I'm primarily a live 2/5nl player however I think this applies to both Live and Online poker.

I wanted to talk about recognizing when we are up against a better opponent.

The problem in my opinion is that ego will often prevent us from recognizing when Villain has us outclassed. Ego + variance can make villain beating us look like blind luck when in reality villain is highly skilled, has a soul read on us, and is just owning us like a $20 Tijuana whore.

Part of the problem is that determining if villain is better than you will be problematic if villain has knowledge/skill sets that you aren't familiar with. If you don't understand 3-betting light then when V 3-bets light you will think its a donk play and thus will think V is a donk when in reality he is not...

However, there are some empirical results that can serve as an indication that Villain is better than you.

#1 V seems to have the perfect read on your range, whether you are the preflop raiser or not
-- V floats a high percentage of your c-bets when the flop/turn misses your range
-- V folds a high percentage of your c-bets that hit your range

#2 V seems to size his bets perfectly against you
-- When you are drawing V bets enough to deny pot odds
-- When you are marginal on the river V value bets such that you feel compelled to called
-- When V value bets and you call, V 'barely' has you beat.
-- When V shoves and you call, you lose
-- V seems to have a knack for betting and making you fold turn or river

#3 V seems to be made out of teflon and you can't "get" him
-- Everytime you flop, turn, or river your hand, you can't get V to stack off
-- Everytime you flop, turn, or river your hand, V folds to your value bets
-- Almost impossible to get any decent money out of V, V gets away from all your monsters before the pot gets too large

#4 V seems to be immune to all your awesome plays
-- You raise V while IP on your draw hoping to gain control of the pot but V is unphased and bets into you on the next street
-- V seems to 3-bet a large percentage of your light raises.
-- V bluff catches you a large percentage of the time with super light holdings
-- When you try to use a scare card to your advantage V comes over the top

#5 V's play takes you out of your game
-- Plays and bets you normally make you don't make against V
-- You find yourself trying to be "tricky" without any real plans other than to flop, turn, or river gin

#6 Unable to properly range or read villain
-- V is constantly turning over hands that surprise you

#7 V is a step ahead of your adjustments
-- You tighten up your range, V has already tightened his up
-- You loosen up your range, V knows just when to re-raise you

Overall, the best way to explain it is that playing V is like trying to grab a fish that is swimming in a vat of vegetable oil. Slippery is an understatement. V just seems like the luckiest SOB on the planet. When we miss or are weak, he bets us out. When we are marginal he value bets us and we pay him off. When we stack off he has the best of it. He seems to know exactly how to bet us out or in a way in which we pay him off. When we are monster he gets away from us...


thoughts, additions, comments, etc.???

V takes your money more often than not

The nature of variance means that it actually takes a long time to be certain that an opponent is beating you dollar-wise. You can usually get yourself there faster by bootstrapping onto qualities that reveal themselves faster, such as teh stuff above.

I'd probably add a few physical things - such as things villain may say to you - if he talks at all. Quite often an opponent will say things that tell me more than he intended, such as when he speculates on my hand before he folds, or my hand when I fold (or otherwise don't have to show)

When you don't recognize any mistakes. But I play LHE so the mistakes are different.

Sometimes when I'm starting tables I'll get into some stuff spots HU with a reg, and I'll think wow this guy is better than I thought...

Then I'll PTR him and see he's a losing player, almost every time.

in a nutshell they put you to tough decisions...i agree with that

When exploited go back to the fundamentals. Position Position Position

I was going to make a joke, but it's too easy.

villain has edge on me if I am unsure of the best strategy to beat him/her

When V goes to toss out his bet, you hear the clang! clang! of his multiple WSOP bracelets.

I play mostly live.

But i often see some guy make a play, where I think wow this guy is good, but then realise later he is just a fish.

Sometimes fish /donks makes a play that seems fairly advanced, but most often the trueth is they dont even know that they did it, or understand why it was a good play.

This is true,

the way you figure out if they are advanced or a donk is consistency and if they make some seriously stupid plays later on in show down.

For instance, the unknown is in position with a OESFD and doesn't raise or bet any street. River comes, plenty of weakness has been shown throughout the hand, and the unknown player doesn't bother bluffing.

Showdown comes, and unknown loses to someone's bottom pair or even Ace high...

This tells me that the unknown is more likely a donk or fish that just got lucky on that other play they made.

Eventually, the truth comes out over time and observation... The math doesn't lie...

When you're flipping more often and/or losing more often.

I too have seen many instances where I thought villain was an advanced player, but then gasp when I see them getting stacked with KJ on a K X X flop after calling a pre-flop raise from a nitty UTG raiser. Of course the exact oposite has happened on many occassions as well. After all, even Ivey/Moorman ocassionally make bad plays. The key is to never jump to conclusions about based off 1-2 plays you've seen Villain make. As pointed out by OP ego can get in the way of judging V, because we often think our way is the "only way". The only thing you can do against some who has an edge over you is to avoid getting involved with them and tighten up your range when you're in a pot with them. The worst thing you can possibly do is to try and outplay them.