My 1st post - Really bad games

[mojo42]

Hello everyone, I am a long time lurker on the forums, and I have learned a lot. I have decided to uncloak and let my voice be heard. I usually like to think about things a *long* time before stating an opinion, but poker is about quick decisions - so trial by fire, as it were. I am a limit player (short and long hand) from sunny (rainy) Barcelona.

For my first post I wanted to talk about really bad games. That is, games where the players are all bad. By bad, I mean avg. VP$IP in the neighborhood of 65%, cold-calling with impunity, lot's of shot taking and going too far with most hands. Needless to say this type of game requires strategy changes.

The reason you can't play DEF poker (I use ABC to refer to standard full-ring play, DEF to refer to standard attack and defend play) is that when you raise you are likely to be called in *all* spots. Take a good SH hand like pocket 8s. You're MP and you raise only to find 5 players taking the flop at 2 bets each. Unless you hit your set, your hand is (probably) trash. More damaging, at 10-1 at the onset of the flop, all bottom pairs and g/s's are now correct to take cards. And whattya gonna do if QK hits a pair? No flop action will reduce. The only chance is on the turn, but many times hitting the flop in this spot comes down to taking odds to draw to 2P or trips.

I usually take the advice of HPFAP in the section on loose games; that is I am only raising big suited. I am *limping* all pairs and premium offsuits (unless I am on the button, or one off with a tight button). I am further limping (as if I am MP full-ring) with all good multi-way hands (T9s comes to mind) *as if there had been an EP limper full ring before me*.

The reasons are obviously to manage the pot size in the case of TP hands, and to get into good multi-way situations otherwise.

Outside of two implicitly colluding LAGs at the table, this type of games gives me the most headaches, and I was hoping to get some comments or ideas others have had about this type of situation. I seem to be in this situation 2 out of 3 times at $2/$4, and I am probably making some assumptions that are incorrect.

Thanks in advance, regards,
-mojo42

[HOWMANY]

Just PM me any time you see bad games like these so I can sit in them and I will gladly point you to some good Stars games where nobody is playing more than 35% of their hands.

[RunDownHouse]

mojo,

For starters, try playing a session or two where you raise with those med pockets, and actually write down when it happens. If you take a piece of paper and physically record when you raised, from what position, what the pf outcome was, and how many hands total were in your session, you might find you're mentally exaggerating how often you get a full table full of coldcallers.

As for suggestion on how to handle games like that, it seems like you've got the right idea. Tons of poker books and experts come to the same conclusion as you, which is what some thinking about the game also leads to: if you're going to be facing 9 opponents on the flop, hands like AK go down in value while hands like JTs go up. Beyond the shifting hand values, which is largely pf, postflop play is more dependent on you and handreading than anything else. Basically, it seems like HPFAP and similar works have covered this a lot, and it seems like you've read and absorbed at least some of that knowledge, but have a bit of trouble either understanding or accepting the results.

[TheWunderkind]

[ QUOTE ]
Just PM me any time you see bad games like these so I can sit in them and I will gladly point you to some good Stars games where nobody is playing more than 35% of their hands.

[/ QUOTE ]
lol
me too please

[mojo42]

I guess more to the point is the question: given anything less than a ST, a multi way pot (4-6) way, and 8-1 or better on the flop, I think the only betting situation is a strong draw (8 outs or more). Missing is c+f, and hitting TP is c+c - watching for where the better is, and plotting a tactic to reduce on the turn... ?

[mojo42]

Hi Wunderkind and howmany, I mean no insult to you as I'm a newcomer here, but posturing about how badly you would beat a particular game belongs in bbv, no? We are (hopefully) talking tactics.

[mojo42]

Great suggestion on writing down events. What I do is to play standard, but after the 3rd time, I back off. So I consider the session to be normal, but if I get 4-5 cold callers on 3 in a row when I am trying to raise specifically to reduce, I move generally back toward a more ABC full-ring game. Is this reasonable?

[TheWunderkind]

post your hands and we will see, look for hands with medium pps, copy and paste them into a txt file and after your session review them and post the questionable ones, that what i do if a questionable hand comes up. That will help you so much more as some general phrases imho