Poker Tells

RoadSweeper

Okay first of all,

From Doyle Brunsons first book

"The most common tell is the pulse on a mans neck. On alot of people the pulse on the neck is visible. If so a man cant hide it, since nobody can control their heart beat in stress situations. When you see a mans neck throbbing, you know he's excited, and usually he's excited because he's bluffing."

Is this accurate. When most players bluff do they not stay as still as possible?
Or would you neck nob be throbbing if you had a monster?


Also can someone point me to a good online resource for poker tells.

Can't afford Mike Caro atm.

cardshark202

Check with your cousins for mike caro's video of poker tells.

NickyOD

RoadSweeper wrote:

Can't afford Mike Caro atm.

If you can't afford one book how can you afford to play any poker at all? Are you playing a home game for wine gums?

Trippie

NickyOD wrote:

If you can't afford one book how can you afford to play any poker at all? Are you playing a home game for wine gums?

wow bitchy or what

Lafortezza

No need for any bitchy comments. Caro's book of Tells is way overrated anyway.
RoadSweeper if you're playing live just pay attention to peoples body language. Try to figure out how comfortable they are with their hand. Watch how weak players act, see what cards they showdown and then think back to how they acted earlier in the hand. It's not foolproof as different players might either tense up or act very relaxed when they are bluffing or when they have a huge hand.
It's player dependant so the quicker you get familiar with players habits, the quicker you will be able to figure out what type of hand they have.

nicryan

lafortezza wrote:

No need for any bitchy comments. Caro's book of Tells is way overrated anyway.

well...unless you're playing with 70's pimps...then you're on a goldmine with caro's...


Nic
--not a 70s pimp unfortunatly...

RoadSweeper

NickyOD wrote:

If you can't afford one book how can you afford to play any poker at all? Are you playing a home game for wine gums?

Does it matter to you how much i play poker for?

ecksor

Ignore him, he probably got outdrawn by yet another "fuktard" in the wee hours of the morning.

RoadSweeper

any comments on Brunsons example?

hotspur

I've heard a few top players comment on the neck pulse as being the best body language indicator. The key word in Brunson's quote however is "usually" because the truth is that different people exhibit physical excitation for different reasons, some when they have the nuts, some when bluffing, some when it's either.

I'd advise not making a play based on mere observation of a single instance of body language with a player, it has to be mapped to a previous instance and outcome. It's the same with lying, if I ask somebody to say something and I look at their eyes I cannot tell a lot of the time whether they are lying or not, but if I ask them to say 5 things and 1 is a lie then I can tell which one is the lie by virtue of the fact that their eye movement or facial expression differs from the other 4 times. The point being that "tells" is about patterns not immutable facts of psychology and body language.

ArmaniJeanss

RoadSweeper wrote:

any comments on Brunsons example?

I think Lafortezza answered it perfectly - differently people will react in different ways. Some are calm when bluffing, and excited with the nuts, others will be the opposite.

Also I suspect you are playing at a fairly low level (purely based on not being able to justify buying the Caro book), in which case there are so many more important things for you to learn re position/drawing odds etc before you need worry too much about tells.

gerry87

Strong is week and weak is strong. Thats your basic one, it's right like 90%. Maybe just more at the lower levels. If someone is staring straight at you, kind of intimidatingly, they dont want a caller. If they're staying really still, maybe staring away from the table, they're generally begging for a caller.

Thats one of the main points from caro's. Pretty acurate really.

spectre

I saw two of the most obvious tells that I have ever seen, they both came from a Sporting Emporium regular in Wednesday's tournament. The two distinct tells came one hand after the next.

In the first hand, just before he peered down at his cards, he began telling a joke, upon the very sight of his beautiful pocket rockets, he found it difficult to remember what happened next in the joke, he appeared completely disorientated

The next hand he was dealt kings, in his big blind, this time, after spying his monster, he turned away from the table to watch the soccer match. Clearly he had no interest in his hand whatsoever... he then min-raised after two others had limped in. LOL

califano

spectre wrote:

The next hand he was dealt kings, in his big blind, this time, after spying his monster, he turned away from the table to watch the soccer match. Clearly he had no interest in his hand whatsoever... he then min-raised after two others had limped in. LOL

LOL what a spa!.

