Speed of play against a maniac. [Archive] - Two Plus Two Older Archives

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JustToast

06-16-2005, 01:59 PM

Played 70 hands last night with a certified maniac. Most against Maniac went his way. Also had one guy who was 89.8% VP$IP, 8.14 PFR, and WTSD: 57.45 with a AF of 0.35 to sweeten each pot.

Maniac Stats:
VPIP: 95.05 (he must have pressed the wrong button once)
PFR: 15.84 (capped raised pots no matter what, but would call if not raised)
Limp-Reraise PF: 6.93
AF: 2.69
Won$ WSF: 36.08 (wow)
WTSD: 62.89
Won$ @ SD: 37.7

Maniac wins both of these.

Party Poker 0.5/1 Hold'em (10 handed) converter (http://www.selachian.com/tools/bisonconverter/hhconverter.cgi)

Preflop: Hero is UTG with K/images/graemlins/club.gif, K/images/graemlins/heart.gif.
Hero raises, 1 fold, UTG+2 3-bets, 7 folds, Hero caps, UTG+2 calls.

Flop: (9.50 SB) 9/images/graemlins/heart.gif, Q/images/graemlins/diamond.gif, 8/images/graemlins/heart.gif (2 players)
Hero bets, UTG+2 raises, Hero 3-bets, UTG+2 caps, Hero calls.

Turn: (8.75 BB) A/images/graemlins/heart.gif (2 players)
Hero bets, UTG+2 raises, Hero calls.

River: (12.75 BB) T/images/graemlins/spade.gif (2 players)
Hero bets, UTG+2 raises, Hero calls.

Final Pot: 16.75 BB

Results in white below: 
Hero has Kc Kh (one pair, kings).
UTG+2 has 7s Jd (straight, queen high).
Outcome: UTG+2 wins 16.75 BB. 

Party Poker 0.5/1 Hold'em (9 handed) converter (http://www.selachian.com/tools/bisonconverter/hhconverter.cgi)

Preflop: Hero is MP1 with A/images/graemlins/club.gif, A/images/graemlins/diamond.gif.
2 folds, Hero raises, MP2 3-bets, MP3 caps, 4 folds, Hero calls, MP2 calls.

Flop: (13.50 SB) J/images/graemlins/spade.gif, J/images/graemlins/heart.gif, 4/images/graemlins/heart.gif (3 players)
Hero bets, MP2 calls, MP3 calls.

Turn: (8.25 BB) 7/images/graemlins/diamond.gif (3 players)
Hero bets, MP2 calls, MP3 raises, Hero calls, MP2 calls.

River: (14.25 BB) K/images/graemlins/club.gif (3 players)
Hero checks, MP2 checks, MP3 bets, Hero raises, MP2 calls, MP3 3-bets, Hero calls, MP2 calls.

Final Pot: 23.25 BB

Results in white below: 
Hero has Ac Ad (two pair, aces and jacks).
MP2 has Qs Qh (two pair, queens and jacks).
MP3 has 3s Jc (three of a kind, jacks).
Outcome: MP3 wins 23.25 BB. 

Now, obviously this isnt a normal way to play against the typical passive opponent at 0.5/1, but against a maniac how do you guys play these?

milesdyson

06-16-2005, 02:06 PM

well you're playing inconsistently on the turn and river in both of these hands. against a maniac, i like to "set" a certain amount of bets aside given the strength of my hand relative to his likely hands and the nature of the board. in both hands, you should either 3-bet the turn or check call the river.

so, you go as many bets as you want (early) and decide that if he's still playing back at you for big bets on the turn, then you slow down. i really dislike that river check raise. when maniacs cap preflop, suddenly slow down to call the flop and then raise the turn on a paired board, a red flag should go up and you should get a weird feeling in your butthole.

Tapin

06-16-2005, 02:40 PM

I tend to switch to call-down mode a lot faster than others around here. With a good-but-not-great hand like KK against a three-flush and an overcard, I'd have called down immediately after the turn raise. I'm also not too confident in AA against a high pair on the board and someone else (other than the crazy guy) hanging around. But I'm definitely not laying either hand down, either.

Think of it this way: Against a better player, you'd to bet to ensure action. Against the maniac, he's going to be betting -- but the end result is that you're still getting the same action.

