Post a common leak and how to fix or take advantage of it (CASH/TRN).

[xSCWx]

I saw this in the mid stakes forum a while back and decided it would probably do some good here.

Post either a common leak for the hero and how to fix it, or a common leak for the villain and how to take advantage of it.

Since HU has a lot to do with adapting to players, a thread like this should deliver some interesting discussion on fixing our own flaws or taking advantage of the flaws of our victims.

I don't see why this thread can't apply to both cash and tournament; however, if it only applies to one be sure to state which one you are talking about.

This one may seem too easy but it is a start:

*NLTRN*Villain is smashing all-in preflop 75-80% of his hands.

Obviously, the amount of time you can wait for a hand is dependent on the size of the blinds. The best thing you can hope to catch is an overpair, but you will likely be run over if you try to wait that long.

Against these players it is very easy to have an edge by calling with ace or even king high, but your edge can be stretched well beyond a biased coinflip. I try to catch them with any middle pair (In hopes that they are caught with 3 outs instead of 6, or worse), or a decent ace (two overs). Although it is not unlikely that a hand like K9 will be well ahead of these villains, you will often show up against hands such as QT where you have 1 over and 1 under, or J5 where you have 1 over and 1 mid. I try to avoid calling with low pocket pairs because almost any non-paired hand will have a coinflip against it, and there isn't really any reason to flip against a villain with such a huge flaw.

As far as hand strength against these players, I would rank:

High PP
Mid PP
Strong Ace
KQ
Weak Ace
Strong King
Mid King
Decent Queen
Low PP
Suited Connectors

I'm sure the hand ranking is up for some debate. I put KQ above a weak ace because KQ is very likely to be dominating the villains hand and very unlikely to be dominated. Although I wouldn't be paranoid about it against this type of villain, there is a solid chance that a weak ace will end up dominated.

For villains who are just shoving all in preflop 100% I am sure someone could pokerstove a better range.

On another note, I've seen a lot of players continue to bet their button when the villain is shoving/folding every hand. Unless you have a strong hand and believe this will induce a shove, or you really feel it is too strong postflop to lay down and your bet might "block" his shove, betting into these villains probably isn't a good idea.

[KexChoklad123]

I think the hands we call with also have alot to do with,

a) is he likely to stay if we double him up
b) how likely is he to keep pushing
c) and obviously stacksizes

We should be alot more willing to call in a marginal spot if he is likely to stay in the game, while if he is a "tilt hit and runner" we should wait for a spot where we have more equity. Otherwise, I like your thinking


Leak, raise alot of hands preflop and calling 3 bets too light..

[TNixon]

[ QUOTE ]
On another note, I've seen a lot of players continue to bet their button when the villain is shoving/folding every hand.

[/ QUOTE ]
This depends a lot on the villain. If you give them the impression you're just waiting for a hand by folding a bunch in a row, they will often start to fold occasionally if you start raising a few on the button, and sometimes just check if you limp.

It's very important to find out if they're going to fold or check, for two reasons:

First of all, you don't want to come up with AA on the button, limp, and have them check/fold the flop because they have J4 and missed entirely. If you're raising periodically, even folding to a push reinforces the idea that they can just run you over every hand.

The second reason is that if they are willing to fold when you raise, you can maintain your stack a lot better by throwing out a raise here and there, while you're waiting for the hand you're going to go with.

[KexChoklad123]

How come this thread did not explode?

[gcaash]

[ QUOTE ]
How come this thread did not explode?

[/ QUOTE ]

[abcjnich]

I lot of players don't know how to look at relative hand strength, they only look at their own hand strength. I am guilty of this sometimes. When I have my A game I am very good at putting people on accurate ranges and playing well against those ranges. When I'm not playing well, my thinking will be more like "I have mid pair good kicker on a drawy board, my opponent MUST have a draw, I'll call off a lot of money."

And that gets me to another thing that donks do- they put their opponents on the exact hand that they want them to have. They don't look at their opponents whole range, only the tiny part that their hand is good against.

A lot of players don't know how to differentiate between a bluff and a vbet. They will think "I have two pairs, I must go all in here for value because I have two pairs," when in fact they will always be beaten when they are called, and they may actually fold some better hands. This is actually a tough one, because their are some really good players who give the impression of this when they 100% know what they are doing (just watch durrr play).

[Nichomacheo]

Leak of mine: calling with too many raises with Q9 type hands OOP.

Fix: Play tighter OOP.

