An annoying STT tactic

[fnord_too]

Ok, here's a tactic that is annoying to me (thus I use it myself on other players [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img] ):

I raise with something like AQ, get called from someone in position. I miss the flop, fire a continuation bet and get called. I miss the turn, check and fold to a bet.

I know a lot of times I am getting taken off my hand by air or a hand that can't stand another lead, but I don't know which specific times those are (obviously). This tactic seems to be a favorite on PP since I have seen it a lot in the ring NL games, too (far less than I see it on other sites, but that may just be a sample size thing, since it really is a good tactic to counter relentless continuation betting). There, I counter it several ways, but one of them, firing a second round, just is not always feasible in an S&G because of stack sizes.

Where this tactic is most annoying is in the middle rounds where you still have to play post flop but a second barrel comits too many chips. The other ways of combatting this are not as effective, either, since you don't see a lot of the players enough for them to realize you use them.

One way is to lead you good to great hands on the flop and either check raise the turn or check call the turn and lead the river. (In a ring game doing something like check raising the turn tends to stick in peoples minds, and you see more hands against individual opponents so you actually can build up a history with them to exploit.)

Another way is to check the flop and mix up raising/calling/and folding when you miss. Check calling tends to scare the hell out of people in the middle rounds. Often I will check call, have the turn go check check and lead the river. Occasionally I have to bail on the plan if the board gets scary, but this line seems pretty effective and gets a lot of folds.

There are some other lines I occasionally use, but the reason this tactic is so frustrating is that most of the time the flops miss you, and playing lines in the middle rounds with weak at best hands can be costly. You just don't have enough time with most people to 1. know they are capable of this tactic and 2. exploit it with good hands to condition them to not want to play post flop against you.

This is a great line to use against people who will aggressively continue on the flop but give up resonably often there after.

So what are you least favorite lines to face and how do you deal with them? Do you deal with this line any differently? Are you one of those bastards that does this to me? Let's get some good general post flop discussion going that is geared to the short (but not tiny) stack play that is the middle game of STTs.