It's not against the rules to play passively if someone else is playing aggressively enough for the both of you. Generally, I try to decrease variance in these high-variance situations by letting them control the hand.

(Now, having said all of that, I should mention that that's my game plan at least -- and I'm not disciplined enough to follow through on it very often.)

JustToast

06-16-2005, 03:09 PM

[ QUOTE ]
well you're playing inconsistently on the turn and river in both of these hands. against a maniac, i like to "set" a certain amount of bets aside given the strength of my hand relative to his likely hands and the nature of the board. in both hands, you should either 3-bet the turn or check call the river.

so, you go as many bets as you want (early) and decide that if he's still playing back at you for big bets on the turn, then you slow down. i really dislike that river check raise. when maniacs cap preflop, suddenly slow down to call the flop and then raise the turn on a paired board, a red flag should go up and you should get a weird feeling in your butthole.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yes, I was definately inconsistant here -- not my best efforts... thus the questions. Your idea of number of bets to set aside against a maniac is interesting though and I might take that one to heart.

I think what really got me into believing he was full of [censored] in every hand (stupid I know), was a hand previous to these. I had KQs, flop came down all undercards but I had OESD. The board in the end double-paired 7's and 5's and I had two opponents, maniac bet, another player called, and I didnt overcall. Maniac ended up winning a 20+BB pot with 93o -- nothing but a 9 kicker but I didnt give the caller credit for being so bad.

This may have induced some tricky thoughts, which in turn led to these hands. You'll notice in the first hand here, he raises the turn with nothing but a gutshot (which hit at the river). That probably contributed to the second hand.

Tapin

06-16-2005, 03:18 PM

[ QUOTE ]
I think what really got me into believing he was full of [censored] in every hand (stupid I know), was a hand previous to these.

[/ QUOTE ]
The trick I've noticed is that with players like this you can't say "I know he's got crap", you have to say "I don't have any idea what he's got" -- since he'll play the nuts and drawing dead the exact same way.

Yeah, I can't do it very well either.

grjr

06-16-2005, 03:24 PM

[ QUOTE ]
The board in the end double-paired 7's and 5's and I had two opponents, maniac bet, another player called, and I didnt overcall. Maniac ended up winning a 20+BB pot with 93o -- nothing but a 9 kicker but I didnt give the caller credit for being so bad.

[/ QUOTE ]

What did the other guy have then? A pair of 3's or something?

JustToast

06-16-2005, 03:27 PM

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
The board in the end double-paired 7's and 5's and I had two opponents, maniac bet, another player called, and I didnt overcall. Maniac ended up winning a 20+BB pot with 93o -- nothing but a 9 kicker but I didnt give the caller credit for being so bad.

[/ QUOTE ]

What did the other guy have then? A pair of 3's or something?

[/ QUOTE ]

Correct.

JustToast

06-16-2005, 03:32 PM

Another related question...

How often will you call a maniac down with less than top pair?

grjr

06-16-2005, 03:54 PM

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
The board in the end double-paired 7's and 5's and I had two opponents, maniac bet, another player called, and I didnt overcall. Maniac ended up winning a 20+BB pot with 93o -- nothing but a 9 kicker but I didnt give the caller credit for being so bad.

[/ QUOTE ]

What did the other guy have then? A pair of 3's or something?

[/ QUOTE ]

Correct.

[/ QUOTE ]

At least he didn't have the Nut Low. /images/graemlins/wink.gif

I have a LOT of trouble playing against maniacs. More often than not I run into them in their "catching all the cards" phase. I think I prefer to move on somewhere that's going to have a lot less variance.

I personally feel that maniacs reduce the skill gap between them and myself and increase the luck factor. This puts me in the same boat with all the other players at the table. So if I have no distinct advantage over the table it's probably not wise for me to stay there.

Anyone else feel this way or am I talking out of my ass again?

TomBrooks

06-16-2005, 03:59 PM

Hand 1

Looks to me like you are being too aggressive here, at least on the turn and river. The board is full of cards in the playing zone including an ace and three flush cards and you only have one pair.

grjr

06-16-2005, 04:01 PM

[ QUOTE ]
Another related question...

How often will you call a maniac down with less than top pair?

