Sit out deception

Have you ever been paint balling?
Have you ever heard of dead man walking?
When a paint ball player has been shot he has to leave the field of play.
Dead man walking occurs when a non shot player joins the dead players whilst walking off the field of play, he then suddenly turns his gun on the opposition. This is DECEPTION.


I don’t know for sure, but I think a similar deception is occurring in MTT and STT tournaments.
How often have you seen a sit out player suddenly come to life with a monster PF hand whilst in the SB or BB? Obviously a sit out player’s BB generates a great deal of interest, sometimes there can be limpers and raisers, so these ‘come to life’ pots can be quite large.

I am not paranoid about this, but I have seen this play a number of times and am very wary of stealing from these sit out players.

Has anyone else noticed a similar trend?

Its like live poker when you are playing with someone that is eating, and they all of a sudden put down the food after they look at their cards.

Standard, IMO.

I've seen it happening for a long time. Especially on Ultimatebet and Cake/Doyle's Room/Players Only.
When I see it happen, I usually give him credit for a big hand.

Have not noticed this play, but I like the idea. Don't know if this is due to lack of paying attention or I just happened to not run in to it yet. Will have to watch out for this one. Maybe even try it myself.

That's why there's blinds. You have to be active, otherwise the blinds will eat up your stack. The people sitting out paid their buy-in, so they are entitled to sitting out. It's basically the same as folding every hand. And even if they decide to wait until they're in the SB or BB and have a monster hand, that is THEIR strategy. It's a strategy. They PAID to get in, so they can use any strategy they want.

I play on ultimate bet and this is common for about every 5 /6

sngs you will play....I never thought about this but it totally makes

sense to at least cash in a 6 or 9 player .

Sorry arahel_jazz, but your live game eating sugestion bears no comparison. Who in their right mind is going to think the guy who is eating at the table is not allowed to look at his cards, or just won't look, out of some sort of polite decorum?
If I play live poker and leave the table every 1/2 hr for a cigarette, this is not a strategy. For the ten minutes I am away my blinds are fair game for all. If upon my return, I decided to play the first hand and it happens to be AA, so what?


Ah! you have mentioned strategy, as if you are aware that this is a recognised strategy?
Oh, and did I imply it is illegal? Answer - No.
Did I imply it is cheating? Answer - No
Did I say it is used as a strategy? Answer - I am not sure, but think it likely.


Conditions where I have seen this work very well, MTT 3,000 players or more.

1 - You must have a guy sitting imediately to your right who takes a long time making EVERY PF decision.

2 - You have to make an exceptional start.

3 - You have to stay at the same table for a long time.

4 - You come from a country on a different time scale eg; weekday 3 am, USA is 10pm. Not obligatory, but helps to convince other players you have packed up and gone to bed.


I SAW THIS - with the four above conditions, the guy was Russian.

The guy had been sat out for 30 mins or so, and the bubble was approaching, good players noticed (the bubble) and started to make their moves. The Russian was a prime target whilst on BB. Now because of the slow PF player to his right, he can press the I AM BACK button at the last second.

I was on the button, there had been a raise 2 x BB and a call from two others, I reraised allin 10 BB with 99, hoping to make a squeeze play or at the very least be seeing the flop with one opponent. The Russian comes to life and reraises allin with QQ, he wins "TYVM" 16.5 BBs and I am out on the bubble.

My whole point is, had the Russian (with a big stack)been an active player the scenario would have been very different. The first guy (stealing in the first) now folds second guy folds third guy limps, I raise to 3 x BB, Russian reraises allin and we both fold. This time the Russian wins 4.5 BB!

At the end of the day how could we ever know if the Russian had a fiendish plan or not?
How long was he prepared to wait if it was a strategy?
Maybe he took half an hours kip and returned at a perfect moment!




Fair play to you Santa fe slim, I think we should all look at giving them credit.

I can give them credit for a good hand, especially when all my chips are in first with T80 and they call showing me AA. Serves me right I suppose. LOL

FYI, sometimes I have entered too many tourneys and some are more social. I will sometimes hit sitout on the non-social ones from later to mid position, which gives me a chance to glance at my cards before autofold. If they are playable, I sit back in. Since I am going to be folding over 80% of my hands normally, it saves the clicking and cuts the dangers of being bounced from one table to another mid-click (one of my pet peeves in multi-tabling.)

I also sometimes have to sitout to answer the door or some such. And, yes, sometimes I have fallen half-asleep. In the latter case, I can wake up at any moment. Seeing an AA thru slit eyelids tends to wake me right up.

Bottom line -- assume nothing.

I've noticed the 'come to life' sit-outs more on Pokerstars. I admit that I too sit out sometimes, only to come back with some really great cards staring me in the face! Since I'm still fairly new, I never noticed if they did it at a certain time or not. But now that you've mentioned it, I may have to adapt that strategy as my own if I sit out time & again!
It is frustrating waiting for the time clock to run down while waiting for a person to react...usually more on Ultimatebet than any other...it's boring & I don't like playing with those that do that all of the time. But I come to play & I will gladly steal their blinds if they allow it.

Like some other people have said, there's not much you can do, and people are entitled to play ultra-tight, just waiting for the best hands. In fact, if you see them doing it, just fold unless you've also got something killer, and continue to blind them down.

Pretty much the way i deal with this situation is: yes, i steal their blinds most of the time if they are in the seat immediately to my left because its like giving him back chips hes giving away, and that makes no sense. But usually i only do that in the situation that everyone else around the table folds to me and im in SB, which doesnt happen very often. Even when it does, the only thing i do is a quick min raise to gain the chips (depending on the site, i know on Ultimatebet if you just call the hand, his is autofolded preflop) but i dont risk much. The reason for that is, people sit back in with monster hands. I have seen it so many times, and this what seems to be very upsetting to you. Just keep in mind, they do that. Thats all i do and i have never gotten caught, except losing maybe a min raise. If a guy is sitting out and comes back in with a push, i will never call him with less than AA or KK, and with KK i still hesitate and sometimes fold. I pretty much look at them as an extremely tight player whos only looking for premium hands.

I have seen it a few times but never regarded it as a big problem.

yes ive notices it also within partypoker the 'come to life' sit-outs. It sometimes can be hard to determine if they come to life because they have a big hand, or if they just logged on and noticed they are signed into a tourny and just go all in for the fun of it. you see more of this within freeroll tournaments, and when it happens sometimes its best just to stay clear of them, they could be bluffing or hold a powerful hand, steer clear of them and wait for someone else to knock them out i say, no point losing to a donkey or a player who has you clearly beat

Thank you Doops and Maid Marian for explaining why you sometimes sit out. As I suspected, in most cases it's because of multi tabling.

As a non Multi tabler, I had no idea of the problems that arise. In effect through sitting out whilst Multi tabling, you have more control, and it helps you to make the correct decisions PF.

If I make the assumption that 90% of sit out players are Multi tablers, at least now, when I see one at my table, I can make a note; Tight prob agg PF?