You can be anyone online; use this as a poker advantage

Winning players know about using their table image as an advantage and also know the sayings like “Its better to be liked than feared", but something I don’t think has been covered at any great extent in poker strategy is the ability a player has online to create their own image. Now I’m not talking about playing hands a certain way to set up an opponent for the future, selectively flashing cards or anything else like this, which all can be viable strategy but its simply not what I’m posting here about. Basically what I’m referring to is acting or pretending to be someone you’re not.

Over the years I’ve come across players that do this very well and after noticing a trend I began to study it a bit closer. Have you ever noticed the players, this happens more often in tournaments, who will start chatting out of the blue by saying something like: username122 is that Springfield MO? or will find another way to strike up a conversation with a player. I’ve seen this be done to perfection where a couple players become friends through out the rest of the tournament, and something like this could most certainly be exploited, and I began watching closer I noticed just that.

Back in 1999, I recall one of the better players at Poker.com (the original) went by the name CitySlicker and played a hyper aggressive style which served him well at the higher stakes ($20/$40 online was high stakes back then) and this was something he was a master of. He would befriend players all the time then beat up on them take their money with a smile on his face.

The problem for CitySlicker came when players started to recognize his tactics and also learned ways to exploit his playing tendencies. What did City Slicker do? He petitioned the poker room for a name change and returned as AceGirl. He found that simply representing he was a woman players would take it easy on him and he could tighten up a little bit and still get paid off when he had the hands. I was suspicious when City disappeared and Ace showed up, but was never sure they were the same player till one night Ace begged me at my $10/$20 game to help him get $20/$40 the same way City used to. Later that night I saw him fighting with River Pheonix at the heads up tables, using words and language that were trademarks of City at that section of the site few players rarely check. I was obviously convinced at this point that CitySlicker and AceGirl were one in the same.

In today’s market its obviously not possible to change usernames all that often, and this is a problem only for the really good and well known players. For example, many years ago when I was playing at Absolute Poker everyone knew me. I was competing for the weekly TLB every week and had a large rail. For me it was impossible to hide who I was, so I needed to not only accept the image of being feared but I had to adjust in such away that I became even more feared by creating an unpredictable playing style where players hated getting into pots with me because they knew I was capable of anything at anytime which helped me balance the ability to steal pots with the ability to force folds.

Obviously with data mining and all the online databases and tools available these days, it’s impossible for the best players to hide. I’ll write a second article regarding as a follow up which will include some suggestions for players in this situation, but as they’re the best players as is, it’s unlikely they’ll need to much advise the article could provide, but I’ll write it none the less as new players entering this category will likely find value from it.

To this point I’ve made two suggestions regarding the “You can be anyone online; use this as a poker advantage”. These befriending players and pretending to be a female” I have a few other tips on the matter to share but I’d like to get others feedback as well. How do you use the ability to be anyone you want to be online to a strategically poker advantage?

Very good post. This is a important part of online poker, there are def. edges to be exploited.
Personaly I've got two chick nicks I play under.

I have actually played posing as a chick before. With the username LirvA it's always been quite easy, unless of course I had my trademark avatar up.

I always played the same way, so I can't say if it really changed anything. I know I always got hit on by dudes though.

.... man, chicks must have it rough.

fucking pisses me off. I'll not say how long it's been since I got laid, but it's enough to make a person want to blow their head off. And it's not like I'm some unattractive, untalented person, I just don't know what the deal is.

And I FUCKING KNOW that if I was a fucking chick, I could go get fucked right this second.

Poor poor girls.

.... I have issues.



On a related note, to the OP, APerfectGent/YourTimeIsUP once said on P5's that if you have an avatar of a black person, you get tons of action.

Don't know if that's true or not.

Never cared for him either, on a personal note. I've watched him donk of thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands of dollars at the high stakes cash games on stars.

I think he's broke now, dunno.

I would just like to add that at Cake Poker players have the ability to change their username every 7 days.