Wouldn't poker be so much easier if we could see the other players' cards? OK, it wouldn't be much of a game, but you can't deny it would make life a lot simpler.
The good news for you though, is that a lot of people play in a way that can tell us what their cards are - even when they're playing online.
They send out signals that can be spotted, understood and translated into an approximation of what two cards they have ... and the best part is they don't even know they're doing it. Let's play a game and we'll show you what we mean.
What to look for
What we'll look for are things that are out of the ordinary. Things like timing - how long does a player wait until he makes a move? We'll look for betting patterns and changes in playing style, and, just in case, we'll keep one eye on the chatbox.
We'll log into a ten seater game with a $5 entry fee to demonstrate. Play with us, and pay attention to the other players, especially when we're not in a hand, as it gives us a great chance to observe without risking any chips.
Our first tell
As the table fills up we get our first tell. Two players are using the chatbox to discuss a hand that knocked one of them out in a previous game ... and one of them isn't happy at all!
Amongst the name calling we pick up two important sentences. “You called with just ace high?”, and, “because you were raising with nothing.”
Valuable information already … an aggressive player who will raise with nothing, and a risk taker calling a big bet with just an ace.
We haven't even started and we already have a partial read on two people. We also know to avoid them for a while. They're going to be gunning for each other, and we don't want to get stuck in the middle.
Next round, we're sitting at the big blind position and we have a pair of jacks. There's a big raise from a player who's very early to act. He's been quiet so far, so this is what we'd call out of the ordinary. Everyone else folds, and although it's a big bet we make the call. We do have jacks after all.
The flop is 3,4 and 9 of different suits. We check ... the other player checks back and the turn brings a King. We check again and he immediately makes a huge bet. We have to fold.
What does he have?
So what does he have?
An early raise suggests a good hand, but the fact that he didn't make bet on the flop probably rules out a high pair, so we're looking at something like Ace-King or Ace-Queen.
When he bets quickly and bets big after the King comes on the turn, our mind is made up. He has Ace-King and we can't call with our Jack-Jack.
We should have bet after the flop instead of checking, but at that point we didn't know if we were up against a higher pair. So a mistake was made and some chips were lost, but by reading him as having Ace-King and getting out of the hand, we're still in the game.
Back to the chat box!
A few hands later and our two players from the chat box have eventually locked horns, both going all in pre-flop.
It turns out to be 9-9 against Ace-Queen, a coin-flip that is won by the more aggressive of the two … and oh, he likes that. He brags in the chatbox about how good he is, and starts using his big chip stack to bully us all, raising, re-raising and putting people off hands.
He's on the button a few hands later when he does something we'd call out of the ordinary. There are two players in an unraised pot as the action gets to him. He spends almost all of his allotted time thinking. Then he just calls.
Alarm bells are ringing here. This is such a strange play from someone who has been so aggressive so far.
He doesn't want to scare people off, so by simply calling, he's keeping people in the hand and providing money- making opportunities for later. He turns out to be holding King-King, and manages to take someone out as the action unfolds.
The out of the ordinary bet
Not a brilliant outcome as it's given the most aggressive (and vocal) player an enormous chip stack, but here's the point … we're not necessarily looking for the big bet, but looking for the bet that is out of the ordinary.
Small or big, quick or slow, we're looking for something that's unusual, and armed with that information you can make a good guess, and either play or get out of the way.
For the next article in our poker journey, we're moving on to look at Bankroll management.
PS – We came third.
