soft playing

[casper]

I play in alot of different local games with alot of the same faces every week. I've developed friendships with some of the better players, we talk about different hands and styles of play, share information on other players and other games, travel together, etc. I've come to know most of their styles pretty well and they know mine equally well. Anyway when I end up heads up in a pot with these players we'll often just check it down, even if one of us has the nuts. Sometimes this means the other player gets a free roll and catches up, but usually the best hand takes it and we don't end up beating the hell out of each other. I play with these people every day and some sessions it costs me alot of money by not being able to extract the maximum for my good hands, when I make a majority of them against one of these players. Other sessions it means I save money when they make their hands against me. I'm really interested in what other people think about soft playing like this. In the long run will this hurt my game and ability to make a profit? Or will it be easier to make a profit, as the people most familar with my game and most able to read me won't be taking shots at me?

[PokerPrince]

Are you playing the game to make money or friends? Ask yourself this. There is a very old saying which I'm certain you've heard, "There are no friends in poker." I abide by this 100% and just about anybody with the right mindset for the game does also. My brother raised me to $240 in a 30-60 game a few nights back. Was I mad? No. We're playing a game where you want to take as many chips as you can off the other players. As far as whether it will cost you money or not by 'rolling them' with your friends depends on who is the better player. It WILL cost you money doing this against a player you have an edge over or can manipulate easily.

PokerPrince

[Ed Miller]

Any time you softplay someone, you aren't doing what you need to do to beat the rake. That is to say, if you softplayed with everyone, you would lose to the rake.

[Tommy Angelo]

I don't think softplaying with a couple regulars guys will cost you money. Any more than that, and it will, because you will soon suffer from "too many friends" syndrome, and once it sets in, it is nearly incurable. That's when you look at a game, ready to apply your normal game-selection criteria, and you realize that there is no point even sitting down because there's only a few players there that you even bet against. (This has never happened to me. I only officially softplay one person. But I've seen it happen to many others, even to the point that ten players will be in the casino, ready to play, but they won't sit down to start the game, because there are "too many friends.")

Tommy

[onegymrat]

You already know the answer to the question, "Will this hurt my game?" You just want to hear it from someone else.

[bernie]

i detest softplaying.

i hope you do this with new/unknown players at your table too. otherwise, it's a form of cheating. think of this from a new player view. he comes in, sees everyone softplaying, then he gets in a hand and gets bet into. its b.s.

it doesnt sound like youre in the game to make money though. but playing to have fun and meet people is a fine alternative.

b

[casper]

Thanks for the posts, I have a few comments in response. I've never soft played with more than two people at the table and its rare that I'll even do that (there are only two people I'll soft play with and they're rarely at the same game). I'm very aware of the rake and I'm in the game to beat the rake and turn a profit. The people I soft play with are always as strong, if not stronger than I am. These are the people that can actually put me on a hand, and they are the ones that know how to take me off a winner. I'll never soft play with a weaker player as far as checking it down. I won't always extract the maximum from a weaker player if I think it will make him more likely to leave the game, but I consider this very different from soft playing a friend. I don't think I'll ever suffer from the "too many friends" syndrome because I'm in this game to make a profit, not to make friends. I enjoy many of the people I play poker with, but this doesn't mean I give them any breaks when I have the best of it. Right now I'm only giving breaks to a couple people who know my game very well and could make it much harder for me to turn a profit if we went to war. Thanks for the posts, they helped me sort out my thoughts on the issue.

[Tommy Angelo]

"i detest softplaying."

I am all for softplaying. When I'm in a pot with two players who softplay each other, I think it gives me various types of edges that I would not enjoy if they played hard against each other. For example, those times when one of them bets, and the other has a hand he should raise with, but doesn't, because in his mind, he'd rather try to get a bet of me before I fold later and they check it down, rather than blow me out right away and then check it down.

Tommy

[bernie]

i take advantage of that too. if someone want to softplay me, fine, ill take a nice free/cheap draw.

what im talking about is when 2 regulars are playing, one has a great hand, but doesnt bet into his buddy, knowing, along with everyone else, that he will call. but then an unknown player sitting there, gets into the same situation, and now the guy is hardplaying him. the other day i watched a guy check quads on the turn and river (he was last to act) against a pal of his. then bets a nut full house against a guy who had just sat down.

it's bad for the game. even though there's nothing anyone can really do about it.

there is one player i will softplay, and that's because he will softplay everyone HU. he will even ask new players or give them a clue when it gets HU that he'd like to check it down.

but even then i may bet into him.

but selectively softplaying only certain players and not offering it to others is b.s.

b

ps...wasnt there a thread awhile back that you started where softplaying was involved? i cant remember, but it seems to ring a bell. or maybe those are the normal bells i hear in my head [img]/forums/images/icons/wink.gif[/img]

anyways, have a good one

[bruce]

Softplaying is b.s. It's bad for the game and it can
potentially cause a lot of hard feelings. I detest it
and when I see people doing it I always make a big stink
out of it. It's borderline unethical in my opinion. Three
guys are in a pot, two who will softplay one another. With
the three there is betting and raising galore and when the
third player folds the two bozos now check it down. How
can that be good for a game? How does the third player
feel if he is a new player? If this happened to me I would
be pissed. I complain about it and sometimes I even get
the floorperson involved although there is usually little
he can do. But the players who do this are usually good
winning players so by bitching I have nothing to lose except piss them off and maybe they will leave. Softplaying is great for a short handed game (ha ha ha). Might as well go sit in the bar and have a drink.

Bruce