Online Poker tells Exemple

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cardsYou’re sitting with a pair of 9’s in the dealer position. The rest of the table has called and the player before you is thinking about the play he wants to make. At this point click the “Raise Any” option. Irrespective of the play made by the previous player the software will instantly raise forcing everyone at the table to re-evaluate their hand. The message that is sent out is that you’re sitting with a very strong hand and are likely to take the pot. Your action may cause a stronger hand to fold and help you steal the pot (not that a pair of nines doesn’t already have a fair chance of taking the pot) or it may make a player with a strong hand play more conservatively to limit their loss should you beat them.

Allowing the software to play some of your hands for you isn’t a bad idea but make sure you don’t become reliant on it or your game-play will become predictable and easy to read. As has been the case so often in the past the central message here is to change gears sometimes to vary your game. Keep you opponents on their toes and make them work hard for every pot they take away from you.

My next tip involves the automatic posting of blinds at the beginning of a round, it’s a useful option which helps to speed the game up and it is generally accepted to be bad manners not to use it. Consider however that you’ve been playing shorthanded for a while and you want to leave the table in the next hand or two depending on the cards you’re being dealt. You don’t want to be accidentally dealt in on a hand you don’t want to play so you turn off the auto post blind option and begin manually posting your blinds. A perceptive player sitting at your table will notice that instead of instantly posting your blind as per normal you are now manually posting them which would indicate to them that you may be considering leaving the table.

After manually posting your blind you get dealt pocket aces and naturally you want to play them so you raise when your turn to act arrives. Normally this action would indicate a fairly strong hand to everyone at the table but in this case the table may have already picked up on your intention to leave soon. Players preparing to leave generally want to conserve their stack and don’t on the whole play hands that are marginal. You have just advertised that due to the fact that you’re wanting to leave the table and are therefore likely to try to conserve your stack, the fact that you’ve made an aggressive play means you are very confident of taking the pot. Under the circumstances if you were reading these tells would you contest the pot? I would certainly think twice before risking my money under the circumstances.

It’s difficult to suggest a way to overcome this particular situation short of saying that instead of disengaging the auto post blind you might want to decide when you wish to stop and hit the sit out next hand button while playing your last hand.

If you’re sitting at a small table of fairly skilled players though this has the potential to work as a very good bluff if you’re sitting with a mediocre hand and want to steal the pot.

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