Just got back from a game and...

I did alright. Only 5 buy-in, came home with 20, I know we're not high-stakes gamblers. First time I won some in a long time.
I actually paid attention, looking and such and picked up a few things, it felt good as hell knowing my opponent is on a few hands when I thought about it :P But I have a question...A pretty dumb question,

If a player is a maniac, calls basically everything, would I want to play more hands against him, or more premium hands?

I'm thinking premium hands but if you play more hands, you might catch something and let the player bet into you.

Sit to his left, and when he enters the pot, iso-raise him with a looser requirement than you usually have for raising. The better your position, the more you should do this. If the rest of the table will let you get HU with him, you will clean up.

The safe way is more premium hands. The most rewarding way is to play more hands with him, period. That is if you really know how to exploit him.. even maniacs have some sort of thinking pattern they follow. Like they will bet straight draws, gutshots and flush draws like the nuts, such as open push the flop or call an allin with it (remember here, this is stupid play but they WILL suck out on you 1 in 3 times).. exorbitantly preflop raise their middle pocket pairs (because they don't know how to play them postflop).. or they always bet into you if you show weakness.. etc.

If you can pick up a 'quirk' like he overbets his bluffs and bets his real hands lighter (so that you would call) then you can clean out the maniac.

Another very exploitable quirk is if they really like to hammer signs of weakness. Be sure to stop value betting your monsters and slowplay them! Then very hesitantly call his bluff overbets.. somewhere along the line you'll stack him with a made hand vs air.

A third common quirk one is when they tend to shove it allin when they don't really know what to do.. like they have JJ and the flop has a K, or they have a flush draw and you bet the pot, or they hit TP on a lowish flop (like A6 on a 246 flop).. they don't know what to do there, so they just push. This is more common than you might think in sucky players! If they know what their hand is worth, like AA on a 57K rainbow board, a set, and so on, then they start slowplaying or value betting etc. If you're up against one of those "shove when not sure" maniacs and you can identify em as such, this is very exploitable also.

If you are really totally clueless about the maniac's thinking pattern, better just stick to premiums..

Oh and another thing are ofcourse the specific reads. I played a live game with some friends a while back, and when I got there this girl told me this:
"This guy who is coming, he plays really insane. He'll bluff with absolutely nothing for insane amounts, like €70. But if he really has a good hand, then you can tell. He will be faking that he isn't paying attention.. like he will ask 'is there another card coming or is this the last one?' or he'll be too obviously playing distracted and looking around.."

Really nice of her to tell me this beforehand

Also, talk to them to see how they think. Like this guy, he was playing like a total maniac preflop and postflop, and I needed to get a read on his thinking, so as an example:

He raised preflop €7. (blinds were €0.5) I folded, and so did everyone else.
Me: "wow, you must've had a good hand there!"
Him: [flips 77] "Well, I already have a pair but if I raise normal and people call and there might be higher cards on the flop, so I raise it harder now."
Me: "Ah yes, that makes good sense. I never know what to do with those sorts of hands."
Him: "Yeah, I just like to play it like that."
Me: "Nice."

Originally Posted by jackvance

He raised preflop €7. (blinds were €0.5) I folded, and so did everyone else.
Me: "wow, you must've had a good hand there!"
Him: [flips 77] "Well, I already have a pair but if I raise normal and people call and there might be higher cards on the flop, so I raise it harder now."
Me: "Ah yes, that makes good sense. I never know what to do with those sorts of hands."
Him: "Yeah, I just like to play it like that."
Me: "Nice."

Never forget that Annie Duke was working on her PhD. in Psycolinguistics, then she started playing poker.

Damn, I love this game.

Unless yo can put him on a range of hands and know your ahead, play premium hands, catch a flop and get him all in. If you miss the flop get out at the first sign of trouble.