Hitman Actual

I think the whole vein-throbbing/hands-shaking thing is more often a sign of a big hand than a bluff. Another one is the excessive breathing: one tourney in the Fitz, a big (i.e. not very fit) guy, who's a tight player, raises in EP and sounds like he's after running to the Fitz from Wicklow. Has to be KK or AA. Flop comes down Ace high, and I swear he's now having a heart attack. He checks and some guy actually bets into him. Heart-attack guy moves in and shows his set of Aces. If only all reads were this simple.

califano

When someone 'puts you all in' and you have a decision and then they start singing a silent ditty to themselves then your so far behind!.

ollyk1

rounders123 wrote:

When someone 'puts you all in' and you have a decision and then they start singing a silent ditty to themselves then your so far behind!.

True.

DeLaBass

Roadsweeper, some tips that may just know already.

When your opponent is dealt his hole cards observe how long he stares at them, does he pull them in close to himself or push them away, does he count or riffle his chips, does he look interested in what everyone else is doing, etc. Just try doing it first with the two players on your immediate left and build up a profile when their hands are showndown, it can help when blind stealing on the button. Also profile the donkeys at the table to give yourself a better chance of cleaning them out.

I often find if a player puts a big bet into you and isn't looking for a caller he may fidget, put his hands over his mouth or try to look relaxed. The thing is, for some players the harder they try to relax the more anxious they become and you'll see it in their neck pulse.

Of course, every player is different so you can't apply these tells to every situation. Good players will put on fake tells too but you don't come across that very often... well at my stakes anyway

DeVore

Here's my tip: ignore all tips.

Seriously, I have played against a lot of opposition in this country big and small stakes and the fact is that its completely different at different levels.

Take the "weak is strong" thing. This is generally true of weak and very weak players. Its utterly NOT true at a certain (higher level) and at another level again, it reverts. A weak player may well shake when he has a monster, another player (more experienced?) might shake when making a big bluff a third (professional perhaps) might look excited because he's sure he's going to make money on this hand and needs to get himself out of a hole... or because he wants you to think he's bluffing. (I've seen all three and occasionally steal with small bets rather then big ones against players who seem to think weak-is-strong is part of the rules of poker.)

What you need to do is work out for each player which level of player he is. Does he bet flush and straight draws or not. Is he interested in hands where he has a big hand, or does he look distracted. Does he have the capacity to bet the river with a busted flush draw?

Also be careful of reading too much into physical reads, they arent as meaningful or accurate as bet patterns, previous behaviour and odds.
Caro's book has made a lot of cash and I've never read it nor bought it.

DeV.

ZZR1100

DeVore wrote:

Here's my tip: ignore all tips.

Seriously, I have played against a lot of opposition in this country big and small stakes and the fact is that its completely different at different levels.

Take the "weak is strong" thing. This is generally true of weak and very weak players. Its utterly NOT true at a certain (higher level) and at another level again, it reverts. A weak player may well shake when he has a monster, another player (more experienced?) might shake when making a big bluff a third (professional perhaps) might look excited because he's sure he's going to make money on this hand and needs to get himself out of a hole... or because he wants you to think he's bluffing. (I've seen all three and occasionally steal with small bets rather then big ones against players who seem to think weak-is-strong is part of the rules of poker.)

What you need to do is work out for each player which level of player he is. Does he bet flush and straight draws or not. Is he interested in hands where he has a big hand, or does he look distracted. Does he have the capacity to bet the river with a busted flush draw?

Also be careful of reading too much into physical reads, they arent as meaningful or accurate as bet patterns, previous behaviour and odds.
Caro's book has made a lot of cash and I've never read it nor bought it.

DeV.

just watch andy black if you are every playing with him.he knows the biggist tell you can get although i have 1 on him atm but might never get the chance to use it again .,