How Do You Play Superaggressively?

[ QUOTE ]
The real trick is that you don't want to be seen going to a showdown with bad cards very often, so you want to try to take down pots when you have nothing by them folding, and get them to a showdown when you have a monster by making good bets against those who will see you to the river, that way the rest of the table thinks that you are tight.

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Does the rest of the table really believe you're tight if you're winning 1/3 of the total pots played? You must be in 1/2+ the total pots played. Honestly, I'm mystified, do people really not catch on as long as you showdown an occasional hand/monster?

[DeuceKicker]

If I'm understanding your question, the key is to mix it up. You can't overbet the pot every time you don't want to be called, and value bet when you want a call.

Many pros say that the most common mistake rookies make is overbetting their bluffs when a much smaller amount would work, and with less risk.

Are you suggesting that I value bet as a bluff? Isn't a value bet supposed to get called? I don't intend on overbetting the pot, I intend on making uncallable bets. Half the pot may be uncallable, while 1/4 the pot may've been a value bet that would've been called.

Well, shorthanded it was very obvious I was involved in alot of hands, but early on when the blinds were 10/20-25/50, I was picking up alot of pots since I knew most 2+2ers would be playing tight and not trying to get into confrontations without a hand, so I picked up alot of small pots early on. Once I had a big stack, it is easy to raise pf and even if your opponent knows you are doing what you are doing, there is little they can do about it besides call and see a flop, or push over the top, and unless they themselves were also deep stacked, they didn't have enough fold equity to push over the top when I was big stacked, and most of the bigger stacks were trying to avoid confrontation and steal themselves from the others.

I'd probably say that alot of the hands I won without a showdown never made it to a flop, and I was about at 25-30% to see a flop from my stats. It mystified me too when I saw my stats for that tourney, was not fully aware how much I was getting involved, but the great thing about playing that was, when I did have a big hand, people wouldn't put me on it and would sometimes push over the top, and when I did get caught stealing, since I had won enough pots without getting caught, it didn't hurt me too bad.

If its not too far back, I can send you the tournament summary of that tourney, it was on my hard drive on my laptop, but my laptops hard drive died, so I'll need to email it to myself if its not already lost.

EDIT: checked the summary, my stats were slightly off, was doing it from memory. I was in 13% after the flop, and won a little under 1/4 of the total hands I played.

You finished in 2nd place (eliminated at hand #2875595627).

320 hands played and saw flop:
- 17 times out of 56 while in small blind (30%)
- 15 times out of 56 while in big blind (26%)
- 10 times out of 208 in other positions (4%)
- a total of 42 times out of 320 (13%)

Pots won at showdown - 9 out of 11 (81%)
Pots won without showdown - 68

[AceofSpades]

Hey dirty, I'd like to see the summary if it isn't too much trouble.

Joseph

Send me a PM with your email.

[Cactus Jack]

[ QUOTE ]
Aggressive play is defined as (bets+raises)/(checks+calls).

Think about this. Where do folds fit in? Are you a baseball fan? Folds are like walks. They don't count as an "At Bat", but they are an appreciated and necessary part of a hitters repetoire. As a baseball fan, we like to see our favorite take pitches and get walks. Sure, it is better when he hits a HR, but if the pitcher doesn't give him a good pitch, he shouldn't swing at it.

So... Good aggressive poker incorporates a lot of folds. I'm not talking about "great laydowns". If you are an hyper-agro player, you shouldn't be making great laydowns, because players will be playing back at you with far less than the nuts. I mean, you raise 97s PF, the flop rags and the other guy bets out.... you fold!!! It isn't about constantly "putting your opponent to a decision for all his chips" it is about constant pressure. Constant bet bet bet that wears down your opponent and eventually gets him to make a mistake. What mistake? He raises back with nothing and you have TPTK. Or he gets his entire stack in the middle when you have a set. THAT is the benefit of agro play. Part of it is the slow accumulation of tiny pots, but the bigger part is making your opponent make a mistake for his entire stack.

[/ QUOTE ]

I'm quoting the entire thing again, because it's such a great post! NH, sir!

The trick to playing super-aggro is the ability to control the pot and to get away from hands. He who can't, is a fish.

