Identifiable & Retrievable – Inconsistencies Between Roberts Rules and TDA
I'm a TD in a small league in Victoria Australia and I often read and re-read the various rules of the game to sharpen my knowledge and awareness.
I’ve been digging into the rules around mucked cards, and I’ve noticed what feels like some inconsistencies across sources.
Roberts Rules of Poker 3.3.2 – Allows mucked cards that are identifiable and retrievable to be made live again if the TD believes it’s in the best interests of the game.
TDA Rule 13 – Again implies that if cards are identifiable and retrievable, a player can be “bailed out” if their cards end up in the muck.
TDA Rule 14 – Explores “discarding” vs. “mucking,” but once more the fallback seems to be identifiable and retrievable.
TDA Rule 15 – Same theme: identifiable and retrievable gives a player redress for an error.
TDA Rule 65 – States: “If the dealer kills a hand by mistake … the player has no redress.” Here identifiable and retrievable only applies to a fouled hand, not a dealer error.
The confusion seems obvious:
Rules 1–4 give players who make a mistake some form of redress.
Rule 65 gives a much harsher consequence for events out of the player’s control (dealer error).
Logically, I would have expected the opposite — that a player would get more leniency if the dealer is at fault, and less if they themselves misplayed their hand.
Am I missing something here, or is this a genuine inconsistency in how the rules are structured?
2 Replies
You are misunderstanding rule 65A. Read 65B
65: Accidentally Killed / Fouled / Exposed Hands
A: Players must protect their hands at all times, including at showdown while waiting for hands to be read. If the dealer kills a hand by mistake or if in TDs judgement a hand is fouled and cannot be identified to 100% certainty, the player has no redress and is not entitled to a refund of called bets. If the player initiated a bet or raise and hasn’t been called, the uncalled amount will be returned.
B: If a hand is fouled but can be identified, it remains in play despite any cards exposed.
You refer to rule 13B as a player's cards ending up in the muck, but the rule references the act of a player mucking. That is different from the dealer killing their hand/making it unidentifiable/unretrievable in the muck. 13B even references rule 65 for further explanation, since rule 65 is "other" situations and rule 13 is in the section about showdowns & pot awarding.
The theme about identifiable/retrievable hands being made live again is consistent in all these rules. Rules 14 & 15 refer to prematurely discarded hands at showdown & when making a bet & thinking everybody in the hand has folded. In rule 65 it's "If the dealer kills a hand by mistake or if in TDs judgement a hand is fouled and cannot be identified to 100% certainty, the player has no redress". A hand killed by mistake is considered unable to be identified/retrieved due to the description of how a hand is killed, or "mucked" by the dealer.
