Regarding Reads

[sejje]

Does anyone know of any good, well-written guides out there to working on reads? Have any strategy?

My reads pretty much stink, especially in 6-max. I never believe that guy flopped the nut flush on a 3-suited flop. Yeah, that guy must have the ten every time on a TT8 board, my jacks are no good. Etc, etc.

I make some solid reads. I've seen the flush draw call the pot on the flop, then bet 1/5 the pot on the turn enough times to know to make a big raise. But I still can't tell if that guy pushing the third card to a flush really has it.

I know a lot of this is playing thousands of hands. But in my year of playing (it's been a year now, happy bday me, I'm still winning) I've played many thousands of hands, and I'm not happy with my reads.

They say some of the professionals like Negraneau and Harmon have uncanny reading abilities. That's what I want; like playing with a marked deck.

Anyway, got a place to start?

[mouteut]

I think reads is my biggest strenght in poker, so i will try to answer this(im basicelly god in 50NL omaha, i always know what everyone is holding, because its full of rocks who plays abc poker).

First you should always pay attention to the action while you're not in the hand. Don't multi table too much for this. I always try to read people even if i'm not in the hand. Just yesterday in omaha, some guy raise and he get reraised all in. I tell him, fold, the guy has nut flush for sure. He folded and the other guy turned over the nut flush. thats not very nice from me to tell people who has what, but i love to do so because it practice my reads.

In that example, the guy who raised on flop had 30$ stack and he raised to 12$, other guy reraise all in. The guy who did this is a ROCK, ive never seen him get caugh in a bluff and theres no reason to bluff a very low stack like this. So this is an obvious read.


I usually try to use psychology. Why this guy bets 15$ on this 10$ pot? i try to remember the whole hand, how he played previous hands, etc

I just try to get in my opponement's shoes. Theres a reason for everything. He don't randomely bets.

Everytimes i got a hard decision to make, i will look at the whole hand history to get information on him(tight or loose, agressive or passive). Often try and get words from him with chat.


Main question you should ask yourself:

Your opponement's style (loose or tight, agressive or passive, frequency of bluff, on tilt or not)

Your opponement's opinion ON YOUR STYLE. If you have a maniac image, he could very well be trying to push you off thinking you got nothing. If you have a tighie image, he might have a real hand if hes reraising you. This part is very important.

Review the whole hand in your head. AA and 27o are not played the same way. Missed draw? Slow play? etc

Players ARE NOT all maniac bluffers. If he bet, you reraise and he reraise back and you have a tightie image, he almost always have something good.

I will sometimes even chat with the player to try and get information. From my experience(i could be wrong on this), someone who dont talk at all might be stressed because hes bluffing, and someone who seems very confortable might have a real hand.



Ill state one last example. Few week ago, i had this guy i bluffed HARD and i showed the hand. Then 4 hands later, i had TPTK with A7 on rainbow flop. I bet more than the pot. The guy reraise me all in(6x the pot). I try to get in his psychology. He wasn't agressive pre flop at all and hes not a tricky player, so overpair is unlikely. If he flopped a set, almost impossible he be this agressive against me. My guess was he was stone cold bluffing because he was sure i bluffed myself. I called and he held bottom pair.

You just have to try and understand why he do this. If you had flopped a set on a rainbow flop, would you bet 6x pot? NOO. Its the same for this guy.

I took all factors in consideration: The opponement's style, my opponement's view on my own style, the previous hands, tilt factor, his psychology.


Experience matters a lot in this. But if you have been 4 tabling playing only your cards for 1 year, this won't help reads as much. I would recommend playing only 1 table at first, and try to read everyone the best you can. Once you're decent at it, try 2 tables. And so on.



Hope this can help, lets see the replies of more experienced players.

Nice topic

[Toe]

great post, im also interested in how to develop hand reading skills.

I guess it comes more easily the more you practice it. One thing I would like some advice from the good players on here about is the betting patterns of your opponents.

How do you try and keep track of this especially if the number of hands shown down are few. Do you just have to use your best judgement and trust your reads or is there a better way at trying to understand what a bet means for a particular opponent?

[mouteut]

You just have to use psychology again

Is this guy trying to steal the pot or to extract the most money possible from you?

Is this guy doing a cheap bluff or he just wants to build the pot?

The way to answer these questions is probably by using the information i described in my above post.

I personally don't go deep into each players's betting pattern, i just use psychology.

