[Escotme]

30 NL, 6-max table. (Although maniac has busted out 2 shortstacks the last two hands, so now we're actually 3-handed.)

There's a maniac at the table - not an indisciminately crazy maniac, but an overly aggressive, half-thinking one - and I've been supertight, waiting him out. I did double up once against him after flopping the nutstraight a while ago. He's reloaded four times and has shown me - and only me - some respect at times. However, 9 hands ago, I folded a busted draw after a weak turn bet got raised 6x.

The questions that I'm looking for input to are these: Should I go for his stack on the flop or play it "safe", protecting my hand? What's the max EV play here?


- Maniac sitting in seat 2 with $42.65
- Hero sitting in seat 3 with $50.40 [Dealer]
- ruffneck1 sitting in seat 6 with $6.07
ruffneck1 posted the small blind - $0.15
Maniac posted the big blind - $0.30
** Dealing card to Hero: Q [img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img], K [img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]
Hero called - $0.30
ruffneck1 folded
Maniac bet - $3.00
Hero called - $3.00

** Dealing the flop: (2 players, $5.85) 3 [img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img], 10 [img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img], K [img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img]
Maniac checked
Hero bet - $3.00.
Maniac raised - $15.00.
So far, everything's been going according to plan. But what do I do now? Given how he's played the last 70 hands, I put him on MPGK here. He could of course have TPLK/MK or pp as well, but I'm 90% sure I'm ahead here and ready to put my stack in the middle - if need be.

There's $24 in the pot and he's got $25 left. The way I see it, I have 2 options: minraise to tease the rest of his stack away, but risking beeing outdrawn or push now.

How would you guys play this?

If you can come up with a mathematical answer to the EV question, I'd love to see the calculations.