Online Tells

[brentlip]

Does anyone have any tells? For example, when a player waits a long time and then bets or raises, he usually has a good hand right.

What about when they use the fast play buttons?

[bennyhana]

ummm, no.

bet your good hands, fold your bad ones.

[brentlip]

Don't you think some are worth enough +EV to be worth learning?

[Zilarik]

The pause usually doesn't mean a whole lot. The only thing it might tell you is that they care enough about their hand to think about it.

Of course, some sites like wpex are so laggy that you might see a 5 second pause regardless of what the villian is doing..

[onthebutton]

Using time to evaluate an opponent's strength is a bad idea, IMHO. Lots of players multi-table, which sometimes leads to delayed decisions.

[00Snitch]

i have lots of tells online. pauses specifically tell me a few things:

1) they are playing 16 tables
2) they are lagging
3) they are thinking
4) they went out for a smoke and forgot to press the "sit out" button
5) they are distracted by their cat chasing their budgie around the appartment
6) they love being a knob who waits for ages before folding, just to [censored] the other players

[milesdyson]

timing tells are the only ones that matter, but they vary wildly. play enough and you'll figure them out if you have good intuition. certainly there are times when you take longer to make decisions at the poker tables. try to catch yourself doing this, and see what it means when you take longer than normal.

in very very general terms when you're heads up, in-tempo betting or raising is going to mean a strong hand. im not talking insta-betting or raising (which could mean a very strong or weak hand), i mean about 0.25 to 0.5 seconds for every move. clearly deliberate.

the other one is the check, HMM, raise tell. believe it or not most players dont play 4+ tables at a time. sure they might be web browsing or whatever, but most players are paying attention when they're playing. it seems that if the time between your bet and their raise is somewhere in the neighborhood of 2-4 seconds, that there is a higher chance of it being an impulse bluff. once the time goes beyond 5 seconds or so, it is unlikely to really mean anything. but between 2-4 seconds or so, it is often that the guy checks intending to fold with his nothing, but then reconsiders quickly. and then decides to raise.

anyway, those are two i pretty much firmly believe now.

[Ignignokt]

I would agree with Miles, especially about the intuition. A pause can be a great tell, but a pause in isolation means nothing. I pause a lot, and usually it just means I wanted to see the TV replay of the Italian soccer player diving.

[Bilgefisher]

I pause for a few seconds now and then intentially. For the reason that some feel its a tell. Since alot of poker players make the split sec. coin toss decisions, I feel it throws them off balance just a little bit.
Hey I'm a newbie and most likely full of it, but thats what I noticed.

[bennyhana]

[ QUOTE ]
timing tells are the only ones that matter, but they vary wildly. play enough and you'll figure them out if you have good intuition. certainly there are times when you take longer to make decisions at the poker tables. try to catch yourself doing this, and see what it means when you take longer than normal.

in very very general terms when you're heads up, in-tempo betting or raising is going to mean a strong hand. im not talking insta-betting or raising (which could mean a very strong or weak hand), i mean about 0.25 to 0.5 seconds for every move. clearly deliberate.

the other one is the check, HMM, raise tell. believe it or not most players dont play 4+ tables at a time. sure they might be web browsing or whatever, but most players are paying attention when they're playing. it seems that if the time between your bet and their raise is somewhere in the neighborhood of 2-4 seconds, that there is a higher chance of it being an impulse bluff. once the time goes beyond 5 seconds or so, it is unlikely to really mean anything. but between 2-4 seconds or so, it is often that the guy checks intending to fold with his nothing, but then reconsiders quickly. and then decides to raise.

anyway, those are two i pretty much firmly believe now.

[/ QUOTE ]

so do you have a special watch you use for these times, or do you trust the timer at the often accused of being rigged poker site?

see, i think the poker sites delay their timers so people will think others are bluffing and pay them off, when they actually have a good hand, therefore increasing pot sizes, and increasing rake. so, if you are using that method, you might want to invest in a good stopwatch. I think timex or armitron would do, though i have no experience with either.