The Poker Player’s Manifesto: Part XVI - Know Your Enemy

Poker is a game of people, and people have trust issues. Well, most of them. Some of them are downright gullible and will believe anything you tell them. Sometimes, somebody who usually has trust issues will believe anything you tell them. As we head into our eighth month of this series and sixteen thousandth word, we finally reach the core of what poker is all about—People. We spend so much time talking about the mechanics of poker, its mathematical fundamentals, and controlling the only thing we can control, our decision making process. We as poker academia largely ignore the variable that is our opponent though, and I have heard many successful colleagues basically ignore the idea of tells. Let’s spend some time examining that variable we so often call Villain and how best to control our decisions while considering the conditional probability that comes from human-powered opponents.

“It is said that if you know your enemies and know yourself, you will not be imperiled in a hundred battles; if you do not know your enemies but know yourself, you will win one and lose one; if you do not know your enemies nor yourself, you will be imperiled in every single battle.” – Sun Tzu, The Art of War

It’s awfully difficult to know your enemy in poker. Not only is it difficult to understand the way that other people think since people are changing their minds all the time. People are also moody, and their outlook and strategy can swing greatly over time and battles. A player winning more hands than they usually do will often adjust by attacking more than they usually would. A player who is typically conservative may go berserk in a state of panic after losing many chips.

I like to imagine what the CIA’s database must look like. We as poker players should have a similar file cabinet on our opponents. Every single piece of information we have on every single poker player should be written down and stored in that file cabinet. Sometimes I’ll put Post-It notes on the file cabinet, reminding me of things like an opponent being drunk, tilted, winning, or recently divorced. Then, when I am going into conflict with an opponent, I have data on them and that data will help me make more educated decisions in the battle ahead.

These file folders start empty. In poker though, I am a firm believer in stereotypes, so while a folder may be empty, that doesn’t mean that is devoid of information. Stereotypes are taboo and a problem because people stick with them, ignoring new information. In poker, however, there is no better place to start, because in poker we are dealing with ranges. The Asian guy at The Commerce is usually going to play differently than the grandma at Canterbury Park in Minnesota. Usually. There are no racial undertones here from my perspective whatsoever, I am simply using the observations I have made over the years to get a head start on knowing my enemy. If I keep folding to the grandma’s three-bet and calling the Asian guy’s value bets, then I am doing it wrong. Every poker player is unique and dynamic, but starting from somewhere is better than starting with a blank canvas.

Many years ago, Daniel Negreanu wrote in this magazine a handful of columns about the way people typically play regionally. I was tempted to do that but I feel a little out of touch these days, and the last time I felt on top of things, I would have still agreed with most of those old articles.

I believe region supercedes age, gender, or race when assigning values to the unknown poker player. At this point, all poker rooms are dominated by locals, and without internet poker to commingle styles anymore, I am seeing each region develop its own character. California is still crazy. Arizona remains as eccentric as the golf carts they drive around. Vegas is still tough, because the locals that make it are solid, and the new kids are talented. I feel like Reno and Tahoe have been adopted by Oregon and Washington, who have consequently been adopted by Canada, who also scooped up Minnesota in the creation of the chillest poker players ever, Team Up Here We Play Nice. Colorado nearly got drug into that team, but like Coloradans’ home state, they haven’t cared about what the rest of the country has done since 1876. Heading South and East you’ll find all sorts of characters, but most of them hate money, because the love of money is the root of all evil. The seven states that I have not played poker in all lie in that corner called New England, however, I assume they play like they play at the Borgata. Atlantic City is like Los Angeles, just East Coast crazy instead of West Coast crazy. Last time I caught a cab from Philly to AC, I helped my cabbie flip off other drivers for the next hour. That’s kinda how they play poker there too.

Poker is a cultural melting pot in all regions. People have many different perspectives on life and thus on the game of poker, so we should constantly be evaluating how our opponents perceive the game of poker. Starting with regional styles, we can apply some assumption to how an opponent thinks about poker based on variables such as age, gender, race, appearance, friends, and comfortability at the table. It is important with all of these conditional probabilities we retain the word usually, as in, “usually the young kid will bluff more than the old lady.” Usually.

It is most important to take notes on things that specifically deviate from our perspective of the norm. If we catch the old lady bluffing, that’s a significant note. If we never see the kid bluff, that’s a note too. After enough hands with an opponent, our file should be so full of actual concrete observations that those hand histories will be what form our stereotype on that player. Eventually we want to go from “old lady in Minnesota, probably not bluffing” to “this lady is insane based on these hands” or “this lady is tight based on these hands” or “this lady is looser than we might expect based on this hand, but she’s had it every other time.” We should be constantly adding relevant data to file on our enemies, forever, so that in whatever battle we may face, we will always know our enemy to the best of our ability. ♠

Bryan Devonshire has been a professional poker player for nearly a decade and has more than $2 million in tournament earnings. Follow him on Twitter @devopoker.