The Rhythm of the Game

To me poker has always been like dancing. It's a rhythm thing. Sometimes you're out of sync with the beat and no matter what you do it comes out all wrong. At other times you are in the groove of the game and you just can do no wrong. But like in dancing, one thing is certain- if you have to count to find the rhythm while at the dance floor you will end up stepping on her toes all the time. Finding the pulse of the game is not something that is easy to learn. As a matter of fact it is all about knowing all the technical stuff, and then being able to forget all about it while playing. Often when you're out of sync, you'll find yourself trying too hard.

Different game types have different rhythms. And sometime the same game change rhythm as players tilt or catch a rush, or when some players start to adapt to other players tilting and rushing. And it is your job to observe when the DJ puts on a new record. If you keep on dancing to the previous song, you will soon find yourself offbeat.

Paradoxically, luck plays a major role in the rhythm of the game. The hourly swings of a winning player are often of a magnitude ten times higher then his hourly rate. Whereas the skill component is often made up of a value bet here and a saved call there, it is the big pots that make up the majority part of the short term swings. And as big pots usually involve at least two players holding strong hands, these pots often play out identical no matter who holds which of the two strong hands. Big pots usually don't come up all that often, so often you'll have to wait for hours to make or break the hand that make a break even session to a winning one. Sometimes that won't happen and sometimes you'll lose the big hand. The huge pots are the base drum in the rhythm. They strongly affect your assessment of how you're doing. It also affects how your opponents view your performance. When you've gotten used to a rhythm you've come to accept that you'll have to wait a certain amount of time before a big pot is due. You keep your calm until the day where all of a sudden it's long overdue since you were the one hauling in a big one. Then you feel out of tune, and in the search for a rhythm you lose the one you've got. At other times you catch a rush and hit several big pots in a hurry. This can go on for days, and sometimes for weeks. But when you get used to this new faster pace, it will disappear some day. And you're out of sync again.

Different games have different rhythms. In general, the rhythm has two dimensions; frequency and amplitude. The frequency is mostly determined by luck. Some periods you will win a bunch of big pots in a hurry. Other periods you will win none, either because your hands don't hold up, or because you get no action on them. The amplitude is about how often the pots get big and this is generally dependent on the looseness and the aggression of the game (the number of players in the pot times the number of bets they put in). In loose passive games, you will not win many pots but often those you win will be monsters. You will also lose big pots that you feel you should have won (suckouts). But it doesn't cost you all that much as many players besides you contribute to make the pot big. So these games have a relatively slow pace with some huge swings. Another thing that will increase the magnitude of the swings is the presence of very aggressive players. These will boost the average pot size, making the pots you win (and lose) bigger. When you're not used to this, you will often feel desperately stuck very quickly. Tight passive games involve winning lots of small pots, and staying out of trouble when opponents play back at you. And tight aggressive games are a mixture between the two. Shorthanded games shorten the time between the swings.

Most of you should know the feeling of being in sync with the rhythm of the game, as well as the opposite feeling. But are you also good at adjusting to a changing pace of the game? The vast majority of players I've faced only knew how to play in one rhythm or maybe a few. Few are those who had a strong sense of rhythm, and knew how to adapt fast to a change. Why does this matter you say?

Well for one thing you'll need to know the rhythm of the game to be able to assess your performance without the luck component. Without luck, talent wont cut it, but poker is nevertheless more about decisions than results. The rhythm is pretty much about the results. Knowing the rhythm will enable you to focus better on the decisions, regardless of the results. Another thing that is important about knowing the rhythm is to realize how it affects your game as well as that of your opponent. Most players play differently when they run good than they do when they run bad. Whining players usually expect bad things to happen to them, and therefore become easier to bluff against. The opposite is the case with players on a rush. And players who just haven't seen much action lately often become really passive. The presence of loose aggressive players at the table will often make other players loosen up, making the whole table tilt. And when this happens, you should know what that does to the rhythm of the game, and then adjust your expectations accordingly, or find another table immediately. Also players will often start to make moves against specific players they consider loose and weak. You'll need to know when they change the speed of their game.

The true expert knows that timing is everything. The rhythm of the game up to the present hand pretty much determines, what he can get away with. For instance consider a situation where it is a 50-50 shot seen from your opponents seat whether you're bluffing or have the goods.. If you bluff with the optimal bluffing frequency it doesn't really matter whether your opponent(s) call all the time or fold all the time. You'll make money anyway. But you'd make a lot more money if you could make him call you when you have the goods and fold when you don't, instead of just calling at random. Can you achieve this? I believe that this is one of the places where the expert players have an edge. They know that their opponent is usually basing his decision on his memories of previous hands. Keep in mind that you often need a huge number of hands to arrive at an even statistical distribution. So even though good players usually have a sound knowledge of the basic statistics of the game, they will deviate from this based on their perception of the specific player they are up against in this hand. But the expert also has access to the knowledge of how previous hands played out in the session, and therefore he can time his bluffs at the time where his opponent is most likely to fold, and make the same betting sequence with a made hand when his opponent is likely to call. To take a classic example; I have successfully steal raised from late position twice in a row. On the next hand, I find aces in the hole. If you raise a third time, you can rest assured that you will get callers. And this is simply because the order in which things happen matter a lot in the human decision making process. We tend to think in cause and effect relationships in chronological time, whereas there is no time in statistics - only the total number of events.

Acknowledgment: Thanks to Leigh Lightfoot for taking the time to proof reading my articles.

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