A freezing evening a few years ago found me outside a local bar bemoaning the smoking ban that, despite supposedly being prompted by public health concerns, was exposing me to frostbite and pneumonia. Much to my surprise I noticed that a tall blonde woman was listening to me. Back inside the bar it transpired that her name was Hope and she had an open tab.

Fortunately she was still attractive at dinner the following evening as we settled into a booth at my favorite Greek place. Rather than looking at the menu, I noticed that Hope was looking carefully at me.

“What?” I said eloquently.

“Gucci glasses, Tissot watch,” she replied. “Don’t recognize the boots.”

I wondered briefly whether I was about to be robbed. My early poker career centered around playing three-card brag in back-room games in North London, and having my accessories appraised was bringing back bad memories. I was rescued from emitting another sparkling, “What?” by Hope’s elucidation.

“I’m an image consultant,” she said.

I’ve been criticized by several dinner companions over the years for relating everything to poker. It seems to me perfectly reasonable that the word “image” combined with the fact that I was sitting at a table should make me think of “table image.” As Hope began describing in considerable detail what she did for a living, my mind naturally meandered to the green felt. It stayed there when I realized Hope was, for reasons that I had apparently missed, providing a comprehensive history of the Coach purse and that all I was required to do was nod and chew falafel.

This experience impacted my poker game in two profound yet distinct ways. First, I quit drinking. That however is a topic for another time. What I will discuss in this article is how dinner with an image consultant got me thinking about new possibilities for poker profit.

During the online poker age, the concept of “table image” has often been reduced to little more than a series of numbers. In deciding how to react to an opponent’s bet, for example, you are likely to refer to statistics provided by a HUD.

One of the first things you notice when transitioning to live play is that your opponents do not have green and red numbers hovering above their heads. Do not despair. Although this useful information is lacking, other data have been added. For example, you can now see your opponents’ actual heads, along with their hands, clothes, jewelry and so on. Equally important, and yet more often neglected, is the fact that your opponents can see you.

Understanding how we are perceived by our opponents has obvious implications for how they play against us and how we in turn interpret their actions. Before looking at how we should incorporate our table image into the data stream that we constantly analyze at the table, I want to address something more fundamental.

Our table image is something we can manipulate. In the context of the online game this is mostly restricted to making occasional advertising plays that attempt to create a false impression of our normal game. Changing gears in cash games or adopting a “tight early, loose late” style in tournaments are related strategies that fundamentally aim to confuse our opponents so that they play their hands sub-optimally against us. Ideally, we would like to have them so puzzled that they make howling mistakes.

In a live setting, our physical appearance and our demeanor at the table are the first things our opponents see. For some opponents the physical image that we project will have a profound influence on how they play against us, particularly initially when it is the only information that they have. I am not necessarily suggesting that we should go out of our way to create a physical appearance that is at odds with our true playing style. However, I do feel that it is inexcusable laziness if we do not at least consider how our appearance is likely to be perceived by our opponents.

A few years ago at the Rio I was handed a copy of the Full Tilt Poker Strategy Guide and a pen by someone who introduced herself as Jenny. I opened the book and inscribed it:

“Dear Jenny: I am not Chris Ferguson. Love and kisses – Kat xox.”

Ferguson is a bit taller than me, but we’re the same age.. Like him I have long hair and often wear a black stetson and shades.

I mention this in part to give you an idea of my physical appearance. Clearly some elements of this image have certain connotations. The black stetson, for example, is almost a poker caricature. Without it I have been described as “a cross between Joey Ramone and Professor Snape.”

Anyone can dress like a poker player. Similarly, we all have certain raw materials that allow us to project other images; in my case, I project images that are as diverse as an iconic punk musician and a misunderstood wizard. What I cannot do (unless I cut off my hair, and that is not happening) is give the impression that I am an off-duty police officer or hold a middle-management position in an insurance company.

I suspect the fact that I have long hair dominates most opponents’ first impressions of me. However, long hair on its own may be associated with everything from a calculating professional poker player to a flamboyant, anti-authoritarian rebel. I find it helpful to further “define” my image for my opponents in order that I might better understand how they are reacting to me. How and what I do to achieve this depends on the nature of the game.

Mike Cappelletti has emphasized that in many Limit Omaha-8 games it is better to be loved than feared. At least when played live, these games are very loose and often passive. Profit comes from playing relatively tight pre-flop and showing down the nuts. No style points are awarded for fancy double-promo raises and other tricky plays. Your opponents are giving you money. They are more likely to continue to do so if you create the impression that, like them, you are a hapless victim of the whims of the Poker Gods.

I mentioned above that I usually wear a black stetson and shades. I do so primarily for practical purposes. The stetson keeps my hair out of my food and my prescription shades correct both myopia and the fact that my pupils don’t contract properly. If I’m playing Limit Omaha-8 I dump both the shades and the hat and avoid the brighter poker rooms.

If I’m playing a tournament or a Limit Holdem cash game it’s often an asset to look competent or even intimidating. Unlike Omaha-8 it is imperative to win uncontested pots in these games. One way of facilitating that goal is to convince opponents that they don’t want to cross swords with you. The shades and the hat go back on and I only smile for tactical purposes.

Like most facets of poker, it’s important to be sensitive to the game texture and the nature of your opponents when deciding how and to what degree you might manipulate your table image. In some games it simply doesn’t make much of a difference. If I’m in a loose NLHE cash game populated by drunks who are oblivious to those around them I’ll likely wear shades simply because doing so is more comfortable.

