Interesting discussion

cardshark202

An interesting thread was started earlier today by ZeeJustin on 2+2:

How Do Non-Rational Players Succeed in Poker?

AmarilloFats

As a non rational loser I am most interested in this....
Can't open,,,,./././/Can someone C+P

Hitman Actual

Here it is:

"I’m a very logical person. I used to think that logical intelligent people will always do well at poker, and that people that are bad at math / logic that play by feel will do poorly. The super-analytical approach seemed superior to me in every way.

I would talk to players like [EMAIL="H@llingol"]H@llingol[/EMAIL], MrSmokey1, Ozzy87, Sdouble, and even TheTakover and wonder how they had success. These are all great players, but their approach was so different from mine that I couldn’t understand it. None of these guys are particular adept at figuring out pot odds, or explaining the gap theory, yet they all do very well. I had to figure out why.

I recently read Introducing Neuro-Linguistic Programming by O’Connor and Seymour. NLP is essentially a psychological study of skills that lead to success in all facets of life, especially social interactions. I learned a lot about the learning process and the subconscious mind in this book. Namely the following:

Quote:
The Four Stages of Learning
1. Unconscious Incompetence
2. Conscious Incompetence
3. Conscious Competence
4. Unconscious Competence

Unlearning is 4 to 2.
Relearning is 2 back to 4 with more choices.

To anyone that has studied psychology, it is probably very clear that the subconscious mind is a lot more powerful and capable than the conscious mind, which is why the learning process must work in the order listed above. Take poker for example.

1. At first it’s just a game. You might not realize how complicated it really is, and you certainly don’t realize how clueless you are.
2. Once you start with beginner strategy, you begin to realize how clueless you are.
3. After a while, the strategies you are learning start to sink in. You may begin thinking, “A8o in early position. The chart tells me to fold this, so I will fold it.”
4. You begin to fold A8o in EP without even thinking about it. Your subconscious mind has now taken over this step of the process, and your conscious mind now has more “memory space” to start thinking about other strategies.

The conscious mind is capable of between five and nine active thoughts at one time. The unconscious is capable of a lot more. It is integral to learning that we take our conscious thought processes and internalize them.

The first theory I came up with, is the “luck of learning” theory. One problem with the learning process in poker is that our brain is very results oriented. That doesn’t always work for poker. It is extremely hard to always be able to separate the results from our judgment in determining what is and what is not the correct play.

This leads to luck, or maybe I should say randomness, being involved in the learning process. Some players will 3-bet AK 4 times in a row, and lose all 4, and may start playing it slower, be it consciously or subconsciously. If this happens enough times, a bad habit may reach stage 4 of the learning process, where it is internalized. Once this stage is reached, it becomes a lot harder to go back and fix the problem, because at that point, it’s no longer thought of as a problem, but a solution.

I think that logical, intelligent players are a lot less likely to be affected by “bad luck” in the learning process. By thinking logically, they are able to better separate themselves from the results.

In general, only a very small percent of poker players are both logical and intelligent. However, a very high percentage of winning players are logical and intelligent. This is for fairly obvious reasons, so I won’t get into it.

What I want to talk about, are the non-logical players that do very well. But first, I guess I should quickly say what I mean when I refer to intelligence. When I say logical and intelligent, I am assuming the person has a very specific kind of intelligence, namely a mathematical intelligence. These people will do very well on the math portion of the SAT’s for example.

When I talk about non-logical players, notice I am not mentioning intelligence. I do believe intelligence is absolutely necessary to be a great poker player; however, these non-logical players have a different kind of intelligence. According to Dr. Howard Gardner there are seven forms of intelligence. “Logical intelligent” players will have Logical-Mathematical intelligence and often spatial intelligence. I find that the non-logical players that are successful often have a great deal of Interpersonal intelligence, and to a lesser extent, spatial intelligence.

Disclaimer: I am not well versed in psychology. The above is opinion based on my limited observation. I can not say with confidence that this is all accurate.

I’m getting slightly off topic here, so let me get back on track. What other traits do successful non-logical players have? I find they often play by feel, and can not properly externalize their plays. They have a feel for pot odds, but often can’t calculate them on the spot, even when the calculations are very simple. They often have poor bankroll management skills, and do not make good grinders. Some of them are actually losers at low stakes, and winners at high stakes. How can this be?

I believe that the biggest difference between low-stakes and high-stakes games is the importance of hand-reading skills. This is why some of the non-logical players will inevitably do extremely well.

