As a game designer, I find casino "games" frustrating, because they are designed to not only mitigate skill, but also luck, in favor of the house. The fact that the casinos have roped in John Law to steal back their winnings after they were taken fair and square is especially galling. If they were grown-ups, they would take their beating, ban Ivey and Sun for life, and change their processes to avoid being beaten again in the same way.
Famed poker pro with ‘remarkable’ $9.6M scheme has to pay it back
11–20 of 213 posts
Re: Famed poker pro with ‘remarkable’ $9.6M scheme has to pay it back
#12"Sun trained herself to identify aberrations along the left or right margins of the card backs, no wider than 1/32 of an inch"
That is insanely impressive. Anyone have an example of what these look like?
Re: Famed poker pro with ‘remarkable’ $9.6M scheme has to pay it back
#13This seems like a ruling unlikely to stand up on appeal. This technique is akin to card counting, where skill is combined with luck to create a long term advantage. I also think it should have been fairly obvious to the casino employees that some kind of advantage play was happening. Ivey is very well known as a poker player, and while he also is known as a gambler, arbitrary superstitions are outside of his characte…
> I don't know what part of the law it supposedly broke, but it seems like the judge believes that the player in the casino has a legal obligation to be a sucker. I went and had a go at the New Jersey Casino Control Act and I believe that the judge is saying that Ivey violated 5:12-114(2), which states: "It shall be unlawful for any person playing any licensed gambling game knowingly to use bogus or counterfeit chips…
The article links to the Judge's opinion [0].
The referenced section is 5:12-115(a)(2) and (b):
"a. It shall be unlawful: ... (2) Knowingly to deal, conduct, carry on, operate or expose for play any game or games played with cards, dice or any mechanical device, or any combination of games or devices, which have in any manner been marked or tampered with, or placed in a condition, or operated in a manner, the result of which tends to deceive the public or tends to alter the normal random selection of characteristics or the normal chance of the game which could determine or alter the result of the game.
b. It shall be unlawful knowingly to use or possess any marked cards, loaded dice, plugged or tampered with machines or devices." [1]
EDIT:
The Judges opinion [0] also makes it clear that he is following the precedent set in Golden Nugget v. Gemaco, Inc. [2], where it was ruled that a game was voided because the casino accidentally used unshuffled decks. More specifically, without assigning fault to any party, the court argued that the game was not authorized into the Casino Control Act, thereby voiding the contract.
In this case, the judge argues that, although the specific statute of the CCA that was violated is different, the difference is not relevent to the arguement set forth in Golden Nugget, so the same result applies.
[0] http://courthousenews.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/ivey.pd...
[1] http://www.state.nj.us/casinos/actreg/act/docs/cca-article09...
[2] http://www.law360.com/articles/621651/casino-doesn-t-owe-1-5...
Re: Famed poker pro with ‘remarkable’ $9.6M scheme has to pay it back
#14Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I don't know what part of the law it supposedly broke, but it seems like the judge believes that the player in the casino has a legal obligation to be a sucker. I went and had a go at the New Jersey Casino Control Act and I believe that the judge is saying that Ivey violated 5:12-114(2), which states: "It shall be unlawful for any person playing any licensed gambling game knowingly to use bogus or counterfeit chips…
The article links to the Judge's opinion [0]. The referenced section is 5:12-115(a)(2) and (b): "a. It shall be unlawful: ... (2) Knowingly to deal, conduct, carry on, operate or expose for play any game or games played with cards, dice or any mechanical device, or any combination of games or devices, which have in any manner been marked or tampered with, or placed in a condition, or operated in a manner, the result…
Oh, so that's even more clear than what I thought. I didn't see that citation, my apologies. In that case, I agree even more with the judge's decision: a member of the public would not expect the meaning of the cards to be able to be "divined" by another player at the table in such a manner and the casino, had it known of the flaw, would not have used the cards, and Ivey undoubtedly used the mechanism to alter the result of the game and affect his actions based on the "random" selection.
I disagree with the people in this thread who say that the judge expects Ivey to be a patsy.
Re: Famed poker pro with ‘remarkable’ $9.6M scheme has to pay it back
#15This seems like a ruling unlikely to stand up on appeal. This technique is akin to card counting, where skill is combined with luck to create a long term advantage. I also think it should have been fairly obvious to the casino employees that some kind of advantage play was happening. Ivey is very well known as a poker player, and while he also is known as a gambler, arbitrary superstitions are outside of his characte…
> I don't know what part of the law it supposedly broke, but it seems like the judge believes that the player in the casino has a legal obligation to be a sucker. I went and had a go at the New Jersey Casino Control Act and I believe that the judge is saying that Ivey violated 5:12-114(2), which states: "It shall be unlawful for any person playing any licensed gambling game knowingly to use bogus or counterfeit chips…
Seems like, from the excerpt you quote, the relevant few words are "...or knowingly to substitute and use in any such game cards..."
