i do not understand pokerroom.com stud players at all

[crockpot]

so here are two hands from my first couple of stud sessions at pokerroom.

1) i have kings up on fourth [(K4)K4], bet, and a guy showing an ace calls, along with two others. guy makes open aces on fifth and bets. since i've seen these kind of bets before with anything, i call him on fifth and sixth. on seventh street he checks, i bet my kings up for value, and he calls and shows trip aces(!)

2) i start with buried aces. open eights on fourth bet and get two callers, me and a guy with K7. K7 catches a king and bets, eights call, i call. sixth street the kings bet again and i'm the only caller. my board remains incredibly unthreatening. seventh he checks, obviously not having made a second pair. i bet the aces for value, he calls and shows a runner-runnered straight(!)

who the hell are these people?

on a side note, this site has terrible software and i do not recommend it to anyone except really desperate bonus whores.

[Dynasty]

I don't understand how you can think you've got a winning hand either time.

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on seventh street he checks, i bet my kings up for value, and he calls and shows trip aces(!)

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I probably would have bet trip Aces but I almost always would check Aces-up in this spot. What the hell are you doing betting into open Aces? You know he's going to call with two-pair and many players will fold a single open pair in that spot after geting called on 5th and 6th.

So, what was he thinking? Maybe something like this: "It's plainly obvious to everybody at the table that I have three Aces and yet this guy keeps calling me. Therfore, he must have a draw to something which beats trip Aces. I'll check and call the river if I don't make a full-house. He's not going to call anyway if he can't be my obvious trip Aces."

You should almost always fold your hand on 5th street. The pot would have to be large in order to make chasing worthwhile.

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i start with buried aces. open eights on fourth bet and get two callers, me and a guy with K7. K7 catches a king and bets, eights call, i call.

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Against most opponents, you should seriously consider folding. You probably should have done it on 4th street if the (x,x)8,8 is not excessively loose.

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seventh he checks, obviously not having made a second pair.

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Again, if I've got an open pair of Kings, I'm checking the river with Kings-up. It should be obvious that's the minimum hand I've got. I would have bet a straight in most situations.

[crockpot]

i think the clear difference here is the distinction between you and a bad player. facing someone of your caliber i would have folded both hands when the open pairs started betting. but i have rarely if ever met anyone on these websites whose 1/2 stud philosophy is not "keep betting until he raises me."

in the stud games i used to play on ub or party, i would check the river in these situations, and i would invariably be shown one pair and curse myself for missing a value bet.

if i had been shown two pair in either situation, that would have been no biggie; people will check and call with two pair. but in both cases the player had way more strength than they were representing, so i had no clue why their strategy was to check and call.

[MRBAA]

Sigh. You have played very badly, my son, yet you do not realize it. In the first hand, why are you calling open aces on fifth, with two more bb streets to go? Unless you suck out with a full you are almost certainly beat here. The pot is small. Your opponent has a better suck out redraw than you. Overcards = critical in stud.
Thank your opponent for not betting the river. I certainly would have.

Second hand, your opponent may not have recognized that he rivered the straight. Again, you decide your opponents are bad but forget that bad players get cards too. They both show significant strength early in this one, but you somehow think that the fact that
"I've got aces" means you must be ahead. What made you think the eights didn't have trips? Drawing to big two pair against multiple opponents in loose stud games is death.

Anyway, the good news is you posted here. I'd suggest giving opponents (or at least their cards) more respect. The way you make the most in these games is letting them call with their aces or two pair when your big draw hits. And they will call. Missing a few slim value bets on the river doesn't matter all that much compared to that, IMHO.

[tanda]

Agree with other posters.

The str8 non-bet was strange. The AAA non-bet less strange, but unusual nonetheless.

However, you played poorly. Probably never should have gone to the river in either hand. With correct play, the strange play of your opponents would have never happened or mattered.

[berya]

Yeah they suck but so do you. The two plays you made are terrible. If I see two players making these same mistakes in a middle limit game I'll play as long as I possibly can. And it doesn't matter that it was 1-2 or whatever you were playing.

[crockpot]

thanks to all for the frank comments. my stud game definitely needs some work, even if i won't freely admit it.

whether or not you like my play, i still was shocked at how some of these hands played out. it certainly seems like the 7-stud games are very ripe on small sites where only one or two tables of it are running, so they make for good bonus whoring play.