About chat...
i was going to make a reply in the other thread (regarding Lancasterus) because a semi-interesting discussion about 'chat on or off' had developed. But the thread was locked so I'm doing this instead.
If this is off-topic then we can go ahead and lock this too I guess...but I think it's a worthwhile topic.
If leaving chat on causes you to get into arguments with the table-idiot or go on tilt then you are right that turning it off would be your best course.
The way that PBob is responding I almost wonder if the chat he was witnessing was distracting him too much. Probably not, but it's possible.
however, if the chat doesn't bother you I think it is +EV to have it on.
1. If you're multi-tabling then you might not see as many of the hands and show-downs on the tables where you fold pre-flop.
If I see something in chat that says "OMG YOU FISH!!" or something like that then I pull up the HH to get a look at exactly how badly the fish played.
If it's his 5th suck-out in a row and somebody else is rambling on about it then this letting you know that this fishy guy thinks he's 'running hot' and can run people over. Adjust your play against this guy accordingly.
2. The guy who is doing the berating is typically going to be a sucky player himself. However, I've been on table with generally decent 26/20 type players who lose a couple of tough hands and start going on about how they can't catch a damn thing.
I beat a 26/20 guy with quads over his nut full-house (so he claimed, it wasn't on party so i couldn't check) and he was really whining about it. Did somebody say "Tilt"? He was getting really hyper-agg in blind-steals, moreso then I would have expected. Calling him down with almost anything can be +EV if you read him correctly (he showed-down unimproved 86o on a future hand that I likely wouldn't have called-down if I didn't think of the percentag chance that he was just plain tilting).
3. I'll chat occasionally to try to keep the table friendly. If I get quads and somebody tells me "NH" or "WOW!!!" I'll try to get back with a polite 'ty' or something.
4, If someone is criticizing my play I want to know about it. I want to see if someone is calling me a 'raise-a-holic' or if they are just complaining about the general amount of raising going on at the table. It's one thing for their stats to show that they are 35/2/0.4. It's another thing for them to be telling you that everyone is raising too much and that everyone should just play 'real poker' and 'how can everyone raise with all that junk?'
He's basically telling you that he's more and more willing to call you down with really marginal crap now (low AF means he's not going to raise a whole lot...but he can still be a calling station).
I believe one can gain a lot of info from one's opponents via the chat.
If you don't get tilted off by it then it can definitely be +EV to leave it on.
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