The truth of the matter still is that most non-logical players, even intelligent ones, will fail early on in their poker career. I think this goes back to the “luck of learning” I talked about above. When learning, the “logical intelligent” players rely less on luck, and are able to logically analyze situations well enough to somewhat remove the results from the equation. The non-logical players are not able to remove the results in the same way. They often don’t read the books that explain they must play tight, calculate pot-odds, and abide by other guidelines to do well. These fundamentals are the ones necessary to win, especially at low stakes. Essentially what I’m saying is that these players need a lot of luck to do well early on in their careers to learn the fundamentals internally. Getting past this seemingly trivial stage is very hard for many of these players. The few that do break through, will often have a natural tendency to read people, and will therefore do well relatively easily at higher stakes games, assuming they were “lucky” enough to learn the proper fundamentals.

I am often shocked at how many terrible plays the successful non-rational players are capable of making. I think my “luck of learning” theory explains this. They often have gaping holes in their fundamentals because they weren’t “lucky” enough to learn them properly. However, these poor fundamentals are often overshadowed by expert hand-reading skills that allow these players to do well in high stakes games. This is obviously not always the case, but I believe it is very often the case for the successful non-rational players.

I also find that the logical-intelligent players will often break through the low limits very easily. The fundamentals come quickly to them, especially if they are taught to them in a conventional manner (note that the logical players are much more likely to learn via traditional means like reading, rather than the non-rational players, many of whom have never read a poker book). After low stakes, these players often hit a brick wall that they can’t get past. Did you move up easily to 15/30 LHE or 3/6 NL online? Did you have trouble getting far past those limits? If so, this probably applies directly to you, and I know this applied doubly to me.

Often times these players will have had great success due to their logical intelligence, and they don’t realize, the main skill they need to master to start playing higher stakes games is that they need interpersonal, or hand reading skills. It is a very hard and slow process to develop these skills purely analytically. The subconscious mind will be much better able to recognize the patterns of their opponents.

For me, I first learned to play small-stakes LHE 6 handed. I then switched to Sit’n’gos. In both of these games, hand reading skills are very unimportant. When I moved to cash games, at first I struggled a lot. I didn’t have the proper hand reading skills.

The turning point for me was when I learned to trust my gut. When I say gut, I am talking about a very specific subconscious inclination, and it is much better than I am at telling me what hand or hand-range my opponent has, and how he will act with certain hands on future streets.

I find the most successful players in the world are the ones that are able to master both of these extreme opposites in skill that are both of paramount importance. You absolutely must learn the fundamentals, and this is best done through an analytical step by step process. After this, you must learn hand-reading skills, and the best way to do this is through natural practice, and distinguishing which “voices” coming from your unconscious mind you should listen to, and which ones you should ignore.

The unlearning and relearning processes I briefly mentioned above are also crucial. The “voices” are developed from reaching stage 4 of the learning process, but sometimes in poker we learn something that is incorrect. If we are able to pinpoint these mistakes in our game, and then properly unlearn and relearn the appropriate situations, we will always be one step ahead of the game. So if you have a little voice in your head that says “call, the pot is big” that happens to talk at the same time as your voice that says, “it’s a value bet, he has the nuts for sure”, you must try to externalize which one of these unconscious thoughts is more apt. In my personal experience, I have found the voice that tells me my opponents hand to be far more accurate than any other voice or inclination I have at the table.

When learning something as complicated as poker, I think it is extremely helpful to first take a look at the learning process itself and get a better idea of the intellectual journey you are about to embark upon. I made the mistake of trying to externalize all my thoughts, without realizing how powerful my unconscious mind can be. There is a reason that many poker players that play by feel will be successful. They have interpersonal skills that allow them to understand not only their opponents, but the overall flow of play in a particular poker game. These skills are rarely talked about in poker circles, because they are hard to rationalize.

The reason why the unconscious mind works better at this task is because of the sheer amount of information being processed. We could analyze our opponents play analytically: “Ok, he raised preflop, and he’s a tight player, so he has a decent hand. He bet the flop, but that could just be a continuation bet. He bet smaller on the turn, so maybe he has a good hand and is afraid of the flush, or maybe he’s milking a really strong hand. It’s also possible he has a pair and a straight draw, or some kind of combo hand. I don’t think he’s the type of player to fire a second barrel often, but maybe he’s doing it here because it’s unlikely that I hit this board hard.” Going through all the possibilities could take a long time, and I find that it is too hard to keep the many factors involved in a read active in the conscious mind. This is why this process is best internalized.

