Getting a Seat: Lists, Lockups and Room Lingo

The half hour between walking in and posting your first blind is pure logistics, and it is run in a vocabulary nobody publishes. This is that vocabulary, plus the three requests worth making at the podium that most players never make.

The List

You give the podium your first name and last initial and the game you want. Ask for $1/2 no limit specifically, and ask to be put on more than one list if you would take either game, because being on two lists costs nothing and halves your wait.

Your name goes on a board or a screen. When a seat opens, the floor calls your name. You usually have a few minutes to claim it. If you are away when called, you often get moved down rather than off, but that depends on the room, so tell the podium if you are stepping out.

Must-Move Tables

Many rooms run a main game and a must-move feeder next to it. You get seated in the must-move, and when a seat opens in the main game, the longest-seated must-move player moves into it. You have no say in that.

It matters for one practical reason: you can be moved mid-session away from a table you like. That is not a disaster, but it is worth knowing before you settle in, and it is worth asking which of the two tables you are being sat at.

Seat Changes and the Lockup

Two requests almost nobody makes, both free.

• Seat change button. Ask the dealer to put you on the seat change list. When a better seat opens at your table, you get first refusal, in the order requests came in. Which seat is better is the whole subject of the seat selection guide: in short, you want the loose aggressive players on your right and the tight ones on your left.
• Locking up a seat. If you are called for a seat but need ten minutes, you can put chips or cash on it to lock it up. Most rooms allow this within limits. Ask, do not assume.

Room Lingo, Alphabetically

• Behind: money coming from the cashier that plays before the chips physically arrive.
• Button: the dealer position, and also the physical disc marking it.
• Chop: when the two blinds agree to take their money back if everyone folds. Some rooms allow it, some do not.
• Drop: the rake, and the jackpot dollar the dealer pulls from the pot.
• Floor: the supervisor who makes rulings. "Floor" is a request, not an insult.
• Kill: a stake increase after certain pots, in some games. Rare in $1/2 no limit.
• Muck: the discard pile, and the verb for folding into it.
• Must-move: the feeder table described above.
• Rack: the plastic tray holding 100 chips in five stacks of twenty.
• Straddle: a voluntary blind, usually double the big blind, posted before the cards.
• Table stakes: only the chips in front of you play in a hand.
• Time: a request for a moment to think, or in some rooms a per-half-hour seat charge instead of a rake.

Cashing Out and Coloring Up

When you are done, rack your chips and take them to the cage, or ask the dealer to color up if you have three hundred singles. Do not leave chips in your seat, do not tip the cage, and count your rack before you walk away from the table. Rooms are honest and mistakes still happen.

The Three Questions Worth Asking on Arrival

1. How many $1/2 games are running, and how long is the list? This is your read on how good the night will be.
2. What is the buy-in cap, and is there a straddle rule? Both change what stack you want.
3. What is the rake and is there a time charge? A high rake at low stakes is a real cost, and it should shift you toward playing fewer, larger pots.

Questions People Ask About This