Going Live

Playing poker used to mean going to a casino or cardroom and sitting down with a bunch of grizzled regulars who looked like they were glued to the furniture. It meant enduring bad playing conditions, intimidation and the odd horrendous smell. More than that, though, it meant having to sit at a table exposed to the world – worrying about every bit of information you gave off, or desperately trying not to flinch as you stared down the local champ after making a big all-in bluff.

But then online poker came along and everything changed. Suddenly you could dance around the room when you hit the nuts and no one could tell, or close your eyes and plead with some guy on the other side of the world to fold, fold, fold…

The only problem with this revolution, of course, is that because a whole generation has been weaned on the online game, nowadays the vast majority of people – including many of you reading this – have rarely or never played live.

Elementary mistakes

In my poker career, however, it was the other way round. I learned how to play live first, when internet poker was in its infancy, and then discovered the online game. Nowadays, though, it’s far more common for online players to get the urge to turn off their computers and try their hand in the live arena. This, however, is not an easy transition, as players of all abilities have found out. In fact, when commentating on European Poker Tour events I’ve seen numerous excellent poker players make basic mistakes, like giving off obvious tells, using the wrong colour chips and so on.

For a while the internet generation tried to argue that there was no real difference between playing online and live. And to some extent this is true – after all, poker is the same game whether you can pick the cards up or just see them on a screen. However, though some internet pros have had great live success, the established pros have more than held their own, as witnessed at last year’s World Series of Poker. So it would seem that it isn’t as simple as live poker being the same game.

Telltale signs

The most obvious difference about playing live is the extra visual information on offer. Because you can see your opponents and vice versa, it’s possible to glean a lot of physical information from players at your table and use it to your advantage.

Physical ‘tells’, as they’re often called, got a bad rap a few years ago, when the internet generation first hit the real-world cardrooms. Online players insisted that compared to fundamentals such as bet sizing and maths, physical signals were far less important. Now, however, it’s generally agreed that live pros have an edge because of the extra information they get, especially from weaker players. In fact, the more accomplished live players who were previously internet phenoms have now embraced this aspect of the live game. Kevin ‘BeLOWaBOVe’ Saul, for one, cited a live tell for making a big call in the recent PokerStars Caribbean Adventure.

If you’re planning on making your first foray into live play you should definitely study the theory of tells first (see the books, right, for a good starting point), as well as specifically watching the action to pick up information. After all, poker’s a game of information and any edge you can get is an advantage.

Your own worst enemy

While it’s great to pick up information on your opponents, they’re also watching you like hawks for physical signals. In some ways this is a bigger problem for players moving into the live arena. Sitting in front of your monitor at home you can stretch out, scratch, give players the finger and so on, and it has almost no bearing on your results. Try the same in a live game and you’ll give off a lot of information and possibly be asked to politely leave.

The problem with trying not to give off tells is that many are subconscious and hard to eliminate. Some of the best online players have struggled with this, and experienced live pros will snigger quietly at the online superstar who always breaks his chips the same way when he’s strong and differently when he’s weak.

The key to not giving off information is to have a consistent betting and playing routine. Some ‘online’ players such as Annette ‘Annette_15’ Obrestad and Bertrand ‘ElkY’ Grospellier have mastered this by simply betting and then staring at the middle of the table, completely shutting down to the outside world.

If you’re a casual player you may not need to go this far, but try to keep your betting action consistent and stare straight ahead. And no matter how much someone goads you, try to avoid any kind of talk during a hand – you’ll often give the game away without even knowing it.

Etiquette

One of the major differences between online and live play is the physical action of betting, which can broadly be termed ‘etiquette’. It’s important that you don’t feel bad if you make mistakes when you start playing live – everyone was a novice once and even experienced pros make dumb mistakes with poker etiquette.

The good news is that most errors can be eliminated with two key steps – announcing your intention to the dealer and taking time over your decisions and bets. Announcing your bets can seem amateurish, but it completely protects you against chip-handling errors. There isn’t a live player on the planet who hasn’t made the mistake of tossing in a big chip and not announcing ‘raise’, meaning the bet just counts as a call. Meanwhile, taking your time to think about your bet should ensure you make good decisions and don’t do dumb things like push in the wrong colour chips. After all, one big advantage live play offers is that you get more time to make a decision, so you might as well use it.

How the games play

One thing you’ll notice when you start playing in a casino is that the way people play differs noticeably from a typical online game. In very general terms players tend to call more online. This is because it’s much easier to do – clicking a button as opposed to moving chips into the middle – and also because it’s much easier to be wrong online than it is in a roomful of strangers. This factor also means players are a bit less aggressive live than they are online, because no one wants to turn over 7-2 offsuit having been caught bluffing. Like a lot of things in life it’s a lot less embarrassing when you’re at home on your own.

There are also some differences in the skill level of games. When it comes to cash games, for instance, it’s generally true that the standard of play is significantly lower live than online. It’s hard to measure it exactly but live games will often play as much as three or four limits below an online game. By that I mean a live $ 10/$ 20 no-limit Hold’em game might play like a tough $ 1/$ 2 table online. There are some obvious reasons for this. In Las Vegas the lowest no-limit Hold’em cash game you’ll find is generally $ 1/$ 2 no-limit, whereas online you can play as low as $ 0.01/$ 0.02. Also, live cash games tend to be much softer because there are less live pros; most people playing poker for a career will be online where they can get in far more hands and turn a bigger profit.

As a result the live games are usually weaker, with less preflop raising and re-raising (although the opening raises will be bigger), and much more passive play after the flop. The exception to this is ‘the maniac’ who seems to populate live games more so than online cash games. A lot of this is because gamblers are drawn from other parts of the casino to play (especially the bar) , and this happens a lot less online.

Wot no Poker Tracker?

One pretty major drawback of live play is that you have to rely on your own reads and observe the action more carefully, because you can’t just flick on your poker heads-up display to show the other players’ stats! Therefore it’s important to pay a lot more attention to pots you’re not involved in than it is online, as you are the only source to record information.

A lot of these points are also true for playing live tournaments, though the drop in standard here may be less noticeable as online tournaments tend to be populated by weaker players than their cash game counterparts. Another factor to consider is that you’ll have to play much faster in most low stakes live tournaments, as you’ll see far fewer hands per blind level than you would online and will come under pressure from the blinds far sooner.

One final thing to think about, that you won’t find sitting at home playing online, is the human element of the game. When playing in a live cardroom it’s easy to feel intimidated – in fact, many experienced live players will try their best to get under your skin and make you feel small and threatened. This might not affect everyone in every cardroom, but if you’re just starting to play live it can be unnerving, especially if there’s a bit of chat at the table. If you feel this way just remember that despite the differences it’s still the same game and that no matter how comfortable or scary your opponents are, they only get dealt two cards, exactly the same as you. Play your game and make good poker decisions, just as you (hopefully) do online.

It’s also really important never to take anything that happens at the poker table too personally. Disputes and tilt issues seem to affect players much more easily in a live setting than online, as you can see your opponents and they can see you. Of course, the key to not succumbing to this is to get your head down and ignore the banter. Play good poker, let other players tilt, and focus on taking their money.