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The Ultimate Live Poker Tell

10,144 Views on 30/4/14

The Ultimate Live Poker Tell Explained

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Playing live poker can be someone's bread and butter or totally confusing to an online grinder. For online players adjusting and transitioning to a live game can be pretty weird. We can actually play optimally but it's our opponents tendencies and lines that we need to be more aware of. Opponents do not react as they should or we hope they would. They call more, bet higher amounts and do some seriously weird stuff. Poker strategy and plays aside one main thing is tells.

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Recent Live Tournament Experience

Duringpokerimage a recent tournament I played an older gentlemen stared at me after I bet. I tried not to laugh but really I don't believe he is picking up something from me. I think some pros will absoloutely have live tells on players but a wannabe will not. As he was staring at me for 5 mins I just laughed and said "cmon buddy this isn't funny anymore", I even said that I have no idea what to do in this situation and it is more uncomfortable than anything. He said he was picking up live tells and I said OK. He called, I table the nuts and he mucks. This happened 2 more times each time him making the wrong decision. This is obviously funny as he basing his decision on how I act and not hand strengths/ranges...what a dumbass!

So throughout the tournament I would look at people and see if there was anything to it. Some people did sweat but it was hot, some players did scratch their head but they probably had an itch and some people did throw their chips in but they probably just enjoyed doing that.

How much can be put down to live tells? I am honestly not sure and I would imagine 0.001% of people actually looking for live tells know what they are doing and can make correct decisions from it.

The Ultimate Live Tournament Tell

However one live tell I picked up on was golden and it is quite an old one. This is when a player said “I will show you this one if you fold”. This is a dead giveaway and we should call instantly here or go all in to re-bluff. Basically the player starts to get nervous and does anything he can to get a fold. Showing your cards could give relief to the villain tanking so offering that kind of gives villain a reason to fold as they will be instantly notified to if they made a good or bad fold. 

One thing to watch out for is a good player who has been around. They may use this when they have the nuts as a reverse tell. Obviously don't look into this to much for now. If you are playing live and see a bad player saying this then you can be pretty sure they are bluffing.

Author

Dan O'Callaghan

Primarily an MTT grinder, Dan began playing poker over curry and Kopperberg whilst at university about 4 years ago.   He exists as several aliases but is best know as 'danshreddies'. His biggest score came earlier in the year when ... Read More

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