Show your hole cards?

Been debating this with a friend who was watching me play the other day. He absolutely never shows his hole cards if his bets aren't called. I've always showed these a lot of times, especially in the middle stages of a tournament, in order to build a table image. I don't play cash games.

It's been my opinion that a tight table image pays off in the later stages, when the blinds get bigger and people are playing more marginal hands. I would rather have someone fold to my re-raise bluff at the final table than eek out a few hundred chips from people staying in with middle pairs early in the tournament.

Thoughts?

i absolutely show when it is to my advantage.

how do i determine what is to my advantage?

What the 1st poster said. table image

I never ever show, I have automuck on. If somebody asks me to show, I might tell them in the chatbox whatever is most advantageous for me at that point.

Concerning table image, I think showing hole cards to try to create one is -EV at low buyin tourneys. Players simply aren't paying attention. I see players show me AK after shoving all-in then proceed to shove the next 5 hands, do they seriously expect me to believe that they picked up AK all those times too?

don't do it, at least until you're answering a lot more posts than you're asking questions on.

End of the day, you are giving out info for free. Trying to guess how low BI fish will react just isn't possible IMO.

I turned on auto muck at all my sites about 6 months ago and have never looked back.

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it's always good to leave them with that little bit of doubt in the pit of their stomach about what you were playing.
plus then you don't have to try and determine if their current actions are the result of you showing or if it is simply that they have what they are repping. more often than not at low stakes they have it, so it's better to not open up the possibility of leveling yourself.

Online I always auto-muck, mostly because I multi-table and can't be bothered (I usually play cash though). At the casino I almost never show, other than a couple of times just to be friendly to the fish :wink: . At my home games I'll show a lot, mostly because I know the others aren't really paying much attention and also because I drink a lot at my home games :) .

Im different from most ppl as I show my cards a ton. I show made hands, bluffs, and a lot of hands in between for various reasons. I do this a lot when I sit down at a table just to keep opponents off balance.

I really don't know why I do it a lot of the time. I'll show a lot of TPTK type hands that I used a stock line on. Villians assuming Im a standard player only helps me down the road IMO.

I never show, ever. Fuck'em, pay to see that you have me beat. The ones that impress me are the guys who show their cards after a bluff all in at a 5BB or 6 BB pot. Like haha, bluffed ya. Keep it. Just becasue they show me that I'm supposed to auto call the next time with MPWK, Not.

use automuck for sure, then you won't have to worry about these things.

Auto-muck.

Against most players looking me up is a mistake I want to encourage, because I'm not even going to suggest that I'm showing unless a river bet is called.