Passive or Agressive?

[jay_shark]

A little bit of both .

I'm continuing my education in January .

[roommate]

psari, i wasn't implying that it was less than optimal at all... i meant it as an emphasis to convey encouragement even though you sound disheartened about your aggressive nature right now.

In fact, being the bettor/raisor is quite an advantage when compared to reacting to someone's bets/raises...

keep it up... maybe post some hand histories in this forum... and we will all give you our two cents

~rob

[jay_shark]

Hey Rob , speak for yourself , my opinion is worth one cent.

[roommate]

jay~

I find that the bankroll of your intellect is related to your ROR by the number of hours you play poker versus attend class (or watch discovery channel) proportional to the amount you sleep at night... the equaton is:

ROR = 1 - (1-POKER/CLASS^INTELLECT)/(1-POKER/CLASS^(INTELLECT*2)

where poker and class are normalized to hours spent sleeping.

I can conclude therefore, that my opinion is worth far more than 2 cents... and similarly, yours may be as well. Nichomacheo's intellect is however is an infintessimal fraction of a cent (POKER>>>SLEEP)

~rob

[jay_shark]

You crack me up .

[matrix]

I am an aggro LAG monkey HU and so far it works OK.

I built alot of my HU strategy around HOH2's HU section.

I work on the assumption that HU is a game about pairs I very rarely worry about flushes straights (unless the board is 4flush/4straight) and take TPNK MPGK to thew felt most of the time - until I have some reads at least.

I find that getting out of the blocks superfast usually gives me a nicechip lead by the time the blinds get to level 3 at the low stakes (NL $20) I play at, then I switch gears take my foot off the gas and play rocky for a levelthen just as the blinds pickup a notch again I go back to aggro and make some very easy steals at higher blind levels before the villain has twigged to what I am doing (some of them never do)

At least that's my default plan - If I discover my opponent is a station I slow right down and take another tack, if I pick villain for a rock I take another slant etc.

I think HU play is mostly about throwing your opponent off balance and figuring him out before he figures you out. Then playing a style that works best against the way they play.

You get dealt the best hand at the table 50% of the time after all [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

[Winenose]

[ QUOTE ]
But post-flop, I find that the plays where I am losing a lot of chips are when I fire at the flop with top pair, bet the turn as well, and then get raised on the river when an overcard comes down. I will call and my opponent will turn over top pair. Why did he call down with an overcard? Is it my image that is allowing him to call me down with less than stellar holdings?

Is it my image that is causing my opponents to play this passive style and be successful with it? Or is my strategy to careless to begin with?

Any thoughts?

[/ QUOTE ]

I bolded the important part.

I have this exact problem myself - I don't trust people.

Try not to call when you get raised on river, unless you have a monster. One pair is not. I know it's HARD. I once read a good saying on these forums somewhere, that applies (from the other side) to your situation :
"Don't be afraid to go all-in with your best hands because people feel like you insult their manhood and call with all kinds of crap"

[XxPenguinxX]

It's not futile, I do it all the time. But you have to have some grounds for thinking it will work. The sorts of things I'm looking for are (in some sort of order of importance):

- If Villain has been betting and a scare card comes, he slows down and tries to get to showdown cheaply

- He has shown that he is able to lay down hands he liked on the flop if the board gets messy

- He plays his own draws passively

Never try this on someone whose first instinct is to call - you'll need to commit too many chips to it to make it profitable.

In short - good thing to have in your playbook, but you must have the right conditions in place to try it.

[acidca]

[ QUOTE ]
I work on the assumption that HU is a game about pairs I very rarely worry about flushes straights (unless the board is 4flush/4straight) and take TPNK MPGK to thew felt most of the time - until I have some reads at least.[ QUOTE ]


leak!

I find playing ultra-aggro is the best way to play heads-up, but it is important to give your opponents credit for whatever hand they represent until you have reason to beleive they're FOS. Typical players will respond to heavy aggression by trying to trap you, not out-bluff you. To beat this, you must not allow yourself to lose very much when they hit a hand that's better than yours.

Another common (tougher to beat) strategy against super-aggros is to float. Luckily, floating doesn't work when you're willing to felt with MPGK, but after you fix this leak, you'll start to see players who like to float. Watch for guys who seem to call the flop a lot. Beating these guys involves a lot of pace-change. When I identify that someone is floating, I immediately switch to TAG play and exercise a lot of pot control.


-acidca

[K C]

Passive opponents are easier to beat than aggressive ones provided you're not beating yourself.

If you're having trouble here it's almost always because you're allowing yourself to be trapped by these donks too often. There's a big difference between aggressive and too aggressive and these fish will feed on the overaggressiveness and that's what you have to be wary of.

Several people have said keep it on the small side and that's excellent advice. You're taking more pots, they are taking less, and they are planning on the sum of their less being greater than the sum of your more. If you allow that to happen you're in trouble.

As for calling stations I've read that you want to bet less into them and this isn't necessarily the case and in fact the opposite is true generally. If you have the best of it against a random hand and they usually call you usually should bet.

The key with passive players is to minimize your mistakes and you do that by taking heed of the patterns of their play and adjust accordingly. You'll get some players who will only play the good hands and you've got to strengthen your requirements accordingly. Of course this makes it a lot easier to beat them as long as you take proper heed.

Bottom line though is that if you play an aggressive style and lose at HU you're beating yourself but it's not hard to fix and go from giving away matches to being pretty tough to beat.