Playing by "Feel" - Is Instinct a Valid Tool?

[TomBrooks]

For Online Play.

When making a poker decision, how much weight do you sometimes give to a "feeling" of what your opponent has? Lets say you've been watch a particular opponent play certain hands, make certain bets, call and fold at certain times. You see his stats. You've been trying to read his hands. You might consider what you think he thinks you have. You may weigh your table image into the equation.

Your logical mind will then weigh some or all and perhaps other similar factors and come up with the best decision it can based on the logic and the odds etc.

Your subconscious mind may also have an opinion. You may have a "gut feeling" about what a Villain has or how he will react to a particular action you may take. How much weight might you give to these instincts? Do you let it sway you when a decision is close? Will you sometimes give it a lot of weight?

Have you found that sometimes your instincts are working good and sometimes not so well? Have you found any times when you just seem to practically "know" what your opponent has, and your feelings have been largely correct?

How valid or valuable can a gut feeling or an instinctive decision be?

[bobbyi]

Your subconscious mind often picks up on things that you don't notice or realize consciously. So yes, a "feeling" can sometimes have value. For example, when you really feel that someone is bluffing it can be because there is something "off" about the way the play the hand compared to how you think they would really play a strong hand, even though you have trouble putting your finger on what it is.

The problem is that this can also be a way to rationalize making bad plays. People will convince themselves they have a feeling the guy is bluffing just because they don't want to fold. You must have the discipline not to do this or to recognize when you are and understand what is happening.

[WhoIam]

[ QUOTE ]

How valid or valuable can a gut feeling or an instinctive decision be?

[/ QUOTE ]
The answer is the same as for live play--it depends. If your instincts are generally reliable (i.e. you make more money in questionable situations using your instincts than you lose), than use them. If you've found them to be unreliable, then just use proper strategy using quantifiable things like betting tendencies. A lot of poker authors place a lot of emphasis on going with their "gut instinct," but they were lucky enough to be born with a poker pro's intuiton.
Your intuition is used the same way as tells--only in close situations. Just because you have a feeling doesn't mean you should play bad poker or deviate significantly from your normal line. I play NL and will often face an all-in in a situation where I have no idea if my hand is best or not based on how the hand was played. In these situations I mostly go by feel and when I call I have a winning ratio of 2-or 3/1.

This probably doesn't apply to you, but a lot of people seem to think that poker intuition = esp. Don't call with poor odds because you "know" your draw will come in. Intuition is just a non-conscious part of your mind picking up patterns. For example, if you "know" someone is lying, it would be possible to look at a videotape of them and consciously analyze all their non-verbal cues and come up with the same situation. The conscious mind just doesn't process information as quickly.

[Felipe]

What funny is when you get to show down, and you show your Aces full of Kings and your opponent goes "I KNEW it!! I just knew it!!!" with disgust. If he knew, why did he call to the river? Having insticts and awareness of them is one thing; trusting your instincts and acting upon them is another.

Humans (luckily) are not robots, and the best robots cannot beat a human at poker (i assume?). Having and listening to instincts, utilising your psychology, and understanding the psychology of your opponenents can help in your winrate.

[Felipe]

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The conscious mind just doesn't process information as quickly.

[/ QUOTE ]Do you think the unconsious part of the mind processes information more quckly than the consious part of the mind?

[henrikrh]

On feel today I managed to put 3 players in a very large pot on almost excact hands. The flop had been JJK, turn was an Ace and put two hearts up. I put one person on trip jacks, the other on just and ace and the third on the flop draw. Each player I put on a hand had just that. Got me thinking about 'feelings' and they seem to be a valid tool. Just don't let them convince you to make calls you shouldn't in order to try and catch a bluffer, that can go wrong.

[WhoIam]

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Do you think the unconsious part of the mind processes information more quckly than the consious part of the mind?

[/ QUOTE ]
Yes, once the unconscious mind learns to do something, it is much better at it than the consciouss mind. Driving is a great example of this. Rememember how overwhelming it was when you first learned to drive and had focus on every little task? Now you only think about driving when something unusual happens and can do it while listening to the radio, talking to passengers, and eating a cheeseburger. Same thing with playing sports.

[pokernicus]

[ QUOTE ]
What funny is when you get to show down, and you show your Aces full of Kings and your opponent goes "I KNEW it!! I just knew it!!!" with disgust. If he knew, why did he call to the river? Having insticts and awareness of them is one thing; trusting your instincts and acting upon them is another.


[/ QUOTE ]

I think that in these situations what actually happens is that your opponent (subconsciously) puts you on a range of hands, of which he can beat some and lose to some (or maybe just one), and (subconsciously) assigns a probability to each hand. He calls if it's +EV to call assuming this distribution.

You happen to show him the (unlikely) hand that beats him. When he says "I knew it" what he's probably saying is that "I knew this was a hand you could have had that would beat me. But, I thought it was more likely that you didn't have it (or that the pot size justified the risk of my calling without the nuts)."

Of course he may be steaming at this point and may not care to elaborate on the nuances of his statement in the chat window. /images/graemlins/smile.gif

[BarronVangorToth]

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How valid or valuable can a gut feeling or an instinctive decision be?

[/ QUOTE ]


blink

[Felipe]

:pokernicus:

nice reply /images/graemlins/laugh.gif I like the analysis, and I think I've understood.

:BarronVangorToth:
what were you trying to convey? "blink"?

[daveT]

I think that after a while, instinct should take over when you are at the card table. I think that this is especially true at live games, where the pot is not printed on the screnn, and the timing of your bets, raises and folds have to be fairly consistent, so that you do not show the power of your hand, since you are not able to press "autobet" or blame a slow bet/call on your modem.

In that way, instinct is a valid tool. But it is good to not get carried away with it. Once a week, I make a conscious effort to track the size of every single pot played, regardless if I play in it or not.

It also helps to
1- learn and do the math of several plays so that you will not have to think about it

2- think about the game while you are not at the table, so the plays can be made quickly (instictually).

3- remember that the majority of your plays are marginal, and that is where the good players seperate themselves from the bad, and I believe that instincts play a large part of this.

[CallYNotRaise06]

I go with my "feel when its just a really close decision between choice A and B. If i think its 50/50 to call or fold, i just go with my gut. its suprisingly accurate when its true gut.

[Supersetoy]

[ QUOTE ]
:pokernicus:

nice reply /images/graemlins/laugh.gif I like the analysis, and I think I've understood.

:BarronVangorToth:
what were you trying to convey? "blink"?

[/ QUOTE ]

Blink (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0316172324/qid=1136942913/sr=8-1/ref=pd_bbs_1/102-5779160-0402568?n=507846&s=books&v=glance)

I read it. Thought it was pretty good.

[Shaman]

Blink is a very good book that shows the upside and downside of "thin slicing", that is, making intuitive decisions and judgements very rapidly. The problem is it does not teach you HOW to do it. But these two books do teach you exactly how to do it:

Flow (http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/0060920432/ref=sib_dp_pt/103-8122430-9681462#reader-link)

User's Manual (http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/1899836322/ref=sib_rdr_fc/103-8122430-9681462?%5Fencoding=UTF8&p=S001&j=0#reader-page)