[Guruman]

ok, after a bit of reflection i think i'm getting a better grip on what's going on here.

first off, the person that i played today was playing very well and had no excuse to be playing down at the limits that i was at. It was just a $5 LHE HU tourney and i was playing super low so that I could try some stuff out cheaply and vs supposedly weaker competition.

Of course, i never got the chance because this guy never raised pf.

since he limped 100%, the following situations began to occur:

1)I found myself with lots of marginally made hands in small pots on big streets. I had no idea where I was because he was limping big hands and trash alike.

2)Villain was capable of racing to showdown with all of his own marginal made hands. He was content to check behind Ahi or Khi on every street, and he'd call any bets that came his way. This means that the only hands he was betting were made hands and pure bluffs, which is an awfully nice mix to have.

3)villain was capable of threebet bluffs vs my flop checkraises and then followthroughs all of the way to the river. This made checkraising with bottom pair or Ahi draws difficult, because it was going to be expensive to showdown and his range was consistent with both big hands and air.

4)villain almost never raised when i donked the flop. it was either an immediate fold or a call with the intention of calling down or raising the river. He got max value out of top pair a couple of times from me this way when I had a made but slightly weaker hand.

5)villain played very straightforwardly vs me when he was oop. I generally either raised or folded pf, and he generally either checkfolded the flop or called down. I don't remember him checkraising much from oop.



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the net effect of all of this was that i was lost when oop and he know exactly where he was when he was oop, which was a major advantage and the mechanism by which i've been getting pwned.

I attempted to make the initial adjustment of just playing very straightforwardly when oop: checkfolding whiffs, betting or checkraising made hands and huge draws.

The problem is that I naturally whiff alot when I play poker, and my opponent re-adjusted by bluffing instead of giving free cards when i showed i was capable of resisting induction and betting for value.

Now its not as though I could tighten up any because I wasn't being given the opportunity to fold pf. This meant I had to either start rebluffing or calling down super lightly. I elected to kind of return to a standard oop strategy of checkraising pairs and draws, donking some with pairs and on scary boards, and slowplaying top pair and mid pp until the turn.

This got me back into all kinds of trouble again though, because all of the sudden i was putting money into small pots with no idea of where i was at again. I found myself raise/folding in some spots where I knew it was a bad idea to be in that position at all - especially because I made a couple of light calldowns that revealed big multistreet bluffs from the villain in good spots.

He didnt bluff too much. He bluffed just about right, and it was tough to match up with from oop.

so after all of this rambling here's the next thing i'm going to try when i face one of these guys:

1)continue to play standard poker from in position:

Every one of these players has been very straightforward and predictable when oop. They give up a little bit there and pf in exchange for the big rewards they reap postflop from in postion when i spew. I have to stay consistent at retaining my in position edge above all.

2)emulate their passiveness from oop and actively adjust tightness:

this means i need to be checking and calling with weak made hands like bottom pair and Ahi, and maybe just check/calling with some draws and bluffing whiffs out of tempo on the river. This should have the net effect of mirroring and neutralizing the oop strat that they have been employing against me while keeping me out of trouble postflop. The diff would be that they're checkfolding bigger pots on the flop than i am. It also allows me to realize the most equity with my hands that I can from oop.

The combination in position aggression and out of position looseness and passiveness should force my opponents out of thier comfort zones - specifically making them play more hands from oop and in bet/fold situations from in position.