In the end, there should be a balance between the analytical mind, and the unconscious mind. I find it rare for people to maser the use of both of these. Most players can be summed up in one of the two categories I have laid out. However, if you want to be a truly versatile player, it is important that you learn to utilize both of these techniques constantly. The balance will not be easy to find, but it is a goal that every poker player should aspire to."

poker4life

lenny_leonard wrote:

The turning point for me was when I learned to trust my gut. When I say gut, I am talking about a very specific subconscious inclination, and it is much better than I am at telling me what hand or hand-range my opponent has, and how he will act with certain hands on future streets.

and distinguishing which “voices” coming from your unconscious mind you should listen to, and which ones you should ignore.

I think this was really interesting reading, especially the above 2 parts. I definitely am a logical thinker (everyone is to a certain extent), but I also try to let my subconscious guide my play. The tricky part is deciding which "voice" to listen to. This took a while to figure out, but you get used to your own head eventually, and can interpret what your subconcious is telling you. Everyone will have different specific experiences of this I suppose, but fascinating to see someone express these ideas as he has.

Its a pity there isn't more discussion like this on boards really.

Daithio

That's a brilliant post. It describes my play perfectly. I'd definitely consider myself more of an instinct player, although I roughly know the maths side of the game I've never placed that much emphasis on it, and I can usually work it out easily enough on the spot if I have to make an important maths based decision. The part where he talks about the way that some successful non rational players have gaping holes in their game is also very true for me. I can make mistakes which you wouldn't see in a $5 stt, and this is definitely something I have to work on.

Also I think this post highlights pretty well the fact that dissecting and discussing hand histories online is a pretty futile excercise. Often the amount of different things we are supposed to have considered in order to arrive at the correct play is way too much information to consciously process in 30 seconds when you're actually in hand. If you arrive at the correct play in one of these situations where there is so much to consider, it's either by luck or because your subconscious has decided it for you. Not because you have consciously processed the information in a way that some people who post on poker forums claim you should have. It's quite easy to do this in hindsight when you have a few minutes to think about everything and write your thoughts down, but on the spot it simply doesn't happen that way.

ionapaul

Thanks for linking to that, cardshark, very very interesting. I imagine (please correct me if wrong) that most of the fairly successful online players are of the logical-intelligent 'persuasion', while I find that many of the successful live tournament players in Dublin are in the 'trust my gut, forget odds (or at least internalise the calculating process)' camp. I remember one of these veterans once telling me 'when faced with a tough decision, consider it for a minute and then go with your strongest gut feeling - you'll rarely be wrong' - is this gut feeling the result of subconsious analysis and evaluation?

mewso

The big step is trusting your gut when it tells you to call a big bet. When it tells you to fold it's very easy to lay down the hand and congratulate yourself that you trusted your gut. Interesting stuff allright.

poker4life

ionapaul wrote:

- is this gut feeling the result of subconsious analysis and evaluation?

I believe gut feelings or intuition are the result of the workings of your unconscious mind. At the table your mind is constantly processing all the sensory input and information its receiving - you have to trust the analysis your mind does based on this input, like Zee Justin is saying. The tricky part is learning "which “voices” coming from your unconscious mind you should listen to".
I used to find one of 2 voices in a specific situation (the situation where I have the choice to call an all-in bet or not) - one voice saying the opponent might be ahead, but I could easily hit an out. The other saying well you could definitely be behind here, but I have a strong hand.
I learned that when I heard the first voice I was always behind, and stopped calling or getting involved, but its very tempting to hear you could hit outs etc, and that you only might be behind.
But the second voice or opinion was always heard in situations were I'm ahead, so I obey that. But this was a stronger more forbidding feeling, as in saying you could definitely be behind here - so it was counter intuitive to call or play in this scenario! But I learnt that that was just my subconscious minds way of telling me I am in a winning scenario!!! Maybe my
subconscious was trying to trick me into losing for some reason. You're not fooling me!

Daithio

musician wrote:

The big step is trusting your gut when it tells you to call a big bet. When it tells you to fold it's very easy to lay down the hand and congratulate yourself that you trusted your gut. Interesting stuff allright.

Lol, I would have said the exact opposite.

poker4life

Daithio wrote:

Also I think this post highlights pretty well the fact that dissecting and discussing hand histories online is a pretty futile excercise.

but on the spot it simply doesn't happen that way.

I'd agree with that to a certain extent. I think hand analysis is only good for building your theoretical "base" knowledge, with the goal that ultimately your subconscious will take over, and the logic of its decisions will be based on the base knowledge you picked up consciously.

