) regarding people who tend to cancel at the last minute?
Same as others have said: my current group has a tiered invite list, and these players get pushed to the bottom.
 
I’ve got two: the first was a first time invite of a regular, and this guy ran his mouth all night. Really antagonizing stuff, getting in peoples faces, slow rolling, slinging insults at the losers etc. We didn’t even drink much in the early couple years, so he couldn’t even hide behind that. Towards the end of the night I boat over boated him and took the opportunity to lace into him pretty good. I felt a little bit like a jerk afterwards because that’s not my style. On the flip side, if anyone had it coming, it was this dude. He did not appreciate the taste of his own medicine, left on the spot, and didn’t ever come back.

The second guy made a flushing sound every time someone, wait for it, had a flush. After a month he still wasn’t getting the hint, so we found a much better replacement
 
Last edited:
I've personally banned two players. One for cheating (riffling the stub when he dealt), and one who thought that angling and insulting other players was "part of the game."

Not my game, but I was playing the night a new guy ate a 4x dose of host's special brownies without asking, got extremely messed up, and slept on the couch after making an ass of himself. He hasn't been back. :unsure:
 
My kind of girl...

I'll "love her" then ban her!! (Please PM me her #)

IMG_9154.gif
 
Do you guys have any rules (hard or soft rules) regarding people who tend to cancel at the last minute? Say you send out a group text asking who is able to play this Friday to get a proper head count and confirm you have enough to play. The day of the game, someone text and says oh I don't think I can make it because I don't feel well, my kid doesn't feel well, I'm tired, etc. How long do you put up with that before they get removed or taken off the priority list?

I try not to get too upset about it, but when one person does it way more often than anyone else it does bother me after a while. Last time I just said that last minute changes makes it pretty difficult to make sure we have enough for a decent game, hoping that was enough to give them the hint.
I’ve dealt with this before. I finally just took them off the invite list. If I were ever to invite them again I’d plan for them to not show up and consider it a bonus if they did. I don’t run mega huge games and 1-2 last minute cancellations can really screw my tournament setup.
 
Flakiness is almost harder to deal with than outright bad behavior.

Had a situation in the past few months where four semi-regular players missed multiple games, all saying variations of the same thing:

“I can’t really play weekdays anymore, but if you had a Friday game…”

So for two sessions in a row, I tried Fridays.

One of my other steady Thursday regs couldn’t make it—has his kids on weekends. But I netted +3 players from the group who wanted a Friday game, right?

Nope. All four reserved … then canceled on gameday. Two weeks in a row.

Lesson: When they say “Sorry, I can’t make it, I can only play [X]day,” what that really means is “I don’t want to play.”
 
Flakiness is almost harder to deal with than outright bad behavior.

Had a situation in the past few months where four semi-regular players missed multiple games, all saying variations of the same thing:

“I can’t really play weekdays anymore, but if you had a Friday game…”

So for two sessions in a row, I tried Fridays.

One of my other steady Thursday regs couldn’t make it—has his kids on weekends. But I netted +3 players from the group who wanted a Friday game, right?

Nope. All four reserved … then canceled on gameday. Two weeks in a row.

Lesson: When they say “Sorry, I can’t make it, I can only play [X]day,” what that really means is “I don’t want to play.”
I'm one of those and that's not true for me. Maybe for others. My schedule is so variable - if I can play I am coming. If I can't - I won't. I don't like being the variable but it's my life schedule, so they just plan on +1 with me and play without me.
 
My general rule is to assume that 1-2 out of every 8-9 reservations will cancel on gameday.

Some of those excuses will be legit (illness, work crap, semi-emergency) and some will be just laming out.

This effectively means that if I want at least an 8-person cash game, I need 10 reservations; if I want a two-table tourney (for which I prefer a minimum of 14-15 players) I need at least 16 reserved.
 
Last edited:
My general rule is to assume that 1-2 out of every 8-9 reservations will cancel on gameday.

One of those will be legit (illness, work crap, semi-emergency) and one will be just laming out.

This effectively means that if I want at least an 8-person cash game, I need 10 reservations; if I want a two-table tourney (for which I prefer a minimum of 14-15 players) I need at least 16 reserved.
I think that's true most time and wise planning.
 
Another similar person I won’t invite because he is a pervert stalker and would never want him near my family. Several women in our group have said they feel uncomfortable when he is at a game. More than enough reason for me to ban him.
I’ve definitely stopped going to games because of people like that! I’m glad you uninvited them.
 
My general rule is to assume that 1-2 out of every 8-9 reservations will cancel on gameday.

Some of those excuses will be legit (illness, work crap, semi-emergency) and some will be just laming out.

This effectively means that if I want at least an 8-person cash game, I need 10 reservations; if I want a two-table tourney (for which I prefer a minimum of 14-15 players) I need at least 16 reserved.
There's a magic point where you have a slight wait list and people know flakiness gets them bumped to the back that flakiness becomes much less of an issue. Unless your people are just flakes overall.
 
I was banned from an underground game. The host was raking $10/hand, way over tipping his wife that was dealing the game as well. I was still beating the game so I didn’t say anything but after a month when he decided $10 wasn’t enough and went to $15/hand I texted him to ask why he was screwing us over so much lol. I was told the rest of the group felt I wasn’t a good fit and was no longer welcome at the game. :LOL: :laugh:

There are people I won’t invite anymore. One player in particular that had been a long time member of our poker/social network is banned for being an asshole to everyone. He begged me for an invite and I finally gave in for a limit night, he no called/no showed. Limit night is only 7 handed to start so losing a player like that really sucks.

