Betfair Official Blog

Multi-Tilting™

Tilting can't be avoided, but it can now be controlled (to a lesser degree). So says Matt Broughton...

Ah... tilting...

Perhaps you can control it, or perhaps - like most of us - you can't.

I find tilting is a phenomenon generally misunderstood by non-poker players. Visions fill their heads of PC monitors being thrown though windows, keyboards snapped in half over knees, and large quantities of beaten laptops being piled up in a landfill somewhere just outside of Birmingham

If tilting were just about venting your anger we'd all be fine. You could just hang some punch bags or sides of beef near your PC and then simply beat the crap out of them every time some fish hits a two-outer for all the money. Alternatively one could simply purchase a big jar of 'Calms' and a litre of vodka to wash them down with... the options would be endless.

But that's the problem: tilting in itself is probably more costly than the event that sent us tilting in the first place. Tilting isn't just a slap of the forehead; it's a slap of the "raise with 10-Q offsuit", or the slap of the CALL CALL CALL CALL throughout the streets to discover that your opponent DID have quads after all.

But what to do? You can't just flick a switch and forget that the muppet who just outdrew you was the last thing standing between you and ultimate supremacy of the poker universe. So... here's a thought: Take your tilt to another table.

Yes... MUTI-TILTING!

Multi-Tilting is an invention that allows you to tilt on one table, while remaining calm, beautiful and totally Zen on another.

The theory: Ok - this is VERY simple. Let's imagine your usual game is the $1/$2 table. You open your table and take your seat. MEANWHILE, you also open a table you couldn't give a tom-tit about. Perhaps a 10-seater 10c/20c game that you only bother with if you have AA or KK. Yes you're being charged a whopping $0.30 every orbit of the table, but that's just TILT TAX, and if you do happen to hit a big hand on this table, you're looking at a profit of perhaps three to four dollars over the course of a few hours. IMPORTANT: DO NOT be tempted to actually play on this table.

Ok - now that that safety mechanism is in place, begin your normal game...

Fast forwarding through time, let's now assume that some god-damned fish has just rivered you with a miracle straight despite you having flopped two pair and having made the pot outrageously expensive to remain involved in. As one would expect, you have steam coming out of your ears, profanities not heard since biblical times issuing forth from your swear hole, and a strong desire to press your mouse into his face hard enough to leave tiny little burns where the laser comes out.

BUT WAIT! You're safe, because thanks to Multi-Tilting™, you now need only control your rage long enough to reach across with your furious, shaking hands to press the button that switches between tables. The $1/$2 table becomes your (ignored) background game, while the 10c/20c game becomes your tilt-ridden battleground.

Go on, vent you lunatic - vent! Raise UTG with J4! Call with pocket 8s while there are two kings, an ace and 4 spades on board. ENJOY HANDS LIKE 9-2!! Go crazy and enjoy your tilt. Chances are it'll only cost you a couple of dollars (rather than a couple of hundred dollars) and the cost of letting the main game tick over in the background is a mere fraction of the Tilt Tax you'd normally be paying. See? Multi-Tilting™, it's a beautiful thing.

Don't thank me. Thank poker.

• Poker