I'm just gonna cut in on this flame war before the thread gets locked.

Here are the reason I prefer indirect game in clubs and bars.

If I'm going up to everyone and talking to them - guys, girls, mixed sets, etc. Then it looks extremely congruent for me to approach the HB9s and 10s later after I've done some sets. They see me as the sociable guy that a lot of people know. That raises my value before I've even opened my mouth. It also allows me to meet new people when I go out, which enriches my life apart from just getting an f-close.

Secondly, a "rejection" or "blow-out" in an indirect pickup is nothing more than a lack of reaching a hook point, or a glance away, or something like that. It's so minor that I can still leave my social proof intact by just saying "good meeting you" and walking away if a set isn't going well. I have that luxury because no girl is gonna slap me or throw a drink on my face for asking where the cloakroom or the bar is.

Thirdly and most importantly, an indirect method is playing a very fun and exciting game with the girl. You're constantly keeping her guessing about whether you're into her or not. Active disinterest, push/pull, etc. are fun to play and she LIKES that. Keeping her guessing makes her WANT YOU MORE. If you direct, you're immediately signalling your intentions from the beginning. She now has to make a decision on the spot about whether she wants to fuck you. If she says yes, then great, but with this method you get far more blowouts that are harsher, and now the whole venue has seen you get totally blown out. You do that 3-4 more times, and your value will be so lowered that you'll get blown out of every set thereafter.

To me, the challenge in game is to reach a stage where I just KNOW that I can approach ANY girl and within a few minutes be able to generate real attraction in her for me. Only indirect game can do that. Going direct is basically a numbers approach that sidesteps the GENERATION of attraction because it only works if they ALREADY HAVE IT. You're basically missing a significant chunk of what gaming is.

To give a hypothetical example, let's say we take a single woman and find out the sort of guy that really isn't her type. Maybe she finds pale skin and blond hair particularly unattractive in a man. Now let's give 2 PUAs the task of pulling her that night. They each are blond, pale, and equally attractive. They're wearing equally nice clothes, have the same amount of money, are equally confident, and both have the same exact amount of gaming abilities from kino escalation to comfort building to seduction. The only difference is that one of them uses indirect and the other direct.

What's gonna happen? The direct guy is gonna do some warm up sets maybe, get himself in state, having a good time with his friends, and then he's gonna walk right up to her and do a direct opener. Chances are, she will reject him. After all, he's unattractive to her based on his looks, and she has no reason to want to get to know him. She knows nothing about his character, his charm, his intelligence, because he's made her make that split second decision.

Now, that second PUA goes indirect, and he has the chance of actually building attraction through displaying his other qualities, such as humour, intelligence, ability to physically escalate. Before she knows it she's swept away. Later the next day when she leaves his place and goes to lunch with her girlfriends, they say "wait a minute, this guy totally doesn't sound like your type at all?!" "I KNOW" she replies, "but there's just something about him that's so different!"

You can say what you like about just going around "knowing you're the fucking man" and being super confident, but not every woman is just gonna SEE that immediately. Going indirect gives you the opportunity to actually DISPLAY all your other attractive qualities to her, and then smoothly transition and escalate without ever giving her the opportunity to have to make a decision. To me, that's what sweeping a girl off her feet is all about.