Referral Code Full Tilt

It takes a while, but you will learn how to read other poker players, you will gain an intuition and a sixth sense. Depending on how you are playing, be it on-line or face to face, will require different ways of reading them, as will be explained, but in both situations it can be done.

Now I’m sure many people prefer face to face (that is at home or in a casino) when reading people at poker. People communicate with each other using body language as well as what they actually say, and subconsciously we pick up most of what another person is telling us, about 90 per cent, from their body language. So despite what a person says, through their chips or their vocal chords, there may be a deeper truth.

You will find that your seasoned poker player will be an excellent reader of people, after all Jamie Gold the current world-leading chip winner (with an impressive $12,0161,719 earning’s to date) used to work promoting actors, people who effectively need to lie convincingly in their trade. And some of that life experience must have rubbed off on his poker experience and subsequent success. So it shows how essential being able to read people is, as most poker players also need to be able to lie convincingly in their trade and perhaps as importantly know when they are being lied to. Presumably, being around trained fib-tellers, Jamie Gold picked up some non-verbal cues about when someone is lying.

You don’t need to jet off to Hollywood and become a talent agent or director to have a successful poker career (but, hey as careers go, I’m sure it would be just as interesting). What you need to do is listen to people and watch them, if you’re a bloke and your partner always complains about how you don’t listen, well for once do so (It’ll have the double benefit of improving your relationship as well as your poker game).

I’m not implying that your partner is lying to you, in fact just the opposite, by referring back to an intimate, trust worthy persons behaviour, will help you see the glaringly obvious tells of someone who isn’t being truthful. Good poker is a social game, it relies heavily on what you know of people. Are they risk takers, steady and truthful, calculated, playful, intelligent, dangerous and so on.  Whenever you talk to someone socially you are developing the skills required for face to face poker.

Combine this with other little idiosyncrasies you might learn about someone, and, their body language will be telling you a great deal of what you need to know, for instance do they tap their fingers when they are excited, smile a lot, or become exceptionally chatty with a good hand. Most players will also keep looking back at their cards if they have a good hand, (although I’ve trained myself to do the reverse) all kinds of little hints that will help you match your play to what the opponent has.

One last thing before I move onto the second part of this topic about reading people is beware if they actually tell you what hands they have. Technically speaking it’s against the rules, but as Jamie Gold has demonstrated some players even get away with showing a card during big tournaments. This can in some ways create more uncertainty for you, the opposing  player, than if you were left guessing. For a start if any other players are still involved they will be able to compare what they have, so if one person blurts out that they have AA and another person has an ace too, what do you think they will do when it’s their time to bet?

The answer is probably fold, (because they can’t beat the AA with two or three or four  of a kind now, and even if they make a straight, it will be a shared pot and would be a lot harder to guarantee than someone playing KK and getting another King in the community cards). Meaning your winning hand may not make as much money, or that if you know they have AA, your KK might not look so tempting if the King doesn’t show in the flop, but if you had been playing ‘none-the-wiser’ might still have seen the hand to the river and luckily caught another King.