NC, I want to play like a maniac---My journey to the dark side

[Buccaneer]

If you wish to rag this post please skip it, if you can not help yourself please read the whole thing first. I don't care if it is ragged or not, only that you also reply in detail. This is not a tilt post. I played well this a.m. and was upbeat when I started it. I will admit that just thinking about this produces an empty feeling that verges on tilt because I can not seem to find a solution. Let me state again this is not a tilt/badbeat post. I am desperatly seeking a solution (and an online spell checker).

OK I know that maniacs are beatable and that we should be begging them to come to our home games, we should be glad that they are in tournments with us. We know If we play 10,000 hands with them that we will end up winning our 1-2bb/hr. The only problem I have found is that sometimes you only play 9,999 hands against them. What should you do to beat these guys into submission.

------------------------------
Example: Last night I played a live 10 player tourney. Guy to my left is a great guy but has to sometimes have the winner explained to him. He is a good player but if he doesn't know that his 5 kicker doesnt play because of the board cards then he just can not be that up on strategy. Right???? On the first hand I am on the button and get 88 dealt to me. The guy to my left bets about 20% of his stack, someone in middle position calls and then crybaby in LM thinks (which always means he is going to push) and he pushes his 77 that wins all the time on TV. I fold and guy on my left goes all in and the other guy as well. Guy on left trips up, crybaby leaves table in a huff, muttering about his cards and the dealers skills and I am sitting there with a full buy in less the bb. Guy on left buys a few pots and he now has about X4 his origional buy in.

This table is afraid of going up agains him now. I have won a few small pots. We get in a hand and it is folded around to me. I am on the button and attempt a steal and bet X3 the bb. Of course guy to my left goes all in and I figure that this is as good a time as any to stand up to him and it is time to settle this crap down. I do not want to bore you with the rest of the hand but lets just say I made the right decision, the right read, but lost the hand. I watched from the rail as this guy continued to buy pot after pot, playing 80% of his hands and eliminating player after player. He won the final hand with a 42o that he went all in to in response to someone that had more than one third of his stack.

Example 2: Home game, 25/50cent nl, $10 buy in. Guy buys in and begins to bet like he has a huge stack. Guy has to buy back in and keeps betting very aggressivly and doubles up with cheese. He continues to play most every hand, raising preflop with a large continuation bet on the flop. He buys pot after pot and draws out on you if you stay in the hand with him. He likes to say, "it's a betting game". He has to have the board explained to him. Sometimes he doesn't know if he won or lost. He plays cards that I would fold just looking at one of them but if he needs a card there it is on the river. When he gets tired and goes to bed I take over the table and remove most of the money that is left.
------------------------------------------------------

If you have read to here please tell me how to think about these players. Sure these guys are stacked but you know how they will play. They buy pots to finance more bully tactics and they take a hand to the river 9 out of 10 times. They are not bluffing. They play and make straights, flushes, boats, trips. They have no fear. They have a box of luck that follows them and even seem suprised if they do not get that runner-runner they were planning on.

I really do not believe in luck but the dark side is calling me. I want to read Helmouth, google the net for Gus Hanson. I am begining to crave learning at the feet of Darth Longshot, Sith River, and Chancelor Bad Beat. 2+2 has shown me the force, Obi wan Miller and Obi won Slansky are great teachers but I am not prepared for the lashing that the dark side is giving me. I know the dark side is evil but it is powerful and I must be unpure of thought because I am unable to use the force and defeat the evil of the dark side.

Seriously what am I missing. Where is the edge I need to exploit? I do not think it is wait these guys out. If correct strategy is to play tight preflop, with skill post flop and with selected and directed agression then why is it that if you want to beat someone playing like that you should play like a maniac. Why are they so successful? These guys are too successful for there to not be a flaw in our TOP, a leak in our bucket that it is easier to ignore than fix. The only way I can think of is to not play these guys but then I do not grow as a player. I want to grow and mature, become one with the universe, play perfect poker, and of course drink thier blood.

[amoeba]

its just short term variance.

and if you are play .25/.50 with $10 max, in other words 20bb stacks, then all you should be doing is waiting for premium hand then getting it all in preflop. the structure makes it pretty much a luckfest and alot of the postflop skills you learn will not be put in to use.

[Godfather80]

[ QUOTE ]
If you wish to rag this post please skip it, if you can not help yourself please read the whole thing first. I don't care if it is ragged or not, only that you also reply in detail. This is not a tilt post. I played well this a.m. and was upbeat when I started it. I will admit that just thinking about this produces an empty feeling that verges on tilt because I can not seem to find a solution. Let me state again this is not a tilt/badbeat post. I am desperatly seeking a solution (and an online spell checker).

OK I know that maniacs are beatable and that we should be begging them to come to our home games, we should be glad that they are in tournments with us. We know If we play 10,000 hands with them that we will end up winning our 1-2bb/hr. The only problem I have found is that sometimes you only play 9,999 hands against them. What should you do to beat these guys into submission.

------------------------------
Example: Last night I played a live 10 player tourney. Guy to my left is a great guy but has to sometimes have the winner explained to him. He is a good player but if he doesn't know that his 5 kicker doesnt play because of the board cards then he just can not be that up on strategy. Right???? On the first hand I am on the button and get 88 dealt to me. The guy to my left bets about 20% of his stack, someone in middle position calls and then crybaby in LM thinks (which always means he is going to push) and he pushes his 77 that wins all the time on TV. I fold and guy on my left goes all in and the other guy as well. Guy on left trips up, crybaby leaves table in a huff, muttering about his cards and the dealers skills and I am sitting there with a full buy in less the bb. Guy on left buys a few pots and he now has about X4 his origional buy in.

