How to deal with the guy that always PFR's?

[Nubb]

I currently am a few months into my online poker 'career' and am an overall novice with Holdem. I've read this site a bit and ordered a few of the books. I am trying to learn as much as I can about No Limit Holdem.

But one particular theme is driving me nuts. I play $0.05/.10 NLHE on Bodog and in the long run (two whole months) have been going well. I play tight agressive and am working to play tighter preflop.

Usually when I play I find myself at a table with someone who is constantly raising $1-2 preflop. I dont mean every once in a while. I am talking every other hand.

Take the guy at my table tonight. I made a list of some hands he had preflop.

$1 preflop with KTs
$1 preflop with A2o
$2 preflop raise with AA
$2 preflop AJo
$1 prelop raise with QJs. Called an $8 AI that followed.
$1 PFR with pair of 6's. Called a $6 AI that followed.
$1 PFR with QJo.

Now this is preflop and the smallest buy in table I can find. Max money you can bring to the table is $10. But his stack is usually around $70 that he gets from buying out the pots of people who call his PFR.

After the flop though I have noticed that he will keep pushing money in until people fold. Most of the people at our tables will go through their complete buy in if they actually want to get to the end of the hand.

What I have basicly done to prevent my money being slowly drained is if I am not willing to pay $1 to see the flop I will not put my money down.

What is the best way to handle this particular person or people that play like them?

I have considered moving up to a higher table in hopes of finding people that dont do this. Would that at all be a wise choice? My BR is ~300 right now.

[vqc]

dont find players that play the way u want them to play
adapt to the players that are already there.

its a blanket statement. But its important.

[lolzzz_321]

N00b,

Try reraising AI preflop, or raising a flop bet.

Or switch tables...

[Demiparadigm]

LOL.
The most profitable players at $2000NL raise every other hand. Raising your stakes is not the answer.
Changing tables probably is though, if this guy is sitting to your left.

[Nubb]

dont find players that play the way u want them to play
adapt to the players that are already there.

its a blanket statement. But its important.

Thats what I'm asking for. Suggestions on how to adapt to this style of play.

[Demiparadigm]

dont find players that play the way u want them to play
adapt to the players that are already there.

its a blanket statement. But its important.

Not so important when you have a large game selection, such as you find online.

[vqc]

dont find players that play the way u want them to play
adapt to the players that are already there.

its a blanket statement. But its important.

Thats what I'm asking for. Suggestions on how to adapt to this style of play.

well ask ur self why there are different values of hands?
Where does this value come from?
How does this value change with a raiser who raises lots of hands?

WHy is he raising?
Does he have good hands everytime?
Is he aggro on the flop?
Is he only aggro preflop?
Does he check alot on the flop?

[Surf_Thug]

Don't get involved in pots unless you have a premuim hand. Once you get one push him back hard until all the money goes in the pot and you have his nuts on a chopping block.

If he's raising all the time, He must have junk cards most of the time.

[Rondavu]

His stack is usually around $70 (7x Buy in) that he gets from buying out the pots of people who call his PFR.

If someone is consistently sitting at a table with 7x the buy in, then you might want to re-evaluate your assessment of their skill level. He sounds like he has some real ability, and may be playing below his roll to practice the loose aggressive style. If you still think he's just a bullying maniac, then here's what you do....

1) Get a good hand and isolate against him. If he raises to 45¢ preflop, then raise to $1.50 or $2 with AQ suited or JJ.

2) Use his postflop tendancy against him. What this means is play tight passive postflop against him more often if your hand is not extremely vulnerable. Intead of raising your great flop hand and popping the red flag in his mind, just smooth call his ever increasing bet size attempts at pushing you out. Allow him to commit himself. What's happening is he's pushing around until someone fights back, and then he evaluates and folds if he has what he percieves to be a losing hand.

3) In relation to the last thing, maniacs often raise mid pocket pairs. The way to extract from that type of raiser postflop is to act passive, since there will usually always be over cards on the table, and any aggression will make him think he's beat. Often someone with a low pocket deperately wants it to hold up, so if you have top pair, it's best to let him think you are on some kind of draw so he'll keep trying to protect the dog so to speak.

4) Maniacs are easy to tilt. They are action junkies. If you build up a little bit on a table with him, then pick a spot and bluff him out hard with garbage. Then show him what you did. It will send critters through his mind. He'll become dangerously loose and pay off your real hands like no tommorrow. He'll start pushing preflop with stuff like AJ offsuit. That's when you have him.

Against tight players you bluff more, and against loose players you call more. Pick your spots and call him down.

[a500lbgorilla]

Uh.. call him with good cards?

-'rilla

[Fnord]

Uh.. re-raise him with good cards?

[pgil]

It looks like he is also changing his pf raise depending on the strength of his hand. A weak ace or worse is a $1 raise, whereas a mid ace or better is $2. Use this against him. If he raises $1, call, then push on a flop that would be scary to his range of hands. Unless of course he also calls postflop with garbage that hasnt hit, then just wait for a hand and double up.

