Cheating in Poker - Skilled Methods

Skilled Methods

A cheat may hand-muck a card or more than one card. When a cheat is "mucking" the cheat is cleverly hiding cards in his hand, to later switch his/her hand for. This may also be done with a confederate.

A skilled cheat can deal the second card, the bottom card, the second from bottom card, and the middle card. The idea is to cull, or to find the cards one needs, place them at the bottom, top, or any other place the cheat wants, then false deal them to oneself or one's confederate.

One sign of false dealing could be when a dealer grips the deck with the index finger in front of it or his pinky and pointing finger on both short sides of the deck while the other fingers support the deck while the cards are being beveled slightly. This is referred to as the "Mechanic's Grip". It not only allows better control of the cards, but provides cover by showing the back of the top card, and without moving the hand holding the deck.

A cheat can put certain cards in a position favorable for the card cheater. This is called "Stacking". Stacking is more often done than "False dealing" because it doesn't look suspicious. There are a couple of techniques for "Stacking" cards. The most famous are: Riffle Stacking and Overhand Stacking. By Riffle Stacking the cheat Stack's the card(s) while doing a Riffle shuffle. This form of stacking is the most difficult to master and the most respected under the card sharp's and magicians. The Overhand Stacking methode is one that doesn't take much practice, and is more likely to be done in a situation with a cheat. The cheat does a (what looks like) normal Overhand Shuffle. But while the cheat is shuffling he keeps track of the cards he wants to stack, and with a little practice he can manage to put the exact number of cards in between the cards he wants to stack to make the next round of dealing favorable for the cheat.

Even if a cheat deals himself a powerful hand, he may not win much money if every other player has nothing, so often the cheat will stack two hands, with one player getting a strong hand and the cheater getting an even stronger one. This is called a "double duke".

A slight advantage for a cheat can be to know what cards are placed both on the top of the deck as well as the bottom card, so that information can then later be used to bottom deal or second deal themselves that card. The looking at the top or bottom card without the other players knowing or seeing it is called "Glimpsing" or "Peeking". There are a lot of methods for reaching the same goal. A method that is used most is called the "Shiner". A Shiner is a reflective object (such as coffee, a lighter, a blade etc.) that is placed under the deck, so when the cheat is looking into the shiner the bottom card is exposed, and every card that is dealt over the shiner can easily be peeked by looking in the shiner.

One method of cheating that involves both great risk and great potential pay-off is the cold deck—so called because it has not been "warmed up" by play (and thus randomised). Such decks are usually pre-stacked, and are introduced either at the deal, after the real deck has been shuffled, or before the deal, where a card sharp will make a false shuffle using sleight of hand. The latter method may require collusion or a pass if the style of play or house rules call for a cut. The skill lies both in convincing other players that the shuffle is legitimate and in ensuring that other players receive hands that are good enough to entice them into play, but not too good to arouse suspicion.