Calling down with Ace high

[cartman]

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Duly noted. I've been getting wrecked in spots like this lately by 60/40/2-ish maniacs.

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Folding a big Ace against these guys is not an option in my opinion. It is just a matter of whether to check and call down or to bet "knowing" you will get raised and then calling down. It is the non-maniac type that are more of a concern to me.

Cartman

[Lash]

Scenario 1
When he raises the flop-

If your plan is to call down with Ace high when villain takes this line, I start to question why you think that should be your standard response. I’m sure a big factor is that you’ve seen him take this aggressive line so many times with 2 big cards, Ax, and some unimproved sm./med. PP’s etc. So now you automatically take a payoff line based on what?

1- PF hand values? Your AT is better than most steal raise hands… So what! You’re playing a post-flop situation now. It only matters what you do with AT in this situation. In other words, you need to worry less about your hand’s value… and worry more about your poor position and whether you should fight back or concede at some point in this hand (post flop)
2- Trying to slow him down? Playing Ace-high passively out of position will usually not accomplish that, in fact, it may encourage him to play even more aggressively – So now he’s going to start seeking maximum value with position vs. you more often – Uh oh

There may be other reasons you made this your default plan / line. Those 2 above would be my guesses, let me know if I’m wrong.

I prefer playing back at him on the flop, or calling - intending to play back and/or get away from the hand at some point by doing the following:

1 - 3-bet flop
2 - Call his flop raise intending to lead the turn
3 - Call his flop raise with the intention of check raising the turn

The difficult part in using any of the above 3 options is that you need to find motive to do so in the heat of the moment. In addition, you need to be aware that certain turn cards will force you to give up and/or become passive.

EXAMPLE MOTIVES FOR THE ABOVE 3 OPTIONS (these are vague examples, and there are many more, and for more specific reasons)

1 – You may be ahead
2 – The value of showing your opponents you are willing to play back at them
3 – You may be behind, but through your aggression you force your opponent into mistakes later in the hand
4 – Board texture, the flush-draw for example – there must be a way to represent it
5 – Potential turn cards that may force him to fold faced with your aggression
6 – Your outs – even if you are behind, you have outs, so why not play it aggressively?

[cartman]

[ QUOTE ]

I prefer playing back at him on the flop, or calling - intending to play back and/or get away from the hand at some point by doing the following:

1 - 3-bet flop
2 - Call his flop raise intending to lead the turn
3 - Call his flop raise with the intention of check raising the turn

[/ QUOTE ]

It is entirely possible that my approach is wrong, but playing back without a pair against this opponent is a recipe for disaster. He is absolutely going to at least see the river card in a confrontation like this. He is very likely to put even more raises in when he is played back at, with or without a real hand. He will always show down Ace high or better.

So playing back loses more money when he has us beat and doesn't diminish the chances that he will make us fold the best hand. The way you beat a chronic overplayer is to play back at them aggressively when you do have a hand and then let them spew some serious chips.

If the villain was capable of folding on the flop or the turn the situation would change considerably.

Cartman

[Wynton]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]

I prefer playing back at him on the flop, or calling - intending to play back and/or get away from the hand at some point by doing the following:

1 - 3-bet flop
2 - Call his flop raise intending to lead the turn
3 - Call his flop raise with the intention of check raising the turn

[/ QUOTE ]

It is entirely possible that my approach is wrong, but playing back without a pair against this opponent is a recipe for disaster. He is absolutely going to at least see the river card in a confrontation like this. He is very likely to put even more raises in when he is played back at, with or without a real hand. He will always show down Ace high or better.



[/ QUOTE ]

I don't know the answer, but is this type of opponent really someone you call a TAG? Sounds like a maniac to me.

[cartman]

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I don't know the answer, but is this type of opponent really someone you call a TAG? Sounds like a maniac to me.

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No this guy is not really a TAG in situations like these. This is one of the abundance of wannabe pros at 5/10 who have TAG stats but are massive overplayers, especially heads up. Here is a post about the type I am talking about.

Cartman

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For what it's worth, I have no idea if these lines are good or not.

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LOL....me neither.

This is why we don't much make money from TAGs. They are often unpredictable and our decisions can easily (and correctly so) go both ways.

[/ QUOTE ]

Cartman,

Looking back at this post, I realized I've misphrased what I meant. TAGs are much more predictable than most players. My intentions were that in these two scenarios, the usual 'TAG hand ranges' could be 50/50 in either direction and it really doesn't matter much what we do one way or another in the long run as long as we use decent judgment.

Sorry I couldn't provide more feedback when analyzing those specific examples.

[Lash]

O.K. I agree that if the "TAG" will not fold Ace high and maybe some small pairs when played back at, your line starts to look more inviting, but is that really a precedent you want to set? Your line says "Look buddy, I'm willing to call you down because I have Ace big and I know what you are all about in these situations."

Why not tend to say "Look buddy, we've been through this before, and I'm here to tell you - you're going to have to dig a little deeper to gain initiative/ free showdowns / etc vs. me here"

[DMBFan23]

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Why not tend to say "Look buddy, we've been through this before, and I'm here to tell you - you're going to have to dig a little deeper to gain initiative/ free showdowns / etc vs. me here"

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I like this quote a lot, I wonder what the median hand is that we need to do this...i.e. it's correct to do it a certain percentage of the time, so should we do it with any AK/AQ, and AJ only if we have a backdoor draw? just AK, and AQ if we have a backdoor draw? do we need a pair? etc. I think you're arguing that the worst hand you need for this is somewhere in the A high range, and cartman is saying it's somewhere in the pair range. I've tended to play more like what cartman said, because I'm a full-ring convert and probably a weak bitch. so your post surprised me as well.

[Jeff W]

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... Your line says "Look buddy, I'm willing to call you down because I have Ace big and I know what you are all about in these situations."

Why not tend to say "Look buddy, we've been through this before, and I'm here to tell you - you're going to have to dig a little deeper to gain initiative/ free showdowns / etc vs. me here"

[/ QUOTE ]

Because what I really want to say is "Look buddy, I know you're an unthinking retard who can't even hear me right now, much less adjust to my play. I'm going to own you over and over again, but hey, at least you get to keep the initiative!"

[sweetjazz]

[ QUOTE ]
Why not tend to say "Look buddy, we've been through this before, and I'm here to tell you - you're going to have to dig a little deeper to gain initiative/ free showdowns / etc vs. me here"

[/ QUOTE ]

In fairness, the read of the OP is that the villain often tries to keep the initiative too hard, leading to overplaying of marginal hands (and paying off when the OP has a real hand), and often doesn't take free showdowns on the river.

So while I agree with your philosophy in the abstract, I am not sure this is the kind of opponent against whom we want to apply it, based on the OP's read.

It's true that in limit it's easier to play too passively than too aggressively, but online there are many players who play too aggressively and the correct counter strategy is to become passive in certain spots.

I'd rather show him that we're going to take a lot of his money everytime we hit a big hand and then if he adjusts we can start playing back at him with a wider range of hands.