Tuesday, December 14, 2010

Online Poker Tips - Analyze the Thinking Time

When you are an online poker player, then you surely know that it is not so easy to get a read on the other players. There is no longer the classic signs, such as blinking, where you could see a bad hand of the enemy. In this article you can learn how to analyze the time every player takes for consideration before making a move. 
What is the thinking time in online poker? When making a move, each player has some time before he must make a decision. Waiting too long causes his hand to be automatically folded. Don't worry - the time given by the computer in all poker rooms is so high that you can make the right decisions. However, there is always tricky situations where people need it a little bit longer. In particularly difficult situations, a player may even request some extra time. But how can you draw conclusions on the playing styles of other players by the time they take to consider their next move? As soon as you sit at a table, you should focus on studying the different strategies of the players and always have a look at how fast they are with their decisions. This is not always easy and not even possible for some players, but there is certainly a chance to find a weakness in their game and use it to your advantage. It is especially important that you always take a look at the speed of operations. You can clearly notice that some players play much more slowly when they have a bad hand. If you have found such a read once, it could become very profitable to play against that kind of player. But be careful! It is not always the case, and each player has a different technique and approach. It could also be that a player deliberately plays slow, to make you get the wrong impression about how strong his hand is. Therefore, it is always important to observe the time of the opponent for a longer period and find out if they deliberately use the time to lure other players into the trap. You can also use the thinking time to your own advantage. Even when you are bluffing, if you play a very fast game it would be interpreted as a signal that you have a strong hand and you are confident of winning the pot. Of course you should use that kind of strategy with extreme caution. Not every player can easy get bluffed, therefore you should choose the situations carefully. 
As you see with some practice, analyzing the thinking time could be very helpful when making a decision whether to call or fold a certain hand. Of course this is only one factor. It must be considered in combination with other factors and never be observed as a single.

3 comments:

  1. Good point. Keep in mind that no matter how many poker tips you get, the best way to improve your skills is to always practice.

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  2. I should learn how to play poker for beginners. I feel like it can enhance my thinking a lot because this is indeed a thinking game and requires some strategy too in tricking your opponent.

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  3. It seems that most tutorials for learning poker online (and offline) seem to focus on the thinking time as a part of the "reading your enemy" tactic. Just goes to show how much of a thinking game poker is.

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