The Second lowest game in any room

[deucesevenoff]

Its not so much that the players are loose or tight, its just that my friend seems to have an easy time representing a hand that can beat what he suspects they have. This is what I mean when I say that they are not necessarily loose or tight per say (there always seems to be a mixture) but that they are easily manipulated after the flop and not expert players. Hence, bluffing can become profitable.

Something I forgot to mention earlier- whenever my friend is bluffing he is doing it with the benefit of position.

[deucesevenoff]

So are you always being aggressive with a made hand/semi-bluff or are you playing aggressively when you have no hand and no draw? Is all the "equity" you need against a weak tight player the ability to represent a hand rather than make one?

[deucesevenoff]

[ QUOTE ]
Deuce:

I have played many hours of 4-8 at FW and these are my thoughts:

1. How much is your buy-in? Are you leaving room for swings? I typically buy in for $200 and have $100 in reserve. I rarely bluff at this limit and have never left down more than $20 playing 5+ hours per session. The only time I bluff is to build a loose table image with some of the local rocks who might pay me off later.




I usually buy in for $200 and that is it. When I get down I tend to go on tilt so I figure that the best medicine is to cut my losses and re-evaluate rather than blowing an extra $100. When I tilt, rather than playing looser and more aggressive I tend to tighten up even more and fail to extract value from my good hands.

2. If you are always going broke at this level you may have another leak in your game that you need to examine.




Yes, I have many leaks and I think not bluffing enough is one of them. The other major one is not extracting enough value from my made hands ("I must be outkicked"; "the guy must have had a flush draw"; "must have flopped a set"...stuff like that). Making folds (correct or otherwise) has never been a problem for me.


3. Are you raising enough? There are player's in this game who never raise even with AA's. You need to play strong hands aggressively to build pots.




I tend to play my strong hands aggressively, the trouble is that those are sometimes few and far between- its the marginal situations which will really define any given player's winrate.

4. Table selection is key at FW - change tables if 4 or more players are not seeing the flop on a regular basis.




Never tried this...I'll look into it next time we go. Thanks for the suggestion.



5. Play slightly looser if you don't see much raising pre-flop from you're opponents.


I agree...I should probably try playing some more online where I can get more experience for less $$. I think that for any given limit, online is considerably tougher than live (i.e. 2/4 online is a much different game from 2/4 live)

Good Luck

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Thanks!

[deucesevenoff]

By "bluffing" I mean betting when the actual equity you have in the pot is close to zero...you derive nearly all your value from the ability to represent a hand rather than to actually have it. The old "what does he think I have" rather than "what do I have."

We are typically playing on the weekend- Saturday and Sunday afternoons. I'm as surprised as you are that this works at this time of the week. In my experience the flops are usually contested 3-4 handed while I am there.

I absolutely have other leaks in my game. Not paying attention when I am out of a hand is probably the crux of my problem. I think that if I were more involved than it would force me to pay attention and try things I normally would not (i.e. betting raising when the straight card hits even though I was going for a flush).

[deucesevenoff]

Thanks everybody for all the great advice. I will try and incorporate some of these suggestions the next time I am at the Woods (or any casino for that matter) and see how they work.

If I'm going to get better I MUST learn to shift gears- and high gear selectively LAGGish play is one of those gears.