I would check hand history, if i see he repeatedly bet max pot with the nuts, and not a single hand has he bluffed, this gives me a pretty good read.

Other players will probably come up with other stuff.

[Fortune 500]

Your opponement's opinion ON YOUR STYLE. If you have a maniac image, he could very well be trying to push you off thinking you got nothing. If you have a tighie image, he might have a real hand if hes reraising you. This part is very important.

Often, this is THE single most important thing you can determine. Your opponents are sometimes playing on YOUR image too. Let's say you've been on a hot run of cards, and in the last 6 hands, you've raised with AA, AK, TT, and maybe a KQ with position. All our pretty standard TAG plays. Now, let's say none of those hands make it to showdown. To your opponents, you're playing LOOSE.

You have to ask yourself what you think of your opponent, but you also have to ask what your opponent thinks of YOU as well... and the image you think you've portrayed may not be what they're seeing. How this incorporates into your decision varies with other things, but it can't be discounted.

[ffgamer]

That's one of the things Harrington says in his book. Just because you think you are a tight player, if you have been involved in a lot of pots because of a rush of good cards, other players will see you as a loose player.

[dalecooper]

This is a bum thing to say, but: playing a lot and playing regularly will eventually make this happen for you. 80% of reads - more than that when you play online - is about betting patterns. Recognizing those patterns comes from experience. The more experience you have, the more quickly and easily you will see the read materialize without you having to think about it too much. And when you're playing often - like daily - it becomes a habit, almost like muscle memory. (If you don't know what that is, think about a basketball player who practices shooting. When he starts for the first time he thinks about his shot, the distance, the amount of force and spin he puts on the ball to get it where it's going. When he has taken a hundred shots from one range, he develops a muscle memory; his arms and hands do what they should do without his brain doing much interfering. When he takes hundreds of shots from all over the court, every day, for weeks on end, muscle memory guides all of his shots home. He doesn't have to think about much of anything consciously, because his body is doing it - and to some extent his brain as well - on auto-pilot. Eventually you'll see that reads in poker is a lot like this, but it's all brain activity instead of part brain, part muscle.)

[bigred]

I think a little poker psychology and experience are the two factors that result in good reads.

[Checkways]

If you understand standard moves/betting patterns for your typical player then you can determine what a person has based on how they deviate or don't deviate from that pattern.

Also, it's about starting from the beginning. Look at postion, preflop action, your image, etc. It's very difficult to get a stone cold read on the flop unless there was some raising preflop. You'll usually need the turn and the river to help you out.

My suggestion would be to first study your own betting patterns, figure out what kind of player you are, and see how others differ from you. This is something that I'm sure you've already done, but by looking at this from the standpoint of understanding others, it helps.

[Miffed22001]

If you understand standard moves/betting patterns for your typical player then you can determine what a person has based on how they deviate or don't deviate from that pattern.

Also, it's about starting from the beginning. Look at postion, preflop action, your image, etc. It's very difficult to get a stone cold read on the flop unless there was some raising preflop. You'll usually need the turn and the river to help you out.

My suggestion would be to first study your own betting patterns, figure out what kind of player you are, and see how others differ from you. This is something that I'm sure you've already done, but by looking at this from the standpoint of understanding others, it helps.

There is definatly truth in this. I think many people believe that reading is some magical skill that is developed when really its about understanding how every and any hand can be played from anywhere. Any adice onthis must consist of learning how toplay any hand whether it be a set a flush draw open ender etc. Once you figure out how people can play those hands and add this to the information you gain about players tyles at the table (table image) then you have the equipment to read a player imo

[thirteen]

I started as a very 'reads' oriented player. I knew little of poker and all i had going for me was that i'm generally pretty perceptive.

When I started incorporating other things into my game, like odds and position and such, I payed less attention to the player and more to my game.

now that I've incorporated the other factors into my arsenal, I made a conscious decision last month to get back to making solid reads, and honing those skills. At first I seemed to be (for lack of a better term) forcing reads. Consciously looking for very specific things and over analyzing them. I would then talk myself into or out of bets/folds and be badly mistaken. I'd get frustrated saying, "but i had a read"... I then remembered that most of my good reads in the past appeared to be mostly 'instinct'(i use this term loosely and will qualify it) through observation.

Basically, I think there are two types of poker players. Those who make conscious reads on opponents based on specific observations. They can usually tell you exactly what they saw that gave them the read.