Another similar person I won’t invite because he is a pervert stalker and would never want him near my family. Several women in our group have said they feel uncomfortable when he is at a game. More than enough reason for me to ban him.
$15 a hand? Does the guy think he's a cruise ship?

No need to ban me, I'll ban myself.
 
There's a magic point where you have a slight wait list and people know flakiness gets them bumped to the back that flakiness becomes much less of an issue. Unless your people are just flakes overall.

My challenge (and that of a friend who hosts a game with the same player pool, non-overlapping weeks) has been attrition due to natural/social causes.

Two of our most regular players died. Two stopped playing due to age/infirmity. Another got pregnant. Another moved to another part of the country. Several others quit poker due to financial issues.

This quickly brought us from a surplus of players to being right on the edge of enough for a game. We need about 70% of regs to play to get it together instead of more like 40%. A couple late cancellations can cause the whole session to collapse.

COVID added to the challenge, since I was not out and about at casinos and other games, where I’d meet players who might make good additions to fill out vacancies.

I figure it will start to fill back up with some work. In the meantime… The few flakes who bail out at the last minute are a bigger problem than usual.
 
My challenge (and that of a friend who hosts a game with the same player pool, non-overlapping weeks) has been attrition due to natural/social causes.

Two of our most regular players died. Two stopped playing due to age/infirmity. Another got pregnant. Another moved to another part of the country. Several others quit poker due to financial issues.

This quickly brought us from a surplus of players to being right on the edge of enough for a game. We need about 70% of regs to play to get it together instead of more like 40%. A couple late cancellations can cause the whole session to collapse.

COVID added to the challenge, since I was not out and about at casinos and other games, where I’d meet players who might make good additions to fill out vacancies.

I figure it will start to fill back up with some work. In the meantime… The few flakes who bail out at the last minute are a bigger problem than usual.
Been there. Empathy. https://www.pokerchipforum.com/threads/seeking-advice-regpocalypse-in-my-home-game.45932/
 
The main reason that I don't invite players back to my house is pretty simple. If I don't have fun hanging out with you for an evening, then I don't invite you back.

A casual player who only played a few times a year asked if he could bring a friend. I usually say no, unless I know you pretty well. I was busy, and said yes. They showed up at 7 pm. His guest, that had never been to my house was completely hammered. After about an hour, along with a potential conflict (he said i shorted him money). I asked Sean to cash out and take his friend home. I think talked to Sean the next day and let him know that he wouldn't be invited back for making such a poor decision on bringing a drunk asshole to my house .
 
Having hosted home games for over a dozen years, I feel like at least somewhat of an authority on the subject, so I’ll offer some advice here.

1) find players that won’t die. players dying will kill your game - some pun intended

2) ask your regs if they have friends they can bring, but ask them if they are “casino friends” or someone they hang out with. If the latter, they’re almost always a-ok. If the former, well, YRMV.

3) you need to market your game - get people excited about attending - what’s to eat, drink, how’s the action, etc. then badger the fuck out of them to show up because real life happens and people forget.

4) srsly don’t let your players die. like the proverb says - dead players post no blinds. Dead players don’t give a lot of action at all, really. Dead players are just generally horrible for the game.
 
Having hosted home games for over a dozen years, I feel like at least somewhat of an authority on the subject, so I’ll offer some advice here.

4) srsly don’t let your players die. like the proverb says - dead players post no blinds. Dead players don’t give a lot of action at all, really. Dead players are just generally horrible for the game.

I have to politely disagree on this point, obviously you didn't see Weekend At Bernie's. He was playing monopoly, and, I have to believe that if things hadn't gotten so out of control, they would have ended up in a good card game. I know I would have loved to been in that game, that guy was action!
 
Having hosted home games for over a dozen years, I feel like at least somewhat of an authority on the subject, so I’ll offer some advice here.

1) find players that won’t die. players dying will kill your game - some pun intended

2) ask your regs if they have friends they can bring, but ask them if they are “casino friends” or someone they hang out with. If the latter, they’re almost always a-ok. If the former, well, YRMV.

3) you need to market your game - get people excited about attending - what’s to eat, drink, how’s the action, etc. then badger the fuck out of them to show up because real life happens and people forget.

4) srsly don’t let your players die. like the proverb says - dead players post no blinds. Dead players don’t give a lot of action at all, really. Dead players are just generally horrible for the game.

Both of the players who died in my game were in their 60s, and their deaths came as a shock to all of us.

One in particular was a vigorous farmer recently remarried with a young daughter.

You never know. And it’s not funny when it happens.
 
I guess I’ve been pretty lucky - I haven’t come close to banning anybody. I haven’t had any assholes. Probably because I don’t really do any public recruiting (aside from PCF.). So the flip side of that is that it can be a struggle to fill a table. But if that 8th or 9th guy is going to be a cheater or an asshole or a no-show, I guess I can do without him.
I did have a guy no-show, no message last game for the first time. And it sucked because another guy no-showed because he was in the ER with his kid (totally excusable.). So we were stuck 5 handed all night, which is less than ideal.
But this no-show, no message guy had a perfect attendance record prior to that, he always gives good action, he’s always on unlimited rebuys, and everybody likes him.
So even if I had a formal 2 or 3 strikes and you’re out system, this guy isn’t getting a strike.
 

Create an account or login to comment

You must be a member in order to leave a comment

Create account

Create an account and join our community. It's easy!

Log in

Already have an account? Log in here.

Back
Top Bottom