note: I normally play limit, but dabble in NL here and there, but do not have probably more than 200-300 hours playing live NL life time.


So this hand gets to the river and seat 4 bets and after a few seconds of stalling/thinking female player in seat 5 verbally says raise.

This is a 2/5 NL game: before she even counts or says what her raise amount is, almost immediately seat 4 starts aggressively starts cutting out additional calling chips. Stacks where pretty even about 500 each pre and until this point I had not followed the action. It was 2 handed after the flop betting, and probably had 80 or so in the middle before seat 4's $45 river bet. Seat 5 obviously notices 4 grabbing more chips and then announces $200 on top.

My question is how often does this happen in live spots? Before this hand I thought the guy was competent player. This raise really perplexed him and he had to take a min or two before eventually making the crying call. I thought it was fairly evident that she bumped her raise after seeing seat 4 do this. She ended up hitting river for a straight * nut on the board", so pretty easy raise- I just don't think she planned on charging him that much till this move.

It got me wondering if its common for someone with position on river to announce raise just for situation vs players who could give off "tells" like this.I see spots like this in limit where players reach for their stacks before its action on them, etc... But I really think this guy cost him self a 100 or so being so blatant.

Is this common with live players that are new or just not aware ?

I come across this tell a little more than once in a while. It will depend on the type of game and limits you are playing. I think there are several variations. The first is when your opponent feels like they have the best hand and they are really gonna call no matter what you bet. This act is somewhat stubborn and shows lack of awareness. I like to over bet in this situation to make it look like a steal and I "want" them to fold. I will use hesitation in this spot. If you sell it correctly, they will pay you off. The second is when your opponent is weak and they are trying to get away cheap by touching their chips as if they are not folding, thus ,causing you to check. This is a tactic of a beginner who clearly doesn't have a game plan let alone the concept of a game plan. You can exploit this player a lot. But don't bluff too big, if you think it will take a big bluff, they usually have it and you will get caught. Finally is the opponent who reaches for their chips to get a tell from you. If they know you are capable of picking up on this, you might react by raising more which lets them know you are strong. Conversely, you might raise smaller or check which in turn, gives them the green light to be aggressive. If you are seamless in your actions, this player will become weary of you and you can now exploit a player who has shrunk to tight aggressive. Overall, to answer your question, live play is far more involved than online play because of the copious extraneous information available. These tells are the tip of the iceberg. Among the hundreds of thousands of players are varying degrees and combinations of: motivation, will, heart, experience, awareness, skill, and moods...and then there are the cards!

Yeah your second example is something I see all the time in Limit, and your right its a classic example given off by really weak players. It's probably one of the most trusted tells that these players give off.

I've got a suspicion that one of my tells is a timing issue. Do you think this is a more prevalent tell with the type of sample size I have, it's also something I also try to watch myself doing online too. I find sometimes depending on my current mind set or how deep into a session I get anxious.

I think there is just a lot of important things I could improve on with out getting into any strategy as far as ranges and such. Seeing this live really set off alarms, I've seen lots of body tells before but this just seem so blatant. It honestly didn't seem like something he was trying to reverse tell * she obv was holding the nuts, so she knew* that got me thinking if 1. I was doing anything that was in any way like this and 2. How common is it in games like 1/3 2/5 to find people doing things like this. I don't have poker buddy's so I'm sure this is something that maybe gets bounced around talking with friends.

In my experience, way more often than not the player who cuts out chips doesn't want to see a raise and tries to discourage the opponent from doing so.

In this example, since she already had announced raise, he might wanted to influence her to make it as small as possible. Apparently, that didn't work out for him. On top of that, he should have taken her clear hint that she is really strong and should have found a fold unless he had the second nuts.

It is very important to reflect on yourself and your behaviors if you want to be a better player. You probably don't see much self examination by the player types in the tells we were talking about. I think psychology plays an important role in reading players as well as improving yourself through things like anxiety. Anxiety is a biggie for me. I deal with varying degrees that affect my play in many ways. The important thing is to recognize it, then you can employ techniques to manage it. Some techniques I use are breathing and habit changes. I notice that when I am anxious I tend to stop breathing for short periods of a few seconds. I have read that this actually causes responses in the brain to perpetuate anxiety. I also take deep breaths when I feel the anxiety build up in the center of my chest. This technique is known to reset the Vegas nerve which is indirectly involved in mood regulation through breathing rhythm. The other technique I use to help with anxiety is habit changing. Take something that you do often. I'll use my phone as an example. I feel the need to check my phone often for email, social media, texts, phone calls, the time etc. I try to see how long I can go without looking at my phone. And ultimately see how long I can make the intervals at which I check my phone. This translates to poker perfectly because you are both focusing on a particular thing (phone-poker) while becoming comfortable with the time while you are not actually doing to those things.

Agree, she had also just seat changed from the 5/T- was never getting out of line in the time she was with us. After this hand seats 4/5 played one other fairly large pot and one medium, end result was seat 5 racking up little north of 1.5k in not much more than 1 hour in play. My initial read was way off on seat 4,unfortunately in my lone opportunity to play a large pot with him did not pan out when he finally finds a fold to my $200 river bet into 175ish with a set of 3's on a King high board calling me down till river . He was really upset he didn't get to see my hand when I would not show.

What really stood out in my mind after this hand was her verbalization on her river raise. Like I said I'm new at live NL, I don't know if this was a tactic in a attempt to see how he reacted to gauge how much she could get out of him? I thought there is probably a decent volume of less experienced players that give off dependable tells when faced with a raise after leading the river.

I normally let my action speak while playing live,verbalizing action less than 5% of the time. Got me thinking if I should mix this in at times while IP while HU? VS obv opponents that may give off tells, or would people get pissed and see this as a angle ?

Verbalizing your actions avoids misunderstandings and is therefore recommended if you feel comfortable doing so.

Sounds like a common, try to get a cheaper raise by acting like you'll call anything, and then psyching yourself out to "actually" calling off a huge raise when your action didn't have your intended effect.
See it all the time in lower limit games.

i would make the opposite adaptation and raise less. grabbing your chips in advance is a sign that they don't want to call.

The rules might say one has to verbally say bet or raise and the value, and only when it is his turn. But whatever, read the rules. One does not get a penalty from one mistake necessarily. I dont understand the chip thing, ur chips, ur hair.

You only have half the story here.
Grabbing chips ib advance doesn't mean they don't want to call, it means they want to get the next card/showdown cheaper.
By betting more, you can get people to make enormous mistakes as they psych themselves out.

Without getting too deep into the specific situation, I find that people who consciously posture with the chips when it is not their turn to act are trying to intimidate. On more than one occasion, I have naked bluffed when, right before I was going to fold, the other player shoved his stack forward as if to show how much he was willing to risk. It usually works.

It means they are trying to stop the bet. Incidentally women are more likely to call after threatening to call and men are more likely to fold.

Basically saying almost the same thing except it seems better to overbet rather than underbet in these cases. Just different style.