In 2006 I won a Party Poker satellite into the WSOP Main Event. It was the first time I’d played a $10k buy-in event, but I was playing over a million hands of online poker a year at this time and figured the field would be dominated by players less experienced than me. Clearly it was a hat-and-shades gig.

It’s usually bad news if your draw in the Main Event puts you at a table where you know someone. From my position in the one-seat I immediately recognized Shane “Shaniac” Schleger in the three. Our paths had crossed at PokerStars and he was not somebody I wanted at my table, particularly out of position. Then things went further downhill when Abe Mosseri arrived.

He stood behind the four-seat and pulled a candy bar from his pocket.

“Does anyone want this?” he said. A couple of nervous-looking players looked more nervous.

“I just bought it and now I don’t want it,” said Mosseri.

A young guy said he’d take it and Mosseri tossed it to him before inspecting the table. He was still standing, nodded a hello to Schleger, then drawled derisively to the remainder of the table: “All internet players, huh?”

By the time Mosseri finally sat down everyone was aware that he’d just placed fourth in a WPT event and that he would be in charge of the table.

While my table image against most of the table was still the one I had planned on projecting, against Schleger and Mosseri it was completely different. In the case of Mosseri in particular it was apparent that he had lumped me in with the amorphous mass of “internet players” who he considered weak and easily intimidated. The important thing in his mind about my table image was that I was wearing a shirt with “Party Poker” embroidered on it.

I’d like to report that I cunningly turned the tables on Mosseri and busted him. In fact I didn’t make it out of the first day, but there was one pot in which I used his perception of me to my advantage.

When Mosseri hadn’t been opening pots he’d been flatting raises a lot pre-flop then playing aggressively post. Given that I had to get through both him and Schleger, I’d made a perhaps marginal open-raise from middle position with KJ suited. I went to the flop heads-up and out of position against Mosseri.

The flop came small cards with no help for my suit. I think I decided not to c-bet because I figured it would either produce a raise or a float that Mosseri would use to steal the pot on the turn. This had been the pattern in two or three previous hands. I had to some extent given up fighting with him.

Mosseri’s confident play and his routine with the candy bar had turned me into exactly the sort of player he expected me to be: a weak-tight internet satellite qualifier intimidated by the occasion. So when I checked and he bet I was about to muck my hand when it occurred to me I could exploit that image. I check-raised. At the very least I figured the move would be sufficiently unexpected it would be effective.

Unfortunately, it appeared Mosseri had something. He started cutting out chips while staring at me. So I pulled a move I’d never try against someone who respected my game. I dipped my head forward so that my eyes were visible above my shades and conspicuously looked away from Mosseri’s stare. He mucked his hand almost immediately with a smirk.

The play worked because I’d accurately assessed how Mosseri perceived me. From his point of view my image was of an internet amateur. When he saw me avert my vision it didn’t occur to him I might be throwing off a false tell. He perceived me as weak and thus any tell that I gave off must be genuine.

This turned out to be a hollow victory given I didn’t survive the day, but it was fun at the time and illustrates that we can exploit our table image even when we might feel it is unfair and inaccurate. I didn’t want Mosseri’s respect, I wanted his chips.

A final example is provided by my favorite live cash game: Limit Omaha-8 where, as explained above, I attempt to be loved rather than feared. It’s actually quite difficult to be loved by the grumpy old men and women who play the game in Vegas. However, the hat and shades stay in the hotel room and I am more than happy to listen attentively when the octogenarian experts explain to me what I’ve done wrong.

I was playing the $5/10 game at The Mirage when the following hand came up. Playing A2TT I had been pleased to see a ten turn giving a board of K85T. A shriveled prune of a man on my immediate right check-called my bet. Half the table must have been on bathroom break because we went to the river heads up.

The river was a 2, meaning I had no low, but was almost certainly facing one. No flush was possible, so when my opponent checked I bet my second set. My opponent called and rolled over A3QK for the nut low.

When he saw my hand he sighed loudly.

“It’s better to check it down when one player is high and the other is low,” he said. I suspect I was blinking at him because he elaborated. “Your bet cost us a dollar in rake.”

I was so baffled by this that I inadvertently produced the ideal table image. Clearly my thrifty combatant interpreted my silence as indicating that I was unversed in the nuances of the game. Regaining some composure I attempted to cement this view.

“Ah right, the rake! I keep forgetting about that. Sorry!”

A couple of hands later I went to the rail for a cigarette, but kept watching the table. I got a strong feeling that Professor Rake was describing my faux pas to a young man of sixty or so who had just returned. I’d dubbed this second gentleman The Expert, partly because of the haranguing he’d given two or three players earlier in the session.

When I sat down my suspicions were confirmed.

“You all clear on the rake now?” said The Expert.

“Getting there,” I said.

Then a wonderful thing happened. The Expert and I got in a hand together. He was in a bad mood having just got quartered and, according to him, had lost more than he should have due to another nut low being overplayed.

The Expert and I both made wheels on the turn. I put in one raise, mostly on the strength of the nut flush redraw, then shut down since an overstraight seemed likely. The river kindly completed my flush. As The Expert kept raising me back it was clear that he assumed I just had the wheel and that his 6-straight was going to give him three quarters of the ever-growing pot. My guess is that his poor opinion of me and the assumption I would overplay a wheel made the river flush card invisible to him.

Much of our profit in poker comes from the mistakes of others. One of the mistakes that our opponents can make is developing an inaccurate view of our abilities and our style of play. It’s both entertaining and profitable to encourage them to make such mistakes.

Kat Martin is a poker player and coach who is currently deciding whether he should move to Vegas or London. His musings on poker and a host of other topics can be found at http://feline9ine.blogspot.com/