Or good for re-learning - i.e. I played AJ horribly and HJ straightened out my thinking. Thing is I hadn't really played in a while, and years ago I never would of played that badly, but I suppose I had forgotten some of the basics. I think that way of thinking is back in my brain now, so that's good.

mewso

Daithio wrote:

Lol, I would have said the exact opposite.

Ah come on surely if you have a feeling you are beat it's alot easier to heed that feeling than it is to go with a feeling that someone is at it and you should call for your tournament life or for your whole stack based on it. Well to me it is.
It does raise the question that has been discussed before. We will probably always remember those moments when we went with our gut and were right but quickly forget the times our gut/subconcious was wrong. It makes these kind of theories easier to embrace and we like the idea of having poker super powers.

poker4life

musician wrote:

We will probably always remember those moments when we went with our gut and were right but quickly forget the times our gut/subconcious was wrong. .

I don't think so - I certainly remember the times I went with a gut feeling and was wrong. Like I said that was because I was misinterpreting what I was being told i.e. I was being told something, I thought it was "call", it was actually "fold". So I would say its probably more often a case of people's subconscious being right, but not listening correctly to it, or consciously over-riding their subconscious by choosing a different action.
E.g. you know you are behind, so your subconscious is saying fold.
But you say - "I'm getting 4/1 on my money, and the odds justify calling". You know you are wrong. But you call.
Here your conscious thought over-ruled your gut. I hate when I let that happen.

Regarding the "super powers": are you saying that you don't believe that the subconscious mind makes decisions/analysis and that the results are communicated to our conscious mind?
Because it happens all the time - very valuable to tune it in when playing poker. Its not super powers, its normal really.

nicnicnic

yeh this is an interesting one allright. Alot of the time when players see me go into the tank on a big decision I'm sure they think that I'm going through all the rational stuff hand ranges/ pot odds/ betting patterns ect.

Whats really happening inside my head is I'm seeing a little bear balancing on a barrel and juggling. Now up to reading this post I was finding this a little disturbing and wasnt inclined to tell anyone, however its all clear now. I'm subconsciously giving my subconscious time to kick in and make the decision for me.

ionapaul

Selective memory surely is something that affects our poker playing (and indeed our entire life!) - I know some players who, after getting in there on numerous occasions with only the river to come and chasing a flush, only seem to remember those times they hit, and as such ignore the odds and decide to gamble every subsequent time they are in this situation. I'm sure they would argue that when their gut tells them to chase the draw, they follow the feeling as it has been right so often, conveniently forgetting the majority of times when they missed!
Something similar is those times you think of a family member / friend and suddenly they phone you - freaky! After it happens a few times, people start to think there must be a connection between thinking of the person and the call - however, in reality it is just selective memory at work again - we disregard the umpteen times we think of a person and they don't call!

Daithio

poker4life wrote:

I'd agree with that to a certain extent. I think hand analysis is only good for building your theoretical "base" knowledge, with the goal that ultimately your subconscious will take over, and the logic of its decisions will be based on the base knowledge you picked up consciously.

Or good for re-learning - i.e. I played AJ horribly and HJ straightened out my thinking. Thing is I hadn't really played in a while, and years ago I never would of played that badly, but I suppose I had forgotten some of the basics. I think that way of thinking is back in my brain now, so that's good.

Yeah I should probably say that discussing hand histories online is sometimes a pretty futile excercise. This is in the cases where there are so many things to consider that it is impossible to try and consciously rationalise your decision within 30 seconds. It is definitely useful for basic hand selection and the simpler concepts of the game.

Daithio

musician wrote:

Ah come on surely if you have a feeling you are beat it's alot easier to heed that feeling than it is to go with a feeling that someone is at it and you should call for your tournament life or for your whole stack based on it. Well to me it is.
It does raise the question that has been discussed before. We will probably always remember those moments when we went with our gut and were right but quickly forget the times our gut/subconcious was wrong. It makes these kind of theories easier to embrace and we like the idea of having poker super powers.

Well the times that I have a really strong gut feeling I'll go with it regardless of whether it's to call or to fold. But when it's not that strong I'd say I go more with the ones that tell me to call rather than the ones that tell me to fold.

AmarilloFats

Enjoyed that.
Experience is nothing without interpretation.
I think dissecting hand histories is a great way to learn.

Ste05

Daithio wrote:

This is in the cases where there are so many things to consider that it is impossible to try and consciously rationalise your decision within 30 seconds. It is definitely useful for basic hand selection and the simpler concepts of the game.

