NextName wrote:
Uhh... yeah, that's the guy who wrote the series of three articles covering this issue in rather complete detail at cardplayer.com, the link to the first of which is in my last post.

And to beat this dead horse some more, I'll quote the rules from the link that you posted-

www.lasvegasvegas.com/poker/chapter3.php

"
5. Any player who has been dealt in may request to see any hand that has been called, even if the opponent's hand or the winning hand has been mucked. However, this is a privilege that may be revoked if abused. If a player other than the pot winner asks to see a hand that has been folded, that hand is dead. If the winning player asks to see a losing player’s hand, both hands are live, and the best hand wins.
"

Please, read the series of 3 articles from Robert, the author of those rules. And pay particular attention to what he calls the "traditional school of thought". I have no problem with the "revisionist school of thought" to which he belongs, but... kids, read your history.

(at cardplayer.com, use the search feature with the search 'showdown shame' to get links to all 3 parts of the article series addressing this issue)

Thanks for the hint to the columns "Showdown Shame" of Robert Ciaffone, it was indeed a very interesting reading.

I think there is nothing to add to the topic itself, it can be implemented in either way. Implementing both and being able to choose which rule to use in open games might satisfy most people.

Did this get implemented on the server today? It seems all hands are showing at showdown now?

Despite all I said, I think what I'd most like to see is like fulltiltpoker, i.e. where things are as they were (yesterday?), but all hands are in the log (or in the future, some kind of gui logplayer like fulltiltpoker has). That would be the most like the WSOP/Roberts rules. Well, the most like that would be to implement something where players can choose some small(non-'abusive'??) number of hands to 'force show'. But that is way more complicated to implement. And in truth, I really like the fulltiltpoker/all-hands-but-only-in-the-log approach.

I actually do think there is more that could be discussed and debated about this issue beyond what Robert wrote in the articles. Specifically, I think you have to understand some of the unspoken things in those articles. I.e. it seems to me that one of the key motivating factors in the modern(non-traditional) showdown rule, is to benefit the good players at the expense of the bad players. Because when all hands show, bad players are less likely to do stupid things (because they then have to face the shame at showdown), and good players are less able to succeed doing particularly tricky things. And it is clear why Robert would write his rules in such a way as to help the good players at the expense of the bad- i.e. I suspect he is a professional profiteering poker player himself. Myself, I like the ability for all players to see all hands (in other words, I don't think even 100% forcing-show should be considered 'abusive'). I like it because I think it helps new/bad players to learn. And since I'm not a serious money gambler, I like to see my opponents get better instead of worse.

Not that important, but interesting.

With all posts above, I'm happy my request isn't just a stupid idea of unexperienced poker beginner.

To add more cents to the discussion, I would like to quote Dan Harrington. In his book "Harrington on holdem expert strategy" he gives very nice idea of "showing your strong hands from time to time even if you don't have to".

This helps to create for the player an image of "very conservative". I.e. "Honor me: I bet only with strong hands, so when I move -- be affraid!"

Current implementation doesn't give to players (to me) this choice "to muck or not to muck".

So what I would like to see in following PokerTH releases?

1. At showdown I'd like to have explicit option (button) "to muck the hand or not" (of cause, if I have the right to muck).

2. Ability to ask dealer to show me already mucked hand (from time to time). Since this complicates the hole showdown process too much, I feel it is wise just to write mucked hands in log file.

Best regards!

PS Does PTH developers read "Feature Request" topics? If not, all our discussion is just a waste of time...