Honestly, there are few times where you should definitely TRY not to perform. This may perhaps be one of them. I will explain why, and I hope my points hit home.
1) You mentioned that these people may be performing gimmicked tricks and other pretty hard-hitting stuff, but there is something you should realize. I am going to take a leap here, but I am assuming these guys don't have much sense of effect or routine structure, and thus the effects are being thrown together without much thought. Going back to what Justin Miller said, if you really want to one-up these fellows, pay attention to what that audience responds to and build a small routine around it. I would, if you haven't already, take a look at Darwin Ortiz's books Great Magic and Designing Miracles. These, and many other sources I'm sure others on here and the magic cafe can point out for you, will help you a LOT in terms of routining and structuring performances and effects. Basically, the fact that these guys haven't put time and effort into structuring ruins the crescendo effect of reactions you may want to achieve. Instead of a book-read type of thing where interest continually peaks, the unstructured performance these guys use will probably keep the reaction levels around the same, when if fact, each effect should build onto the other + follow a specific theme or message you want to deliver to your audience.
2) I alluded to this point in the last sentence of #1, but make sure you have a specific message or theme you want to get across to the audience. By taking the time to get to know your effects, and by making them your own and changing them around to fit your personality and performing style, not only will you DEFINITELY be remembered better in the eyes of the audience... you will also come across as YOURSELF. This is important because most people separate themselves as "myself" and "my magician self," when indeed, they should both be the same person. be natural and yourself, and once you make your routines "your own," then there is literally NO competition with other magicians. Many kids that start magic these days, and I am not one to criticize since I'm only 18 and a few years into magic, do not make effects and presentations their own and thus limit their success and progression with magic.
I hope these points help you out and give you some stuff to ponder over. The second point is rather universal and is something that I find all professional magicians have EXACT knowledge of. They don't perform "for the hell of it," but pretty much have reasons why they want to share magic and what they hope to achieve out of it... and when they're good enough... they don't need to "hope" to achieve because they know that's how they're going to make the audience feel.
Some food for thought
-AK
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