The thing is though, it might take your brain (sub-concious or conscious) 5 or 6 seconds to go through all the variables and thought processes that might take 6 paragraphs and 20 minutes to write and properly articulate, but after you've actually gone and written down what your thought process was it helps later when a similar situation arises again, I think analysing hands is extremely useful. And using Zee Justin's theories, I think it is very important, as it helps to unlearn some of the mistakes that players might have picked up through his "luck of learning" theory. (Which is basically exactly what ionapaul was alluding to when talking about the selective memory point).

Myself personally am very much one of the logical/ mathematical players, so much so that there are often times when I've overruled my "gut" and made a mathematically correct play when I just have a strong feeling that it is wrong. Sometimes it works out when I make the mathematically correct play, and some times it doesn't, but similarly when I decide to go with my gut sometimes I'm wrong, sometimes I'm right, I then made a conscious decision, that I'd pick one or the other, and I made the decision to go with the maths everytime and let the long-term and variance decide how I do. (having said that, On-Line, if I have a very strong "gut instinct" I'll still follow it, but if it's marginal, I'll let the maths decide, however, Live, I don't have faith in my "gut" just yet, due to lack of time spent at the felt, and hence trust the mathematical side alot more than my gut and will often over-rule my gut).

But after reading that post, it had some very good points that I hadn't really thought about properly, and I think, I'm going to give it a week or so, when I'll go with my gut alot more in marginal situations than I have in the past and in marginal situations trust what the "little voice" is telling me, there's usually only one voice for me, but I just haven't trusted him enough :rolleyes: .... and see how I fair, I'm hoping it'll be better than I currently give it credit for.

nicnicnic

Daithio wrote:

Yeah I should probably say that discussing hand histories online is sometimes a pretty futile excercise. This is in the cases where there are so many things to consider that it is impossible to try and consciously rationalise your decision within 30 seconds. It is definitely useful for basic hand selection and the simpler concepts of the game.

Don't think I agree with you here Dave I suppose it depends on the individual but a reasonably intelligent and experienced player can and does consciously rationalise a hell of a lot in 30 seconds. How many things do we really need to consider when making our decision. Off the top of my head

1. our hand
2. opponents/ hand range
3. How we are perceived and how do we perceive our opponents/table images
4. pot odds
5. stack size
6. position

I feel 30 seconds is plenty time to assimilate and make cognitively sound decisions.

I consider myself to be a touch/feel player more then the textbook type and more often then not I'm right.When I get a gut play wrong It never bothers me no matter how stupid i look. I'm not fickle about my poker and as a person a poker hand can bother me for months but not my gut hands for some reason.

Can we actually define what is a gut play. A major flaw in my game is what i term an impulse/reaction play, this usually manifests its self in an instant call or push and while some may consider this the subconscious in action and a gut play I don't. I'm well aware of where and against the type of players it happens but still cant weed it out(cost me a tournament Sunday).

A gut play to me for example is where without any prevalent read on a player you feel he is at it although the rational and textbook says no.

poker4life

ionapaul wrote:

Selective memory surely is something that affects our poker playing (and indeed our entire life!)

- however, in reality it is just selective memory at work again - we disregard the umpteen times we think of a person and they don't call!

Of course I'd agree selective memory occurs in life, and effects a lot of players thinking. But there's no evidence that ZeeJustins theory or what I was saying is effected by selective memory.
The players you are talking about who call with draws or whatever isn't a good example of what ZJ was talking about imo. They say it is their gut, but that's because their gut feeling is probably to gamble in any situation. In other words, gambling is what their sub and conscious minds "want" them to do. But ZJ is talking about the process of learning, and teaching your subconscious to arrive at correct and accurate decisions. Presumably learning not to throw your chips away with a draw is part of that learning, and if those same players "got that into their heads", then their gut would in future tell them not to call. Whether they listen to that gut is another thing - buzz of gambling may just take over!

Not sure I agree with the dismissal of the "phone call" phenomena as simply selective memory either

Daithio

Ste05 wrote:

The thing is though, it might take your brain (sub-concious or conscious) 5 or 6 seconds to go through all the variables and thought processes that might take 6 paragraphs and 20 minutes to write and properly articulate.

This is true, but often when people write these long winded replies they come across as if they actually consciously went through, or would go through, all of these variables at the time of playing the hand. I don't think this is possible really. Especially not online anyway. That's why it's much more important to go with your instincts or gut feelings, because quite often your subconscious will have taken into account alot of these variables in giving you this 'gut feeling' or instinct. It will probably be more informed than any decision your conscious mind will come to in the same amount of time anyway.