This table is afraid of going up agains him now. I have won a few small pots. We get in a hand and it is folded around to me. I am on the button and attempt a steal and bet X3 the bb. Of course guy to my left goes all in and I figure that this is as good a time as any to stand up to him and it is time to settle this crap down. I do not want to bore you with the rest of the hand but lets just say I made the right decision, the right read, but lost the hand. I watched from the rail as this guy continued to buy pot after pot, playing 80% of his hands and eliminating player after player. He won the final hand with a 42o that he went all in to in response to someone that had more than one third of his stack.

Example 2: Home game, 25/50cent nl, $10 buy in. Guy buys in and begins to bet like he has a huge stack. Guy has to buy back in and keeps betting very aggressivly and doubles up with cheese. He continues to play most every hand, raising preflop with a large continuation bet on the flop. He buys pot after pot and draws out on you if you stay in the hand with him. He likes to say, "it's a betting game". He has to have the board explained to him. Sometimes he doesn't know if he won or lost. He plays cards that I would fold just looking at one of them but if he needs a card there it is on the river. When he gets tired and goes to bed I take over the table and remove most of the money that is left.
------------------------------------------------------

If you have read to here please tell me how to think about these players. Sure these guys are stacked but you know how they will play. They buy pots to finance more bully tactics and they take a hand to the river 9 out of 10 times. They are not bluffing. They play and make straights, flushes, boats, trips. They have no fear. They have a box of luck that follows them and even seem suprised if they do not get that runner-runner they were planning on.

I really do not believe in luck but the dark side is calling me. I want to read Helmouth, google the net for Gus Hanson. I am begining to crave learning at the feet of Darth Longshot, Sith River, and Chancelor Bad Beat. 2+2 has shown me the force, Obi wan Miller and Obi won Slansky are great teachers but I am not prepared for the lashing that the dark side is giving me. I know the dark side is evil but it is powerful and I must be unpure of thought because I am unable to use the force and defeat the evil of the dark side.

Seriously what am I missing. Where is the edge I need to exploit? I do not think it is wait these guys out. If correct strategy is to play tight preflop, with skill post flop and with selected and directed agression then why is it that if you want to beat someone playing like that you should play like a maniac. Why are they so successful? These guys are too successful for there to not be a flaw in our TOP, a leak in our bucket that it is easier to ignore than fix. The only way I can think of is to not play these guys but then I do not grow as a player. I want to grow and mature, become one with the universe, play perfect poker, and of course drink thier blood.

[/ QUOTE ]

Value bet your good hands. And remember, good players get as lucky as bad players. It all evens out.

[ QUOTE ]
its just short term variance.

[/ QUOTE ]

exactly.

additionally another angle on the bad beat/rivered winner/hitting all their str8s flushes etc is:

These guys play so many hands of course they're going to hit more hands. How many times do you fold something like 74o and the flop comes down 744 or 356 etc? It happens.

Also bad players are getting it in with the worst of it a lot. Naturally then they have many more chances to put bad beats on people since they are behind much more frequently.

Good players tend not to give out bad beats because they are usually ahead to begin with. You never really think about how many times your 4:1 favorite holds up, just the suck outs.

[scrapperdog]

How to beat a maniac... wait until you have a good hand... let the maniac do his thing.. take the money. Look a lot of this is personal preference but I dont loosen up against a maniac. If you do that you are playing his game. This is a game (playing like a maniac) he is comfortable with and does all the time. He wants you to loosen up and play in a style you are not comfortable with. Dont fall for the trap. Eventually you will get into a good situation and get lots of maniac action, be patient.

There are fewer very sucessful maniacs than you think. You can be sucessful being loose agressive, but it takes very good judgement. Most maniacs are just action freaks, not people with excellent post flop judgement that can win long term with this style.

[amoeba]

and being a maniac with short stacks is just chip spewing most of the time.

[Buccaneer]

[ QUOTE ]
its just short term variance.

and if you are play .25/.50 with $10 max, in other words 20bb stacks, then all you should be doing is waiting for premium hand then getting it all in preflop. the structure makes it pretty much a luckfest and alot of the postflop skills you learn will not be put in to use.

[/ QUOTE ]

My point exactly. But this does not do anything but produce folds. I got AA twice and KK once in the space of 12 hands on line yesterday. My aces were cracked once and lost 5bb (normal variance, no big deal) the other aces tripped up and won and my KK was folded to me in the bb. These hands ended up +1 small blind. Fold, fold, fold, to any agression, that is what aware players are doing. They are not all idiots.

[xorbie]

I'm going to make this very clear. There is no foolproof, gauranteed strategy in NLHE. You can try to get it in with say 70% equity and hope for the best. Really, that's all. If you lose, well that happens 30% of the time. Don't play poker if you don't like it. That's how you win, is when the cards come your way.

[amoeba]

I don't understand your point.

are these players laying down to your aggression or are they maniacs?

[AthenianStranger]

If by "the dark side" you mean using your anger and hatred to win pots, then I think you are on the wrong track. LAGs who play emotionally are losers. Anyone who gets involved emotionally is a loser in poker. A good player, TAG or LAG, is able to use a player's emotions against him, and does not get frustrated himself. It may be right to get aggressive in certain instances against a LAG. There are different kinds. Sometimes I notice that when I start limp re-raising the LAG with my garbage, he slows down. You have to be able to concentrate and make the judgment. You can't just say, "I'm going to become a LAG." That's stupid.