Welcome folks. FTP just started a fairly new type of game called Rush. I want to offer my thoughts on how to crush it and hope to get a good discussion going:
About Rush:
http://www.fulltiltpoker.com/rush-poker
The basic idea is it is uNLFR where you sit at a table, play one hand, and then as soon as you hit fold or the hand ends you pop up at a new table and are immediately dealt a hand. The basic difference is that you have no HUD, you don't see your opponents for more than 1 hand and so have no reads. This thread is about exploring how to crush this game. I played for about an hour today and found the strategy below to be sick. Perhaps I was just running very hot.
How to crush rush:
1) BE EXPLOITABLE. This is the key to everything. While we no longer get our indepth reads on others, they also can't get reads on us. Normally, even the fish picks up quickly (because they are 1 tabling) if we bet 1/2 pot every cbet we don't have it and pot every cbet we have it. Not any more. So play a horrible exploitable way where you bet a lot with your strong hands and small with your bluffs and weaker hands.
Preflop, we can now make our btn steals 3bb, even 2.5bb when we have junky hands like the old 68s and 4 bb or even larger when we have good value hands. Our cbets should be nearly pot every time we are for value and considerably less when they are bluffs. Cbetting 1/3 pot on the A83r board which is super dry is not a problem at all when we have 910s and betting pot when we have AQ is great.
2) STEALING. The game plays VERY tight. Because everyone can just click the fold button and get a new hand people, the fish included, tend to just fold absolutely tonnes. This is true preflop, but it is also true postflop. This has turned the game into the epitome of weak tight and we know exactly how to combat that: steal a tonne. We can open up our SB/BTN/CO and even various middle position ranges a lot. While many see a hand like Kxs or Q7o or whatever and instant fold it in the BTN, we should be waiting and seeing if it folds around and definately stealing. A tonne of the time the people in the SB and BB arn't even at the table any more and instant folded 10 seconds ago. So steal even more then normal. Likewise, this weaktight mentality extends to the flop it seems, cbets get an additional boost in value so you should be making a tonne of small light cbets in and out of position.
3) VALUE. The interesting thing is that the people playing right now seem to be making most of their mistakes postflop. One sees so few flops that it seems when someone finally hits top pair on the flop they are simply not letting it go. I was quite shocked by the amount of light call downs that I saw, relative to a normal NL25 or NL50 game. The result is I think that 2nd barrels actually get slightly less value then a normal game but that going for thin value gets somewhat more value. Because we don't care about balancing or metagame or whatever the value in double barreling regs to "balance" our game and try and helping getting action later is all gone.
As with normal, the basic idea is always going for value, value, value. And because of this passive mentality the game eschews and the ability to play exploitably we can get sick value by just pot pot shoving it hand after hand when we make TPTK or two pair or whatever board dependent. Do not hesitate to go for value, even if it is thin.
4) READS. Unfortunately our reads are cut but we can still get a tonne of good reads. First and foremost is stacksize. If people are not bought in full they are fish, in one way or anouther, it is just a fact. We can assume they are more loose passive then the average and should be going for more value and less bluffs against these players. Llikewise, if someone has a really big stack they are usually a good player. Normally a good reg has some tables where he has doubled up, some tables where he lost money and is at the max buy in so it is harder to tell by stacksize if the guy is good...he may be and just hasn't won anything yet. But now because the game plays so fast with so many hands, the good players pull away in terms of stacksize very quickly. It is the same idea as knowing the "average" stacksize of a multitabler and using that as an indicator. So big stacks good, short stacks bad.
Other good reads are bet size reads such as people limping preflop, or giving non standard raise sizes pots flop like minbetting or c/mr or whatever. Timing tells, name tells etc. You guys already know all this, but the point is before our HUD would tell us the guy was a fish and we would ask how do we deal with such tells. Now we are using these tells to determine that the guy is a fish, most likely fits and the standard profile of a fish as loose passive that overvalues top pair, and then exploiting him based on this limited indications they are a fish. But ya know what, if we have a guy who didn't buy in at the max and limped the chances of him being such a loose passive fish that we don't need a HUD to confirm it.
In addition, when it comes to stealing we should take the time to look at the players around us namely the stacksize. If we have two shorties in the blinds we don't want to raise the 46s. If we have two fullstacks we probably do. Taking the time to look at the situation, wait till it is folded to you with those junky hands and make a decision to lightly steal or not is going to be far more profitable then mashing the FOLD button and hoping to see AA next hand.
Okay that's it for now, please add your own comments about the game, the differences between the normal game and how to destroy it.
Two Plus Two
Linear Mode