Alot of these HH discussions will leave beginner players thinking that they have to consciously analyse every hand they play in great detail, and I don't think this is good advice, so that's why I think that HH's aren't the best way to learn how to play. They can be useful, but I think you have to take into account when reading them that you won't consciously be able to analyse a hand in such depth when in a real life poker situation.

Daithio

nicnicnic wrote:

Can we actually define what is a gut play. A major flaw in my game is what i term an impulse/reaction play, this usually manifests its self in an instant call or push and while some may consider this the subconscious in action and a gut play I don't. I'm well aware of where and against the type of players it happens but still cant weed it out(cost me a tournament Sunday).

A gut play to me for example is where without any prevalent read on a player you feel he is at it although the rational and textbook says no.

That's a pretty important distinction. A reflex/impulse play more often than not is a bad play. It's normally a push without any thought processes behind it whatsoever, conscious or subconscious. A gut play is when you have a good reason for making a particular play, but the thought process behind coming to the conclusion that this is the correct play is subconcsious and so is difficult to consciously articulate. You might even think there is little or no reasoning behind it at all, but that's not the case, it's just that the reasoning was subconscious. More often than not a gut play is a good play, but yeah sometimes you'll get it horribly wrong.

mewso

poker4life wrote:

I don't think so - I certainly remember the times I went with a gut feeling and was wrong. Like I said that was because I was misinterpreting what I was being told i.e. I was being told something, I thought it was "call", it was actually "fold". So I would say its probably more often a case of people's subconscious being right, but not listening correctly to it, or consciously over-riding their subconscious by choosing a different action.
E.g. you know you are behind, so your subconscious is saying fold.
But you say - "I'm getting 4/1 on my money, and the odds justify calling". You know you are wrong. But you call.
Here your conscious thought over-ruled your gut. I hate when I let that happen.

Regarding the "super powers": are you saying that you don't believe that the subconscious mind makes decisions/analysis and that the results are communicated to our conscious mind?
Because it happens all the time - very valuable to tune it in when playing poker. Its not super powers, its normal really.

First of all I'm not sure why we are saying the gut will be more correct than the odds. If the odds say call then it's a correct call. ZJ seems to be talking about your reads of players which if accurate may mean you don't have the odds to call.

I'm not saying I consider the subconcious a super power I was reacting to alot of the "Oh yeah I read a guy once for such and such a hand" comments in that post as if they want to be part of the subconious wizzes.

My main point really is that your subconcious may well be wrong particularly if it has learnt things incorrectly but perhaps the reality is that your concious mind only remembers certain things but the subconcious remembers all pertinent information and will more often be correct than incorrect. It's nice to think so which may well be the problem

poker4life

nicnicnic wrote:

Can we actually define what is a gut play.
an impulse/reaction play, this usually manifests its self in an instant call or push and while some may consider this the subconscious in action and a gut play I don't.

A gut play to me for example is where without any prevalent read on a player you feel he is at it although the rational and textbook says no.

Hellohellohello nicnicnic.

No, I wouldn't agree with your definition of a gut play.
I think you need to understand why your subconscious mind tells you what it does e.g. the gambler who will call with any draw etc.
If you have no "prevalent" read, what possibly makes you think he is at it?? I mean if ther's an ace on the flop, you have KK, why do you think he doesn't have the Ace when he bets, if you have no reads? A feeling, maybe? Or maybe your subconscious mind picked up on some sort of tell to make you get this feeling? The only alternative I can see is that you want to believe he is at it, and use the excuse of gut to justify calling because subconsciously u are annoyed that your KK missed the flop. Or maybe you don't like the person, and your mind just wants confrontation with that person.
These are all false reasons your subc mind might give you, so they may be gut feelings but you should ignore them.

Hitman Actual

Daithio wrote:

Alot of these HH discussions will leave beginner players thinking that they have to consciously analyse every hand they play in great detail, and I don't think this is good advice, so that's why I think that HH's aren't the best way to learn how to play. They can be useful, but I think you have to take into account when reading them that you won't consciously be able to analyse a hand in such depth when in a real life poker situation.

The thing about analysing hands is that if you do enough of them then it improves your 'feel' for certain situations at the table, and you will be much closer to making the best +EV decision. I don't think anyone here is doing a calculation down to two decimal points at the table! I hope beginners realise that the hand analysis discussed here is all after-the-fact analysis.

Regarding the whole 'feel', 'instinct' or whatever theme, I've always felt that the successful 'feel' players are often working within good mathematical limits anyway, without even knowing it. Their good instinct/opponent-reading skills mean that they effectively assign a higher weighting factor to certain hands, so they invariably make a good +EV decision. (Does that make sense?)