[Rondavu]

Uh.. call him with good cards?

-'rilla

Yes. Not just good cards. Good cards on a fairly drawless board. Reraise and isolate preflop if necessary (best to not represent preflop when trying this), and then call down his attempts to purchase and bully. The purpose of doing this is of course to give you a later advantage on that player. You take a risk just calling down passive to show him it's unwise to press harder in the future just because you merely called on early streets or acted weak at any point. You can't always do what the situation calls for. You have to take calculated risks geared to specific situations in order to screw the read. It sounds like this bully was forming good reads. Sometimes the only way to combat that is to mix in a few change ups like Checking a vulnerable top pair and letting the opponent feel a pocket pair is good since you would have protected top pair "if you had it". Becoming passive as a ploy works very well against very aggressive opponents.

I certainly don't condone acting passive with good cards normally, but when dealing with a certain player, it pays to find a way to make them honest against you. It's all in the name of mixing it up and playing the player. It seems unorthodox, but I do what I have to do if the situation calls for it.

Say our villain raises before you, and since you have a loose read on him you just call in the cutoff with A6 suited. The flop comes out Ah 6c Ts. This is a perfect time to just call the villain down. He may have AJ, and now he's going to put you on ace worse kicker or a gut draw when you call the flop bet. He'll increase his turn bet feeling he might get a call from an outkicked opponent or chase out the draw, when you actually have two pair. In the end you'll rake in a huge pot. If on the contrary, you raise him hard on the flop, he assumes you have a better kicker, and he slows down or folds if he has any real skill. Most likely he slows down and seeks a cheap showdown. So why was it right to just passively call here? Because he's going to stick around anyway for any type of callable value bets you make on 4th street since he has AJ. Since you're both going to see 5 cards unless you push him completely out, it's best to assume you'll hold up unless something dramatic happens on 4th or 5th to change your mind. Becoming aggressive on this flop with this hand would only damage your implied odds against an aggressive opponent.

I want to reiterate that calling down passive is not a good idea as a consistent strategy. Only against certain opponents in specific situations. This just happens to be one of them. You can't be a robot. You have to manipulate sometimes.

[edudlive]

Maniacs = great implied odds

Just wait, your time will come. Play passive when you have a hand, and you'll be able to get all your chips in

Depends though. Sometimes it's possible to outlag people. For example, in a freeroll tournament I played against this guy who was trying to steal blinds often and defended his blind. I was also the same way so we clashed often. The flop was ALWAYS continuation bet, because if one checks the other bets in response every time. Then he started RAISING my continuation bets with nothing because he knew I couldn't flop a lot every time I continuation bet. So I started to re-raise his raise of my bet WITH NOTHING and he'd fold. That's how I outplayed him on a few occasions and comitting a quarter of his stack to re-re-raise me was too much for him so he laid it down every time.

[Rondavu]

Depends though. Sometimes it's possible to outlag people. For example, in a freeroll tournament I played against this guy who was trying to steal blinds often and defended his blind. I was also the same way so we clashed often. The flop was ALWAYS continuation bet, because if one checks the other bets in response every time. Then he started RAISING my continuation bets with nothing because he knew I couldn't flop a lot every time I continuation bet. So I started to re-raise his raise of my bet WITH NOTHING and he'd fold. That's how I outplayed him on a few occasions and comitting a quarter of his stack to re-re-raise me was too much for him so he laid it down every time.

This can get out of hand in a hurry, but damn it's so fun when you do it right.

[Rondavu]

Maniacs = great implied odds

Just wait, your time will come. Play passive when you have a hand, and you'll be able to get all your chips in

Exactly. Against an overaggressive player, you'll find yourself raising the river more often because you were trying to maximize your implied odds earlier. The implied odds you recieve from such a player allows you to take a little more risk in slowplaying. They may draw out on you, but you can more than make up for it with the enourmous long term implied odds against this opponent. You just have to know how to squeeze the implied odds out of an aggressive opponent who's forming reads attacking weakness.

It's not a matter of if, but when (and how often) he mistakes you for a draw and makes a huge bet to try and get you out of the pot.

[xX zorrito Xx]

raise all in with pocket pair higher than 8 to any raise lower than $1.50...

re-raise with A Q suited or better to a raise $1 or lower and call anything up to $3 depending on how many people act before you...

[eeeee]

Much great advice above.
But to spin it differently, the opponent is betting like he is sitting at $25 NL, and Nubb doesn't want to play that level, which makes for scared money. SO, while all the fine advice is valuable and correct and useful, it might be the better choice for Nubb to find another table until Nubb's TT getting forced AI is no longer a BR consideration, but merely a table consideration.

[edudlive]

"Against hyper-aggressive players, all your hands are stronger than they seem" - Dan Harrington

You might not reraise with TPTK against a taggy, but against Mr. Maniac, its a no-brainer.