Differentiating between different types of aggression

I've noticed people use the terms aggression and bluffing synomously, and always seem to think passive players play straight poker. However I am bit confused here.

From what I know at the lower stakes (particularly 25 nl), passive players just call and call and call. The better ones call when they think they are ahead. They dont bluff. So a passive player has to play straight poker to retain their title of passive.

Aggressive players, however, seem to come in two types (regardless of their pre-flop play, so this has nothing to do with tight/loose).

You have the aggressive players that will only play straight poker, only bet/raise when they think they are ahead, and always fold when they are behind. They will still make value bets on the river, but won't bet if they think they are behind on the river.

Then you have another type of aggressive player that plays what I call "crooked" poker, namely he bluffs. If he thinks he can get a player off a pot he will, by betting hard. He still value bets though, and will still bet when he is ahead. This player almost always does continuation bets regardless of what he actually holds when he is the pre-flop aggressor. What you get is a player that is very aggressive, since they bet/raise when they have a hand, and furthermore they bet/raise when they think they can get their opponent off their hand.

It is the second type of aggression that I seem to have gotten confused with LAG and Rippy/Michael's style of play. But now I see that the only difference between LAG and TAG is pre-flop play..

So espically in reference to "the wheel" thread (link here: http://www.flopturnriver.com/phpBB2/...ic.php?t=12761),
when people talk about tight aggressive beating tight passive and so forth, WHICH type of aggressive are they talking about? Are there names for these two different types of aggression (I just call them straight/crooked aggressive)? Am I just missing something here?

Here's my understanding of the terms:

passive means a plr allows others to take the lead - calling and checking and passive

aggressive means a plr leads - raising and folding are aggressive

I don't think it makes sense to play using one style the whole time. There are times is makes good sense to play one way or the other. There are also times when you could go either way. For instance if I am not sure I will go passive late in a hand. But I am generally aggressive early in a hand.

There are also loose and tight plrs. Loose means they play more hands and are will take more risk Tight means they are more selective and avoid risk. A loose plr will win more pots but may get trapped into losing a few big pots by a tight plr. A tight plr will win few pots but they will generally be bigger.

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Originally Posted by DimitriT

There are also loose and tight plrs. Loose means they play more hands and are will take more risk Tight means they are more selective and avoid risk. A loose plr will win more pots but may get trapped into losing a few big pots by a tight plr. A tight plr will win few pots but they will generally be bigger.

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I was under the impression that tight/loose only had to do with pre-flop play, (well at least thats what Bair said when I asked about loose aggresive play) but your saying it has to do with post-flop play as well?

im confused lol..

I would think a tight player would also be willing to fold post flop anytime he thought he was beat. But maybe that is just weak not tight. hehe

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Originally Posted by EricE

I would think a tight player would also be willing to fold post flop anytime he thought he was beat. But maybe that is just weak not tight. hehe

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Well, just because your beat doesnt mean you fold ANYTIME postflop right? If i had a flush draw on the flop and theres a 30$ pot and someone bets 6$ into it with top pair, he has a better chance of winning the pot than i do (i.e. im beat), yet I still call because I have pot odds to. As would any good tight player.

But again, as far as i know tight only has to do with pre-flop hand selection and nothing to do with the post-flop play.

If I understand what bair was saying in relation to TAG vs. LAG preflop - I think you're basically talking the tight vs. loose portion of that. Obviously both bet certain hands preflop...TAG players just play and bet fewer.

Post-flop, both players will be aggressive when they at least have some sort of decent draw. This isn't the same as bluffing, though it can evolve into bluffing by the river if the aggressive player has hit nothing, but reads that the other player has nothing worth worth raising or there are enough scare cards, and so the aggressive player continues to be aggressive - and sometimes bluff his opponent out of the pot, sometimes not depending on the player and the holdings.
But - both aggressive types will also fold if they don't have the proper outs/odds/+EV and read the opponent clearly has them beat.

Now, why in the circle does LAG beat TAG given those definitions?
I don't see a clear answer to that - unless my assumed definitions are incorrect.

Passive players call. Aggressive players bet. You dont have to bluff to be aggro.

-'rilla

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Originally Posted by DaHorror

Now, why in the circle does LAG beat TAG given those definitions?
I don't see a clear answer to that - unless my assumed definitions are incorrect.

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Because TAg is missing oportunaties that the LAg is getting. LAg plays more hands and gets lucky on the flop/turn/river and wins. TAg either folded preflop or missed when the board was all lower cards.

Plus as a LAG the last thing you want is someone smooth calling with a hand. TAGs will let you know they have something or get out, occasionally even folding the best hand. As Dolye says, they know you're crazy and may be betting an ISD and they don't want to give you free cards. Passives you can end up giving your whole stack thinking "We'll, he can't call on the river with anything less than XXXX, I'm firing this third barrel." And then the guy shows you middle pair.