The post by El Diablo in that thread is really good as well:

El Diablo on 2+2 wrote:

ZJ,

I think your post can be distilled into this:

--
A lot of players who don't have great logic/math skills are very smart people who are good at identifying patterns and quickly (either consciously or subconsciously) processing large amounts of information. These players may not know why they know something, but they know when they are ahead or behind (and how their opponents are likely to react to their actions) and act accordingly.
--

I'm pretty sure if you compared winners online and live, you would find them skewed higher towards the logic/math side among the online group than among the live group, because there are less non-logic/math elements to go by in making decisions.

The top players are all very good at both sides of this (that doesn't mean that they all necessarily calculate equities or do the math or even understand why, sometimes they just have a good enough feel for equities such that they know more or less how much money needs to be in the middle to make a call good).

The type of mistake the too-much-math player makes is simple. He often makes lots of bad calls because he's "getting too good a price" when that is actually complete BS based on the narrow range that any good reader would put his opponent on. Or, he misses out on opportunities because he can't realize that a certain guy bluff-raises-allin anytime you bet half-pot and instead worries about betting enough so he "gives him a bad price" or whatever.

However, guys like the type you describe can make mistakes for the opposite reason. One big mistake I've seen guys like this make is there's a lot of action and their opponent puts in the last raise. The instinct player now correctly puts his opponent on his exact hand and knows he is far behind, so folds. Except that based on the amount of equity he has in the pot, he should have called.

That's why being good at both types of thinking is important to be really good.

poker4life

musician wrote:

ZJ seems to be talking about your reads of players which if accurate may mean you don't have the odds to call.


My main point really is that your subconcious may well be wrong particularly if it has learnt things incorrectly but perhaps the reality is that your concious mind only remembers certain things but the subconcious remembers all pertinent information and will more often be correct than incorrect. It's nice to think so which may well be the problem

I agree all right - that's what I was saying previously about the odds - when the odds are there, but you know you are losing. You should fold imo.

Definitely your subconscious can be wrong, I think ZJ was saying that you have to train your subconscious and eliminate bad thought processes etc, so that it correctly and accurately assesses the poker scenarios.
Fascinating stuff alright!

ionapaul

poker4life wrote:

Not sure I agree with the dismissal of the "phone call" phenomena as simply selective memory either

Well, check this out! (you may have already read it):

http://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/news/city/2006/09/07/9d6845e8-f89f-4c35-bf4d-39b1ded59ca0.lpf

That said, I still am a total and committed sceptic with regard to this 'telephone telepathy' and would imagine this will be completely refuted in the near future!

Imagine the killing you'd make on the tables if you had 'poker telepathy'!

poker4life

ionapaul wrote:

Well, check this out! (you may have already read it):

http://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/news/city/2006/09/07/9d6845e8-f89f-4c35-bf4d-39b1ded59ca0.lpf

That said, I still am a total and committed sceptic with regard to this 'telephone telepathy' and would imagine this will be completely refuted in the near future!

Imagine the killing you'd make on the tables if you had 'poker telepathy'!

That's weird, I was just thinking "where's old IonaPaul these days, long time no hear"!! Incredible really, and irrefutable proof that telephone and bulletin board telepathy work!
Thx 4 the link, read about that trial before alright. My best one was when I dreamt about a family friend I hadn't seeen in well over 10 years - the dream was very vivid and I was thinking about them all day. Came home and he was sitting in our kitchen! I wasn't surprised at all.

poker4life

Problem with poker telepathy is that unless you use it on the river, variance/luck can still screw you!! I guess you would need to see the future to know if you will still be ahead by the river. Or telekinesis so you could bash that chair over the dealers head for rivering you!!;)

nicnicnic

poker4life wrote:

Hellohellohello nicnicnic.

No, I wouldn't agree with your definition of a gut play.
1....I think you need to understand why your subconscious mind tells you what it does e.g. the gambler who will call with any draw etc.
If you have no "prevalent" read, what possibly makes you think he is at it?? I mean if there's an ace on the flop, you have KK, why do you think he doesn't have the Ace when he bets, if you have no reads? A feeling, maybe? Or maybe your subconscious mind picked up on some sort of tell to make you get this feeling? .

hello poker4life

It may very well be a subconscious read but I'm calling because my gut is telling me thus a gut call.

what lenny says opens the door to another Question

"I've always felt that the successful 'feel' players are often working within good mathematical limits anyway, without even knowing it. Their good instinct/opponent-reading skills mean that they effectively assign a higher weighting factor to certain hands, so they invariably make a good +EV decision. (Does that make sense?)"