[/ QUOTE ]

If you can get him heads up then probably over half the time. The problem I run into (at .50/1 anyways) is the others at the table realize the maniac has nothing and will call your early 3 bets with hands they would normally fold. Then they stick around until the end because the pot has gotten so big and you usually end up losing to one of them.

The only time maniacs are a good thing to me is when I happen to be the one catching the good run of cards at the time. This hasn't happened very often though.

TomBrooks

06-16-2005, 04:07 PM

Hand 2

Why did you only call the turn raise and then check raise the river, particularly to a somewhat scary K (in case Villian had KK)? He already appears to have a J for trips.

Tapin

06-16-2005, 04:14 PM

[ QUOTE ]
How often will you call a maniac down with less than top pair?

[/ QUOTE ]
Frequently, especially since against a maniac I tend to tighten up my preflop hand selection. If I start with what I figure to be a very good or premium hand against someone betting a random hand, I'll typically want to see how it ends up.

About the only time I typically fold against someone who is truly a maniac, once I've committed to the flop, is when the turn and/or river completely every possible available draw (say, I've got red AK against a board of 8s9sTsJs2h). There've gotta be a ridiculous amount of cards that hurt me for me to feel threatened by a maniac's aggression.

Of course, this leads to high-variance results.

JustToast

06-16-2005, 04:37 PM

[ QUOTE ]
Hand 2

Why did you only call the turn raise and then check raise the river, particularly to a somewhat scary K (in case Villian had KK)? He already appears to have a J for trips.

[/ QUOTE ]

I suppose I couldnt give him credit a J based on his play, but had i noticed that he didnt raise the flop, it should have clued in that he had it -- he raised almost everything else. I checked the King at the river to check if the guy caught in the middle had KK as my read on him was a high PP wanting to showdown. Then, I suppose, I tried to figure whether i believed the maniac had the Jack... i guessed wrong. I certainly don't like the way i played this hand though.

Regarding why I didnt believe him with the J, read my post a few from the top about the KQ hand where he raised the turn and showed down 93o to win with a 9 kicker on a double paired board.

aces_dad

06-16-2005, 08:27 PM

I also slow down unless I want to be raised, as the maniac will be doing your value betting for you. It's harder to
put them on a hand, as it is basically random.

In the first hand I check/call that river (and perhaps the turn), even holding one A he's got you beat.

In the second hand I don't check/raise against a maniac without the nuts, as now you're three bet when perhaps 2 bets would have been what you wanted.

However I wouldn't worry too much about these two bad beats, if you get to play an hour against this guy and only get involved in say 8 hands with him, you're likely to win at least 6 of them. Just do your best to isolate him PF, be prepared to call down with marginal hands and hope he gets lucky off of others so he has money to pay you off with.

jrz1972

06-16-2005, 09:16 PM

Just some general advice. When you're playing against a maniac, especially HU, this is not the time to trot out your fancy plays and marginal check-raises. Do not get into a pissing contest with a maniac. That is like waving a red cape in front of a bull. The maniac wants to take control of the table. Let him. Let him bet your hand for you. If your hand warrants leading off or raising or value betting or whatever, fine, go ahead and make the standard plays, but don't try to bully the maniac and don't try to push him off his hand.

You have to realize that the maniac does not always have crap, and he is not always spewing. Sometimes he actually has something. The maniac's range of hands is much much broader, which means that you usually can't put him on anything in particular, but just because you can't put him on a hand doesn't mean he doesn't have a hand.

You should view most (not all) HU hands against the maniac as essentially a WA/WB situation. The maniac will often bet into you with absolutely nothing, but because he'll PFR with nothing you really have no way of knowing that he hasnt hit the flop hard in an unexpected way. You'll should be doing a fair amount of passively calling down with overcards and even TP compared to your fights with other more sane players.

HEPAP has a nice chapter on this topic.

Sinnister

06-16-2005, 10:18 PM

I was amazed at ur turn bet on hand one but given ur read on the guy while playing with him and after seeing what he had u played it perfectly, im not sure if u check called teh river but thats what id have done on that board with the A. Hand 2 I probably wouldve reraised the flop, buit all in all i think u played both extremely well and just got beat nothing more.

GL