Result: Profit.

[xSCWx]

[ QUOTE ]
I lot of players don't know how to look at relative hand strength, they only look at their own hand strength. I am guilty of this sometimes. When I have my A game I am very good at putting people on accurate ranges and playing well against those ranges. When I'm not playing well, my thinking will be more like "I have mid pair good kicker on a drawy board, my opponent MUST have a draw, I'll call off a lot of money."

[/ QUOTE ]

To add to this, how the villain perceives you is as essential as your own read on the villain. If your opponent is growing confident that your huge bets are bluffs and your small bets are value bets, then your next "value" bet should be HUGE.

The bet/check/bet line tends to be pretty good secondary line to use for taking advantage of this hero image.

Example:

Preflop: Hero holds A[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img]K[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img].

Button bets $20, Hero raises to $60.

Flop: A[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img]3[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img]3[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]

Button checks, Hero bets $100, BB calls $100.

Turn: 6[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]

Button checks, Hero checks.

River: 2[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]

Button checks, Hero bets $300.

Against a villain who knows you wouldn't fire a second barrel into this turn without an ace (and knows you have a strong one at that because of your reraise) this "fake bluff" line works very well because he has almost definitely underplayed his hand to try to trap you.

On the opposite end, in a large home game I play at sometimes (~200 people) I have a very tight image. I frequently play hands such as 5[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]7[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] into raises, or even reraising with them. I pay careful attention to how often I end up showing down these hands. Because I have a reputation as a tight player, any time I land a hand with "garbage" I almost always end up paid off.

In the sit n goes against new villains, both players are trying to learn each other's game off of a few hands. One strange line within the first 10 hands can easily lead the villain to believe you are an aggressive donkey. I'll make another post adding to this when I can find a good example.

[xSCWx]

[ QUOTE ]

In the sit n goes against new villains, both players are trying to learn each other's game off of a few hands. One strange line within the first 10 hands can easily lead the villain to believe you are an aggressive donkey. I'll make another post adding to this when I can find a good example.

[/ QUOTE ]

I couldn't find the full hand history for this so I will have to describe the hands leading up to this by memory.

I had never played this guy before but we got off to an extremely aggressive start. On one of our first pots I gave a pot size cbet and he raised the [censored] out of me so I folded. A hand or 2 later we were in a raised pot with a low flop so I raised the [censored] out of him with overs knowing that he wouldn't be able to call. We had a few hands of folding to reraises preflop then the next flop we saw came to this one:

FullTiltPoker Game #3706159359: $110 + $5 Heads Up Sit & Go (28254890), Table 1 - 15/30 - No Limit Hold'em - 13:11:43 ET - 2007/09/29
Seat 1: xSCWx (1,660)
Seat 2: scrum9911 (1,340)
xSCWx posts the small blind of 15
scrum9911 posts the big blind of 30
The button is in seat #1

*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to xSCWx [J[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img] A[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]]
xSCWx raises to 90
scrum9911 calls 60

*** FLOP *** [A[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img] 7[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img] A[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img]]
scrum9911 checks
xSCWx bets 90
scrum9911 raises to 225
xSCWx calls 135

*** TURN *** [A[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img] 7[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img] A[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img]] [9[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]]
scrum9911 bets 300
xSCWx has 15 seconds left to act
xSCWx calls 300

*** RIVER *** [A[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img] 7[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img] A[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img] 9[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]] [8[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]]
scrum9911 bets 725, and is all in
xSCWx calls 725
*** SHOW DOWN ***
scrum9911 shows [8[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img] 6[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img]] two pair, Aces and Eights
xSCWx shows [J[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img] A[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]] three of a kind, Aces
xSCWx wins the pot (2,680) with three of a kind, Aces
scrum9911 stands up
xSCWx stands up

*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 2,680 | Rake 0
Board: [Ad 7c Ah 9s 8s]
Seat 1: xSCWx (small blind) showed [Jh Ac] and won (2,680) with three of a kind, Aces
Seat 2: scrum9911 (big blind) showed [8h 6h] and lost with two pair, Aces and Eights

I'll probably get [censored] about how this isn't a standard play from a villain, but by the aggressive nature of the game I knew from the moment I saw the flop that if I took a non-standard line for the ace (standard in my experience is to check/call the flop) he would be willing to risk losing to rep that he had it.

[KexChoklad123]

You played it passive which is not a strange line given the nature of this match, or?

But I get your thinking [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]