Unpredictable players

[rrrorrim]

Let's say you encountered a new kind of poker player: A Random. Every choice he makes is completely random.



How would you win longterm in the following situations:

1) 6max - 3 opponents are Randoms and 2 are LAGs.
2) Full Ring - 5 Randoms, 4 LAGs
3) Full Ring - 9 Randoms

[Flip-Flop]

Without much thinking so maybe it`s a totaly wrong strategy:

Assuming we are talking about NLHE ...for all 3 games:

I play shove-fold.
I shove PF against the right opponents(when only Randoms are behind) when I have the right cards (51%+ PF equity HU vs. random hand) from the right position ( exclusively from SB when folded to me ).

Also I would shove AA from any position regardless of the action before me.

[iheartponeez]

I don't know if it's ideal, but if you just tighten up and ride any pair to the end with him, I imagine you'd come out ahead. You just have to do things like bet the strength of your hand, since he won't react to information. You just be very obvious with your play, play the hand face-up, and you should come out ahead.

I do have a question about "randomness" which is that is he selecting from "check, bet, fold, raise" and then selecting a random number, or is he just choosing a random number from the start and betting to that much, or raising to that much if less is out there? Because if it's the former, then making a small bet makes him more likely to call that small bet, it sort of sets the tone for the round. If it's the latter, then I think I check every time, since he's putting out a random number regardless of my move, and why commit money to a pot that he might suddenly just shove into?

[RustyBrooks]

On the contrary when heads up you should push the action with almost any hand. When you bet there is a 1/3 chance of each: raise, call and fold. Almost no matter what your hand, you should bet less than 1/3 the pot size. Any time you risk X to win more than 3X, you profit if your opponent folds at least one time in 3. If he re-raises, you do it again, because there is still a 1/3 chance he'll fold. In fact, he'll only call 1/3 times so...

You have lots of shots over the hand to make him fold. He won't fold 2/3 of the time you bet, so if you bet 4 times in the hand, he won't fold at all only 20% of the time (he'll fold 80%). If you bet 5 times, he won't fold 13% of the time (he'll fold 87%) and so forth. You'll have a minimum of 4 times to bet, and since he'll raise some times, you'll generally have 5-6 chances to bet (6 bets means he'll fold 92% of the time by the end)

If you have a lock, your best action is actually to check, because then he can't exit the hand via folding. If you check he'll have a 1/2 chance of betting (his only options are check or bet, unless he open-folds). If you bet he'll only have a 1/3 chance of raising and he'll fold 1/3 times.

[RustyBrooks]

However note that at a full table of these guys you'll hardly ever be heads up, because 1/3 of them are going to call preflop, and some of them are going to raise (some of the ones that call are going to fold to the raise, etc). I'd probably need to do some analysis or modelling to see how often you'd actually end up heads up, and it would need some thought to determine optimal multi way play. On the plus side calculating your equity is a piece of cake, since your opponent's holdings truly are random.

[RustyBrooks]

(Oh, and realistically, you should bet the minimum on all your bluffs against the random players, since they fold the same # of times to $1 as they do to $1000)

[Abbaddabba]

In a heads up pot at limit hold em, the probability that a random player will fold by the river is about 83% if you bet/raise unconditionally with him on all streets.

Of the 17% of the hands that you go to showdown with, slightly more than half will be winners for you since you have superior preflop selection.

Consequently, the random-player will lose about 92% of all hands that are contested heads up after the flop. You cannot lose against this player unless you're retarded.



If it is a no limit game, it matters a lot what the size of his raises are when he chooses to raise, and the size of his bets when he chooses to bet. If he minraises, then you can easily exploit it in a similar way to limit by just minbetting/minraising every hand ad infinitum with weak hands and shove with strong hands.

note: the actual probability of this 'random player' folding before the river is actually slightly higher in no limit, because there is no cap to the number of raises you can make it.


the question of how to approach a mix of lags and randoms wont be very helpful. just play well. when up against all randoms, dont ever fold with a hand that fares favorably against a random hand - and try to minbet/minraise your way into winning as many hands uncontested as possible... shoving the hands that you want to be called by.

[Rek]

If every decision a random player makes is truely random (let's say they never look at their hole cards and will fold, call, raise with no logic behind the decisions) then you should destroy every game. It is better than being at a table of fish, at least they have their own logic behind their decisions.

The issue with your first two scenarios is whether the LAG's are also aware that the other players are random. If they are not then you should destroy those games as well.

[GeeBeeQED]

Against this player only,

Limit, I'd bet or raise every street to the river with top pair or better.

Bet, call second pair to the river.

Check call any other pair to the river.

The above strategy would I think guarentee getting all the most of his chips with the least ROR.

No Limit, I'd play exactly the same except I'd move all in with any 2 pair or better. If his random moves included all in moves I'd only call with 2 pair or better or AA, KK preflop. I'd not push all in preflop until I had him outstacked 5:1 or so.

I wish to play this machine heads up. In fact, I'll take this player on with only a 1 card hand if you like....maybe?

Pushing all in against such a great situation and risking being elliminated preflop (as in with AA) to me would be silly. Why would I want to screw up such a good situation. I'm going to get all the chips soon enough. Taking such a risk although positive EV I don't think would be the greatest overall EV. Think like players, not gamblers.

[RustyBrooks]

There's no point in even playing your cards, since it's so easy to make the random players fold by the end. I'd bet with anything as long as I was getting 3:1 or better.