I'm aware of a few pros that have reputations for being extremely skilled at reading other players, like Phil Hellmuth and Daniel Negreanu.

But if I was looking for someone to emulate for being unreadable, who would it be?

Jamie Gold, as long as he's not saying top top

Being unreadable is not about emulating someone else.

You just develop habits and stick to them.

Look at your cards the same way every time.
Notice where your eyes go after looking to your cards, look at the same thing every time.
Move your hands at the same speed and in the same way.

Some of the easiest tells to spot are people who pull in their cards closer when they have a good hand and push their cards away a bit when they have a bad hand.

Just build consistency in everything you do at the table.
Look at the same things.
Keep your hands and legs in the same position.
Move your chips in the same way every time.
Look at your cards and protect them in the same way every time.
Put your cards in the same spot every time.
If you stare at other players, always do this, if you don't, never do it. Just pick a spot and stare at it, for me personally I stare at the chips in the middle.
Look at the board for the same amount of time in the same way.

Just sit still, move as little as possible.

And most importantly: DO NOT SPEAK
Don't ask questions, don't answer questions, you WILL give yourself away, no matter how good you are.
Though it won't matter against 99.9% of players in the world, since they won't be able to pick up on these things, unless you have very obvious tells.

As long as you're not doing anything really obvious, you'll be fine.
Get Reading Poker Tells by Zachary Elwood, or something similar and make sure you don't do any of the obvious stuff.

Never laugh or show any emotion when in a hand, don't talk, don't stare (or if you do, make sure you always do it, wouldn't recommend it though)

If you look relaxed when you have a strong hand and anxious when you have a weak hand, that's easy to spot.
If you get anxious, just always look anxious and don't do anything that makes you look comfortable when you have strong hands.

For me I used to talk and laugh when I had a strong hand, but was too afraid to do this when I was bluffing.
It's probably still pretty hard for the average player to pick this up, but some of the players paying attention will eventually pick up these easy tells.

Being aware of the most common tells will help you not to display them.

Reading a book on body language might help as well.
I've had a guy at my table who scratched his neck every time he had a weak hand ... easiest tell in the world to pick up when you know scratching your neck means you're unhappy with the situation.

Most pros on television aren't trying to be unreadable, they're just promoting themselves.
Daniel even said so in his masterclass I think, that a lot of the pros will have analyzed his videos and know his tendencies, so he just sits still and doesn't talk when playing though opponents.


Obviously this is all just while you're playing a hand once you've looked at your cards and shortly after the hand if you don't want to give anything away about what you had.
You can talk and laugh all you want, I even encourage you to do so, to keep the fish happy, when the hand is over.


There's very few people out there who can "soul-read" you.
I'm actually very good at this in daily life and I can't really get reads on people at the tables most of the time.

Only against very strong opponents is this something you need to really worry about.

The vast majority of easy to spot tells, especially in low stakes games, are actually bet sizing tells.

It's truly astonishing how many low stakes players give away their hand strength with their bet sizing and never change it up.

The very nature of your question underscores a flaw in your thinking. Being unreadable is not about mannerisms or physical tells, but about playing styles and ranges. Players who are unreadable (for example, like Tom Dwan or Gus Hansen in their prime) are so because they will play unconvetional starting hands in ways difficult to predict.

Emulating a known players style will allow an experienced player to figure you out pretty quickly.

Instead, you should look at it the following way
1. Do I play a straightforward style?
2. Is my range logically constructed?
3. Do I play the same way all the time?
4. Do I react in consistent manner to events (wins, losses, certain game or tournament situations)?

If the answer is yes, then you are readable. Instead, you should be trying to do the following
1. Play a mixed range of value, drawing, and bluff hands
2. Play the hands in your range the same regardless of whether they are value, drawing, or bluff hands (to a point)
3. Vary the way you play hands in your range (but not based on the hand, more based on external events or randomly. For example, 3 bets a certain percentage of hands in your range, flat call a certain percentage, but do not base the action primarily on the hand type)
4. Be aware of how your playing style tends to change based on external events, and compensate (either by not changing style, or 'faking' a change in style to decouple your actions with any predictive tells)

Now, this is all very dangerous, though, because a lot of patterns in poker are there because they are correct plays. Doing something like 3 betting a pure bluff hand just to keep your ranges and actions unreadable is hard to do, but necessary if you truly want to keep from being read.

Another thing to add for low stakes games: In games where half the players have no real understanding of relative hand strength, even solid reads become pretty useless in a lot of spots.

Example:
You call a flop bet and the turn brings in your straight but there's also a flush draw now. Villain bets, you raise and villain calls. River completes the flush and villain bets big into you.

First thought, there are basically no backdoor flushs in his range, easy call. Second thought, he looks extremely confident but he obviously might be able to fake that. Third thought, his sizing looks fancy and we have a read that fancy sizings mean strength. Not good. We call anyway and the guy proudly tables his flopped top set, ready to rake in the pot.

Yah it is a little irritating that weak players, despite being what we want, can show up with unlikely and illogical hands at showdown.

Not really, no

Even if you win the pot?

I still think the gold standard of live tells is Caro's book.

So I've played live poker...twice.

The first time I hadn't read his book, a few months ago.

The second time was three nights ago after reading it.

I felt like God had parted the clouds and given me the keys to the kingdom.

Some pretty good stuff here .. but it really comes back to you, not another Player.

The problem is, even if you played perfect GTO poker, your opponents are still working with a certain percentage of your varied plays. And even if they ignore pot odds they still have a decision to make .. "He has it 80% and he's bluffing 20%"

You can work on eliminating timing and bet sizing tells along with maintaining some balance between your strong hands and bluffs .. but unless you want to go full fledged 'high roller tournament player' style you just need to be you at the table. Now if you can find a Player whose style appears comfortable to how you 'feel' at the table, then try to watch some film on them.

Are you ready to say the loosey-goosey DNegs or Hansen were any less/more readable than the stoic Antonius/Ivey/Dwan? I don't think you can, but you can certainly decide whose personality better matches your natural being. How about Bonomo or Chidwick (or most of the Germans)? Are they unreadable because they are unconventional or does their unconventional play make them unreadable. chicken/egg IMO

It's very difficult for anyone to act unnaturally, the cracks are easier to see when you are uncomfortable.

If you read the Caro book .. and you can also look for Zach Elwood (Reading Poker Tells) who has a forum on this site .. you know that tells are just 'established' patterns based on 'data'. The more data you have, the more you can trust the tell/read. If you are playing against an unknown Player you can use 'all' of your previous experience to put their actions into the hopper and perhaps sway one of your actions either way. The more you play against a specific Player, then you develop a more specific pattern to work from which may or may not deviate from 'the norm'.

From your comment above, you already know that no matter how unreadable you are .. you still need the other Player to pick up on the (lack of) message. If you are up against a 'card' player, it wont matter what you do from a 'poker' sense. You may see that you need to change your approach to 'this' table since you're really just wasting your own efforts in a game where it's not a factor in opponent decision making.

One of the worst feelings in poker is 'I knew you were ... " Sometimes I say it just to say it to start turning the crank. And of course it's easy to say that after the cards are shown. (That's why you don't show!!).

I really enjoy the live side of the game .. don't over use them, but trusting one read in a session can turn it all around for you mentally. You may still lose the hand .. 44 v AK on 99J62 .. but you can now know that you knew they were weak and had the guts to make a call, eh? GL