Anyone who gets a lightning-bolt of realization from CSC's post, should see their game jump an entire level. Jack impressed with the simplicity. Jack very impressed. Wow.

CJ

[Kirkrrr]

The key to being a very aggressive player is to have extremely accurate reads on the players you're against, since a lot of times you'll be in very marginal situations and will have to know precisely who you're playing to be able to come to the right decision. Your variance will also be very high since you'll still make mistakes, i.e. "I know he's got AK, but he should know I just rivered my flush, so there's no way he can call my all-in... Okay, push... Fold! Fold! Fold!... Damn! HOW COULD HE CALL?!!! Next tourney."

But being very good at reading people, trusting your instincts, and having the balls to go with your reads are the keys, I believe, to playing very aggressively.

Kirk

Not that there haven't been some great posts in this thread (thanks CSC), but I'm going to try to address OP's question about value bets a little more specifically. When I use the term 'value bet', I usually mean a bet where I think I am a favorite against Villain's calling range. A 'bluff' is a bet where I do not think I am such a favorite, but believe I have enough FE to compensate.

It sounds like when you say 'value bet', you are talking about a bet of a specific size. Implicitly, I think you are assuming that the size of the bet is the primary factor in influencing whether or not Villain calls. Thus, when you say 'value bet' you mean a bet small enough that Villain can call easily, and by 'bluff', you mean a bet large enough that he can fold easily.

If you are trying to play very aggressively, I think it is a big mistake to think in this way. More than ever, you have to be aware of your table image and your dynamics with each individual at the table. I'd suggest re-reading CSC's post about table dynamics in the Anthology.

The key to playing aggressively (or maybe just to playing?) is using your stack constantly to give your opponent's difficult decisions. If you make it very easy for them to call or very easy for them to fold, you are not giving them difficult decisions. Even if you are getting them to make mistakes, by folding when they are ahead or calling when behind, they are not making maximally large mistakes.

Consider your example, where you are trying to get TT to call your AJ on a KJxxx board. If there is 600 in the pot and you bet 100 and he calls, ok, he made a mistake, you profited. But he didn't make a big mistake, and you dindn't make a big profit.

Suppose, instead, that you've been paying close attention to this Villain for about an hour now. You've bluffed him out of a pot or two, and you've seen him snap off a bluff by check-calling an overbet all-in with top pair when the third spade came on the river. If you can really put him on a range as narrow as a pocket pair lower than J's, then consider firing 500-700 at the 600 pot when he checks to you on the river. This is still a value bet, because you think there's a good chance he'll call with a hand like TT.

You can also make small bluffs. Suppose you raise with 67h and the board comes QQJ, with two hearts. Villain leads into you, and you put him on something like an underpair, figuring he would trap with a Q and maybe even a J. Make a small raise, maybe about three times the size of his bet, and let him call you. He checks the turn to you, fire again, for about half the pot. You miss on the river but he checks to you, make one more bet, 1/2-3/4 of the pot. You might consider this a value bet, because of its size, but since you've been 'value betting' all along, he'll be hard-pressed to call you down with 8's. And of course, if he folds even one time out of three, you profit. If all of your bluffs are pot-sized or oversized bets, you have to succeed a lot more frequently to make them profitable.

The heads up game Harrington discusses where Negreanu makes a small check-raise to represent a flush on the river is a great example. The key was that he knew how his opponent would interpret a small raise like this, and he knew that that opponent had seen him play a flush like this earlier in the tournament.

As a super-aggressive player, you should be value-betting ALL THE TIME. According to Sklansky, many top pros don't even consider their bluffs to be +EV in themselves. Rather, they are setting up +EV value bets later. You HAVE to value bet hands like AJ on a KJxxx board, hands that a TAG would have to check behind, because Villain's calling range against you is going to be so much wider.

You are absolutely right that you can't just shove when you are bluffing and make post-oak bets when you are ahead. Mixing it up and knowing exactly how much this particular Villain will call for and how much he will fold for is critical. Especially on the river, when there is nothing left to draw to, many players make calls based on reads more than on pot odds. That means that if they have convinced themselves you are bluffing, no amount of money will keep them from calling. Recognizing these spots and shoving with TPTK is crucial.