Maniac Play Continued

Okay, well I got some responses to my post about maniac play which is really cool. In response to those posts, I wanted to talk a little bit about hand selection.

A lot of poker authors, pro's, novices, and commentators love to wax philosophical about playing tight aggressive poker. Using good hand selection to beat your opponents. The problem is, if everyone is using good hand selection, the only time pots are going to be big and get lucrative is when two monster hands clash. A great deal of online players who really think they know what they are doing stick to maybe the top 10 or 15 hands when playing. While this is a nice strategy to make poker simplistic, these players will never be able to butcher a game. I mean sit down, play 30 hands, break 2 people and make everyone else at the table piss their pants. Poker is not meant to be a simplistic game played by hard and fast rules. Ring game poker should be played with every hand in a vaccuum, save information you've included about your opponents.

Since I started experimenting with maniac play, I've gotten a lot of grief from players I've beaten with jackpot hands; "How could you play 23 suited to a raise?" It's simple, I knew what I was trying to make with it, if I didn't make it I could let it go. For instance, in that Q2s hand I posted, I called a pretty significant raise with a mediocre hand. Some people would call that a donk move. I disagree. If I had called with that hand and made top pair with my Queen a played it fast, I agree that would have been a donk move. This is a very important part of playing like a maniac: You have to be able to know when your hand is good. I played that Q2s hand because I knew if the flop hit me big it would be almost impossible for it to hit my opponents big, (unless one was holding AQ). For example, I would play Q2s to a raise, but not ATos. Here's the reasoning: First of all the Q2 is suited and gives me a pretty good shot at being best should I hit my flush shorthanded, the AT is off suit. Second of all, the AT is most likely dominated by the hand that is raising me unles my opponent is overplaying an underpair, the Q2s not so much. If I hit trip aces in a a raised pot with ATos, I need to still be afraid. If I hit trip Q's in a raised pot with Q2, I'm not going to worry as much.

Now while all of that sounds pretty good, I'm sure there are some people out there saying, "yes but you're still going in behind." That's fine, and I'll tell you why. I have a pretty good idea of what I need to make in order to have a good shot at winning the pot. I know my opponent is strong so that greatly decreases the range of hands I need to try to put him on post flop. But that's not the important thing. The important thing is my opponent has NO FUCKING IDEA what I have. All he knows is that he's got a big one, so when that flop comes out a seemingly harmless Q28, he's gonna pay me off the whole ride. He knows I'm an aggressive player, which gives me a lot of options as to how to play the hand to break him.

If I think he's a loose cannon and is liable to stand up for himself it's easy, I just bet at the pot hard and try to make it look like a steal right away. If I think he's more reserved, I can try to feign being on a draw and then make a huge bet on the end to try to convince him I missed and I'm shopping. The second strategy is definitely riskier only reccommend doing it if you also have a decent redraw. The third and best way is to let him bet himself broke, he showed preflop strength, so he's prolly going to lead into you, call him. If he checks on the turn, overbet it big, make him think you think he's weak and you're trying to buy it. If he bets again, call or reraise depending on what falls, how you think your opponent plays, etc.

I know this is a rather disjointed explanation and is not meant to be taken literally. As I hope you've gathered by now, there is no script to play maniac style, you just go on feel. I've never surfed, but I imagine it's similar, lol. This explanation is more for the sake of illustrating general principles: You oppress the weak and let the "strong" go too far. I say "strong" because as the maniac you're obviously the strongest prescence, perhaps "bold" would be a better word.

Just remember, in low limit shorthanded games most players are still playing tight aggressive. They are playing a small selection of hands fast and not aggressively attacking pots. If you only play top15 hands, even if you're aggressive, there's not a whole lot differentiating you from the rest of the table. However, if you can SKILLFULLY, play a wide range of hands, it will open up to you many profitable opprotunities that your opponents don't even know how to take advantage of.