Deception

          Would I lie to you?
          Would I lie to you honey?
          Now would I say something that wasn't true?       The Eurythmics

   As we all know, deception plays an important role in the game of poker. In the game itself you can gain an edge over your opponents by disguising the strength of your hand. If you have a strong hand you want others to believe that you are weak so you can lure them into the pot. And if your holdings are weak, the only way you're going to win the pot is if you make the others believe that you have a monster hand.
   Of course, at the lower levels of the game, a lot of players are fairly transparent. Typically they will check or call with drawing hands and bet out when they hit something good. I've been playing at this level long enough to know that when a player calls your big bets to the turn and then decides to put in a big bet when a possible flush or obvious straight appears, they've almost certainly hit the hand that they were chasing. OK, so it's always possible that they're just representing a big hand, but most of the time it's not a bluff (I've called enough of these kinds of bets to know). But the thing that really mystifies me is the kind of player who pushes all-in when they hit their monster hand. I just don't get this. Surely the best strategy is to put in a smallish bet that might win you a few more chips. What's the point of chasing that big hand if you just scare off all the callers when you finally hit it? In other words, a certain amount of subtlety is required if you're going fishing.
   As for bluffing, that can be a bit of a problem at the lower levels. As the old saying goes, 'you can't bluff a donkey'. However, very passive players CAN be bluffed out of a pot with a little perseverance, provided that the conditions are right. Even the most passive player, after first checking, will think twice about calling a big bet when a scare card hits the board. The trick is to not do it too often and to avoid trying to bluff a group of 'fishy' players. Like they say, 'you can't bluff the table'. However, trying to represent a big hand when someone has hit the board can get pretty expensive. That's just one of the reasons why position is so important.

  This is a basic part of any poker game but at another level you have table image. The number of times a player raises, the number of hands they play, the types of hand they play; all this goes to create a particular pattern of play. Although a lot of players pay little or no attention to this sort of thing and just play their hands, there are players around in low level games who take note of the way others are playing. This seems to be especially true in live games where people tend to play each other on a regular basis and get to know each other's games. I've found that my playing style in the weekly tournaments helps to maintain a certain level of deception. I usually play tight in the early stages, and I am usually showing down big hands. I keep bluffing to a minimum and on the occasion when everyone folds to my big bet when I have a monster, I'll sometimes show it, just to maintain the image. Then, when I start to loosen up in the later stages, people are more likely to believe that I have it when I bet big, even if I don't.
   Some of the articles I've read have suggested that the way a player dresses and behaves, even the way that they stack their chips, can offer clues to their playing styles. Personally I think that is taking things a bit far, although I think that the amount a player is drinking might well be a useful clue to how loose and/or reckless they might be. But some players are actually keen to tell you about their playing styles or to share their poker philosophy. While rank amateurs are easy enough to spot, there are many other more experienced players who will go out of their way to demonstrate how much knowledge they have of the game, analyse and discuss hands that have been played and generally give you a good idea of their level of experience. This can be quite useful information.
   On the flip side of this, I've found myself being very careful about the amount of information I volunteer since I started playing regular live games. I try to avoid talking about playing online, I avoid demonstrating knowledge of the finer points of the game, I never talk about pot odds or use poker jargon, and on occasion where there's been some dispute about a hand, I stay right out of it. In other words, I play dumb. The fact that I'm actually pretty clumsy when it comes to shuffling and still haven't figured out how to separate out side-pots helps to reinforce this general image.
   By contrast, there's a player in my regular live tournament who seems to be doing just the opposite. I'd only known this man for a short while when I heard him announce to the table that he was a professional poker player. Since then I've often  heard him give other players advise on how they should play, talk frequently about being given the odds to call, offer endless analysis both during and after his own and other people's hands, and crow about how good he is at the game. Now I don't know if this guy is in fact a professional player, but I seriously doubt it. For a start, what's he doing playing in a $20 tournament? But apart from this, would a professional really behave in this way, announcing to all and sundry the level of his poker expertise?
   You can't play with the same group of people on a regular basis and not come to know and like a good many of them, especially in a social environment like my regular Friday night tournament. But at the same time, I'm in the game to win it, and giving away too much information is likely to reduce my chances of achieving that. Everyone accepts lying as part and parcel of poker play. And I'm not actually lying to my fellow players about what I do or don't know; merely choosing to be economical about certain facts. When we play poker, we are expected to be deceptive. In the real world, we are expected to be truthful. The question is, where does the game end?