Adjusting to Player Types

My previous poker tips were fundamentals, this tip group is more advanced and involves hand reading skills and player reads. Quick tips such as these tend to lump players into stereotypical modes that don’t always fit. So while these plays are good guidelines, there’re not meant to be selected in stone. Nuances arise within players and situations for which additional adjustments should be made.

Overly Aggressive Players

Tip #1-Lay traps. Check more made hands in order to induce bluffs, particularly in short-handed pots. Let them bluff/weak bet their stack off. This is particularly effective on draw-light boards when your opponent reads you for holding fewer calling hands. However, when laying these traps, keep in mind the odds you are offering players yet to act and make sure you’re not offering them good prices to draw out on you. After you have made this play on overly-aggressive opponents to the point where they change their play against you, start betting more of your made hands.

Apply pressure on them with your draws. They’re betting range includes a lot of air/weak hands that will fold to pressure, increasing the value of your semi-bluffs.

Tip #2-Three-bet with marginal hands opponents who will lay down to three-bets. This includes timid opponents and those who raise frequently with weak hands and won’t call your raise without a big hand.  You must make the distinction between those that will lay down and those that won’t. Don’t be chicken! I think this play is a situation where the read on your opponent is more valuable than the content of your hand, though both have merit. That said, don’t three-bet them with hands that are good trap hands. You might want to flat them with AA, but three-bet them with Kc5c. DUCY? You don’t want an overly aggressive players to fold when you have a holding that dominates them, but you do want them to fold holdings that play well against you current holding.

Tip #3-Raise-bluff them more. The value of your bluffs and semi bluffs increases because they’re betting air too often, making their bluffing range wider and their value range narrower. You’ll get plenty of folds, and that may even include the lower part of their value range. This raises don’t need to be sizable, a small amount will do it in cases where air is a big part of your opponents range.

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