I think your basically saying that this type of player is in fact making very fast rational decisions considering all the variables and comming to a decision subconciously. Which begs the Question is the gut play just a myth.

AmarilloFats

If one studies and analyses methodically, one can develop a better "gut-feel" for a game. AGREE?
The converse is not true.....I think that is to confuse correlation and causality.


So I would disagree with..." ... it's much more important to go with your instincts or gut feelings, because quite often your subconscious will have taken into account alot of these variables in giving you this 'gut feeling' or instinct."

From a physiological point of view..When adreneline is flowing in your body, blood flow is very limited to the NEO CORTEX area of your brain...this makes it tres dificle to make conscious logical decisions..

SSo I think..."methodically train your instincts"

poker4life

nicnicnic wrote:

It may very well be a subconscious read but I'm calling because my gut is telling me thus a gut call.:.

But you should try and figure out why your gut is telling you that.

nicnicnic wrote:

what lenny says opens the door to another Question

I agree with Lenny too, it really ties in with ZJ's theory.

nicnicnic wrote:

I think your basically saying that this type of player is in fact making very fast rational decisions considering all the variables and comming to a decision subconciously. Which begs the Question is the gut play just a myth.

I'm not saying that at all - you are talking about Lenny's type of player here?
He said they are "effectively" doing these calculations, not actually doing them.
Hence its gut, not rational.

fixer

damn, this is one of the major portions of a book I am working on with my uncle and cousin who are PhD psychologists.

Anyone want to be interviewed as a case study?

Hectorjelly

The point of doing in depth analysis of hands is so that all the information becomes internalised and that you react the right way (or closer to the right way) the next time it occurs. This is true for all concepts, the more complicated they are the more usefull it is.

During a hand you actually have a lot of time to think through everything you need to, you dont have to just start thinking as soon as its your option. If you make a bet you should start thinking about what your opponent is likely to do, why he is doing it and what you are going to do if he raises you, or the plan for the next street if he calls.

Studying hands online especially in forums like the 2+2 hsnl is the quickest way to learn how to play poker at a very high level.


edit just to add for clarity

If someone posts a hand where they are reraised with AQ, and there is a long winded reply about the merits of all the action. No one is expecting someone to work out from scratch the pros and cons of each action on the spot, the whole point of posting the hand and getting responses is so that the next time it occurs you are ready to make a better informed decision very quickly, as you should have already taken in all the information previously.

The Snapper

Daithio wrote:

I think this post highlights pretty well the fact that dissecting and discussing hand histories online is a pretty futile excercise. Often the amount of different things we are supposed to have considered in order to arrive at the correct play is way too much information to consciously process in 30 seconds when you're actually in hand. If you arrive at the correct play in one of these situations where there is so much to consider, it's either by luck or because your subconscious has decided it for you. Not because you have consciously processed the information in a way that some people who post on poker forums claim you should have. It's quite easy to do this in hindsight when you have a few minutes to think about everything and write your thoughts down, but on the spot it simply doesn't happen that way.

Does'nt the educational process of reviewing these plays and Hand histories, feed into the sub concious learning and become the basis for these sub concious decisions though.

RoundTower

the great thing about poker is that bad players can justify their play in just the same way.

fuzzbox

I think that both posting HH and also reviewing other ppls HHs and commenting on them is an excellent way to become a better poker player.

Posting your own difficult decisions gives you many different perspectives on the problem. This, in turn, allows you to have a more expansive view on the problem the next time it (or something similar) occurs.

Posting your own bad deicisions helps you become more honest with yourself, and helps you get a real good understanding of either A. how big a mistake it was or B. how small of a mistake it was after all (if you get lots and lots of conflicting responses then your mistake wasnt so bad after all).

Responding to other hand histories gets you to think about a situation that you were not in, so you have no knowledge of the results, and no preconceived notions of the situation. You can simply look at the problem and try to say how you would play the situation. This, in turn, can lead to ppl critiqing your proposed play, and can lead to better understandings and better lines and thus, pretty much make you a better player.

I have gotten a lot out of the various poker forums, and have become a better player as a result of both posting my own hands and responding to other posters hands.

ntlbell

RoundTower wrote:

the great thing about poker is that bad players can justify their play in just the same way.

good players have been known to try and justify an awfully retarded play with some nonsensical dribble...I don't see why the morons can't have their say too.