Ex. UTG took 10 seconds to decide to raise, last time he did that he had he had a junk hand but this time he raised less. He's also pretty tight and likes action on good hands, so a small raise likely means a good hand. I'm folding this one.


The second type, of which i think i belong, are those who make 'unconscious' or 'instinctual' reads. You don't have to define each move your opponent makes, just observe (always observe, distraction will cost you information). When you come to a decision, you'll have a feeling about the situation based on what you observed. You may not know why, but you just know.

Ex. Last night i was playing in a SnG, blinds at 50/100 level. With 4 of us in the pot its gets checked around to the button to an aggressive player i've been observing closely. He pushes all-in very quickly. He hasn't shown down a hand but has taken down a couple pots. I'm in early position, flopped middle pair w/ top kicker, normally an instant fold to a push. I played extremely tight up to this point, only showing down one strong hand. I quickly move all in over the top to isolate. The two others quickly fold and the original raiser shows nothing, my middle pair holds up and puts me in the chip lead.

How did I know? After all I haven't seen him turn over a hand yet? It may have been the quick all-in move on the button against what he know where tight opponents. I'm not sure. I folded a hand to the guy earlier when he raised my top pair on the flop and I felt I was beat. I had observed him closely and when he pushed the first that came to me was.. I'm ahead, i know it, but will it hold up? The only other 'conscious' thought i had was that I knew other two in the pot, both weak/tight would fold instantly.

So, for me if I'm taking notes and consciously telling myself to remember certain aspects of a persons play. I wind up making bad decisions against my instinct. I may talk myself into folding to a tight player when, something 'unconsciously' tells me he's on a steal and just using his table image. I find that if my 'gut' reaction feels strong, it's usually right.

I think you should determine what type of 'reader' you are and use it to the best of your ability.

I hope all this babbling made sense.

[storm75m]

1. - Nothing beats experience, it all eventually becomes second nature

2. - Think about the ENTIRE hand and situation, all action on all streets. (Even previous hands if you can)

3. - Completely put yourself in their shoes and ask a ton of questions to yourself. "If I was playing against me and I had this... would I have done this...."

4. - Trust your gut instict, you'll be surprised how often it is right. (Gut instict and "hope" are different, be able to recognize the difference)

5. - Recognize betting patterns. People rarely bet out large when flopping a monster. Recognize when someone wants you to fold, or when they want you to call, then dissapoint them.

6. - Be aware of your own image and the image of others, and how often this image changes. Use your own image to your advantage.

7. - If you're not multitabling take as many small notes as possible. "Value bet the nuts to the river... Re-raised flush draw..." Any small edge is helpful. (Note: I usually play 5 tables full ring, but when I'm playing 6Max I only play one, cause reads make up so much more of a shorthanded game.)

8. -Start trying to think three levels deep... "What does he think that I think that he has?"

9. - Find out where you stand by betting and raising. Stay aggressive, don't wait till the river to try and find out where you're at in the hand.

10. - It will all come in due time. Once you know what your opponent has, it's a different ball game, you're playing their cards, not yours.

[thirteen]

(Gut instict and "hope" are different, be able to recognize the difference)

Very, very good point and well said.

[Fnord]

www.poker-edge.com

[sejje]

I guess my problem is this:

Sometimes I have a read. But more often I have TPTK or some other medium strength hand, and my read is more like "my hand is best until proven otherwise." I bet the pot until someone plays back, then I make my read based on their raise. But until then I had no read.

Smoothcalling in position is easily the best way to extract money from me. Check-calling works almost as well, although I tend to check behind in NL with TPTK (which the past couple nights has cost me a bit) or two-pair on a scary board.

[fender55]

I tend to be a note taker. When I'm playing an SNG, I'll write down who wins which hand and if its show down, what they had and what they were called down with by the loser. I have my own sort of short hand for this and so far it seems to work for me.

People do usually bet pretty similarly in certain situations. If you know how 1 of the players has played the first 20 minutes, he'll probably do much the same things the next 20 minutes unless he's being conscious of his bets.

I don't yet have great reads and have to talk myself in to decisions sometimes, but usually through consulting my notes and my gut I make the right decisions. Not always though...

Some great players through a lot of practice and ability can jsut recognize bets. That's a top pair bet, that's a semi bluff on a draw, that's a hidden hand that you really want me to call, kind of bet. Can't wait till that's me.