But he didn't substitute them, did he? The cards were already in play and he noticed and took advantage of an irregularity.
Re: Famed poker pro with ‘remarkable’ $9.6M scheme has to pay it back
#16This seems like a ruling unlikely to stand up on appeal. This technique is akin to card counting, where skill is combined with luck to create a long term advantage. I also think it should have been fairly obvious to the casino employees that some kind of advantage play was happening. Ivey is very well known as a poker player, and while he also is known as a gambler, arbitrary superstitions are outside of his characte…
> I don't know what part of the law it supposedly broke, but it seems like the judge believes that the player in the casino has a legal obligation to be a sucker. I went and had a go at the New Jersey Casino Control Act and I believe that the judge is saying that Ivey violated 5:12-114(2), which states: "It shall be unlawful for any person playing any licensed gambling game knowingly to use bogus or counterfeit chips…
I have a few problems with this.
The law DOES make a distinction based on who did the marking. Your quote clearly states that it refers to people playing the game, which would exclude the casino.
The cards also weren't marked. The backs were identical. The dealer selectively rotating some cards is what made some identifiable.
The law also says that the player must "substitute and use" marked cards. The casino made the substitution. The cards were marked or tampered with.
Moreover, if this interpretation is correct, and the game is simply invalidated, then it is far more exploitable. In the case of any kind of marked card a player could simply bet huge (randomly) and if they lose invoke this law, invalidating the game.
Re: Famed poker pro with ‘remarkable’ $9.6M scheme has to pay it back
#17As a game designer, I find casino "games" frustrating, because they are designed to not only mitigate skill, but also luck, in favor of the house. The fact that the casinos have roped in John Law to steal back their winnings after they were taken fair and square is especially galling. If they were grown-ups, they would take their beating, ban Ivey and Sun for life, and change their processes to avoid being beaten aga…
Agreed. Ivey and Sun played by the house's rules, the house lost, and now they're trying their damndest to change the rules ex post facto into something that suits them. I find this a brilliant exploit of baccarat and I smile when the house gets pwned by something they didn't quite expect within their own rules.
Borgata should probably be focusing their ire at Gemaco, not at Sun. Her skill is what won this, and I hope that in the end she gets her "revenge".
Re: Famed poker pro with ‘remarkable’ $9.6M scheme has to pay it back
#18As a game designer, I find casino "games" frustrating, because they are designed to not only mitigate skill, but also luck, in favor of the house. The fact that the casinos have roped in John Law to steal back their winnings after they were taken fair and square is especially galling. If they were grown-ups, they would take their beating, ban Ivey and Sun for life, and change their processes to avoid being beaten aga…
[deleted]
Re: Famed poker pro with ‘remarkable’ $9.6M scheme has to pay it back
#19Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I don't know what part of the law it supposedly broke, but it seems like the judge believes that the player in the casino has a legal obligation to be a sucker. I went and had a go at the New Jersey Casino Control Act and I believe that the judge is saying that Ivey violated 5:12-114(2), which states: "It shall be unlawful for any person playing any licensed gambling game knowingly to use bogus or counterfeit chips…
Ivey did not substitute. The casino did not knowingly. I'm not convinced this was violated.
He did request that the specific cards be substituted for whatever the regular ones are, and that according to the impossible rules on being "identical" (see http://www.flushdraw.net/news/borgata-fires-back-at-cardmake...) they were known to be effectively marked.
I enjoy "Robin Hood" stories as much as the next person, but if he had walked in with his own deck of cards and asked to use them (and the casino agreed) is the fault with the casino or the player?
Re: Famed poker pro with ‘remarkable’ $9.6M scheme has to pay it back
#20Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I don't know what part of the law it supposedly broke, but it seems like the judge believes that the player in the casino has a legal obligation to be a sucker. I went and had a go at the New Jersey Casino Control Act and I believe that the judge is saying that Ivey violated 5:12-114(2), which states: "It shall be unlawful for any person playing any licensed gambling game knowingly to use bogus or counterfeit chips…
Seems like, from the excerpt you quote, the relevant few words are "...or knowingly to substitute and use in any such game cards..." But he didn't substitute them, did he? The cards were already in play and he noticed and took advantage of an irregularity.
See my other note below. He requested these specific cards, and that the dealer adjust specific cards, and that they use an automatic shuffler (so that they didn't change order). He may not have done so directly, but he caused them to be substituted which is likely more than enough (IANAL, but I deal with too many).