How to best take advantage of a drunk maniac game?

So,

This situation happens quite a lot at my live games. As the night go on, and the people get drunk, the play gets totally out of hand.

I've seen massive pots taken down with top pair terrible kicker, and even worse.

Obviously, if you give them enough rope, they'll hang themselves, but I still feel like I'm not getting as much value as I should against these players.

What should I be doing?
- Isolating myself into hands with them?
- Loosening up my opening hands at the end of the night?

I'm winning, but only in very small amounts. I feel like I can never get the cards to end up with these people.

Thoughts?

[miajag81]

In this type of game I basically try to see a lot of flops as cheaply as possible, and bet huge when I flop a big hand. Pretty basic advice, but you have to wait till you make a good hand and get them to pay you off as guys like this are essentially unbluffable.

[Skuzzy]

2 schoolsof thought IMO opinion are,

1. patient tight play. This is broadly speaking the art of keeping out of the way while they trade punches and only getting involved when you are 'loaded for bear'. Technically, avoid playing hands where you have only a small edge.

2. play everything. Use your superior post flop skills to massacre the drunken fools. This is the more appealing approach but you have to like the high variance game and expect to lose to a lot of junk two pair hands. If this is a home game this approach is more amiable and will win you friends if not the money.

[ QUOTE ]
2 schoolsof thought IMO opinion are,

1. patient tight play. This is broadly speaking the art of keeping out of the way while they trade punches and only getting involved when you are 'loaded for bear'. Technically, avoid playing hands where you have only a small edge.

2. play everything. Use your superior post flop skills to massacre the drunken fools. This is the more appealing approach but you have to like the high variance game and expect to lose to a lot of junk two pair hands. If this is a home game this approach is more amiable and will win you friends if not the money.

[/ QUOTE ]

Approach 2 is what I've been thinking. Keep tight all night, and when it starts getting ridiculous, play almost anything with a king or ace, and just play post-flop as well as I can.

I'm going to try this next time and see what happens.

I'm sure the variance is going to be crazy [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]