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Originally Posted by drmcboy

Plus as a LAG the last thing you want is someone smooth calling with a hand. TAGs will let you know they have something or get out, occasionally even folding the best hand. As Dolye says, they know you're crazy and may be betting an ISD and they don't want to give you free cards. Passives you can end up giving your whole stack thinking "We'll, he can't call on the river with anything less than XXXX, I'm firing this third barrel." And then the guy shows you middle pair.

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Again this isnt making any sense though, LAG and TAG play the SAME post-flop according to bair so its not just LAGs that would have this problem with smooth calling, TAGs would have it to.

As for bluffing and whether its good or not - I came up with the following principle I called "The law of crookedness", where crookedness is defined as the amount of bluffing done by a player.

The Law of Crookedness - A player should be as crooked as the other tables at the player permit to get the most financial worth for their hand.

At lower stakes, most people will call with bad holdings, so a player cannot be very crooked in the first place. This leads to some not being crooked at all but still being aggressive i.e. straight aggressive poker.

Another pair of terms I came up with to describe players is the conservative-liberal spectrum (no we aren't talking politics here! lol). Conservative players don't call value bets as much for fear they are beat. Liberal players seem to think the other guy is bluffing or overbetting is hand and will call much more. The more conservative the players you play with are, the more crooked you can be. But one they realize you are bluffing them, they might become more liberal, forcing you to be less crooked!

Now lets look at some differences between loose aggressive and tight aggressive. Because loose aggressive players play more hands that won't be ahead as often, they find themselves doing a lot more bluffing. On a conservative table this can still work because that amount of crookedness is permitted. But the loose aggressive player runs into trouble when the table becomes more liberal and they can no longer bluff as much, making their looseness bad value wise. This forces them to tighten up if they wish to beat the table.

Now on the what-beats-what circle it says that loose passive beats loose aggressive, which I don't believe to be exactly correct. Loose aggressive beats a conservative table, tight aggressive beats a liberal table (for reasons stated in the previous paragraph). There seems to be an underlieing assumption that TAG players are conservative whereas LAG players are liberal. If this was true then it would make sense to play LAG on a table full of TAGs. Now it is true that most TAG players are conservative. So LAGs do in fact beat TAGs, assuming the TAGs arent liberal. However, do loose passives beat LAGs?

Well when most people think of loose passive (LP) players, they think of players that will call any pre-flop raise with anything and call the raiser down with a low pocket pair or low middle pair or sometimes with just ace high. So the loose passive player described here is ALSO a liberal player. It is this element of that type of player that allows them to beat the loose aggressive player. However, since aggression is better than passiveness, what if a TAG player could play more liberal? Wouldn't they also have the advantage over the LAG player? There is one difference between the LP and TAG players that should be noted, the TAG player raises a bluff whereas a LP just calls. This gives the aggressor less information as well as the LP player. Now who benefits from this loss of information of both parties if the aggressor is a LAG player? (as compared to raising like the TAG player would do)

I would argue the LAG player does better against the LP player than the TAG player that raises the LAGs bluff/semi-bluff. There are two reasons why: The first is stated in my post The Sheriff's Dillema (link here http://www.flopturnriver.com/phpBB2/...ic.php?t=13698), since in this case the LP player has turned into a Sheriff, and is facing a Sheriff's Dillema when the LAG makes his bluff. To benefit from this informational sacrafice, the LAG player has to bluffing more than 60% of the time to make it worth it. Most good LAG players won't be bluffing THAT often!

The second is that even if the LAG player is bluffing, he often times has a FEW outs against the LP player, so really he is semi-bluffing with a very weak draw. Because of the informational sacrafice, there is no way for the LP player to know when the LAG player hits. This allows the LAG player to be much more flexible on the river against the LP player, i.e. betting if he hit and checking if he missed. If the LAG player is raised instead, then they must fold, not allowing them to see a "free" card giving them the possiblity of outdrawing you.

So what really beats a LAG player? A liberal TAG or LAG (notice they both play the same against another LAG player) player, though a liberal LP player won't do too bad either. And what beats a liberal TAG player? Any other TAG player.

So then the correct way to play would be to be liberal against LAG players and conservative against TAG players. This makes sense, because a LAG player plays crappier hands to begin with and so is much more likely to be bluffing than a TAG player would be.

Furthermore, you should be LAG on a conservative table and TAG on liberal table.

So there you have four different combinations possible for the best possible way to play for different tables and players: conservative TAG, liberal TAG, conservative LAG, liberal LAG.

Notice that there is always better to be aggressive than passive no matter who you're playing!

Just some stuff to think about..

My post was referencing a hand with a LAG and a TAG in it. If the TAG has a hand, he's going to be betting or raising and let the LAG know this pot is not to be bought.

I like the idea that you adjust your style slightly based on the opponents.

It can also make it more difficult to get a consistent read on you, which has to be a good thing.

And of course the whole idea depends on the reads you are getting in general, and how you are able to apply them.

the difference in TAG and LAG goes much farther then preflop play .

its the difference of making loose calls without pot odds and where a tighty will only make a call with pot odds and/or the better hand.

tight just means he's conservative about his moves and loose is just the opposite.

as an example we can use real world pro players.

we can say phil helmuth is a TAG

we can say gus hansen is a LAG