How do I spot a fish?

1. Preflop leaks; is the biggest indicator someone is a fish. Playing too many hands, open limping, over limping with hands they should raise, if they are bad preflop expect them to have tons of leaks elsewhere(especially postflop).

2. Is betsizing postflop; you can always tell when someone has no clue when their betsizing is not standard for your level of game. This type of indicator varies from game to game. Basically just watch what type of hands they bet with postflop and add that up with their sizing's.

3.Showdown hands this is by far the best indicator. You get tons of information from hands that go to showdown. You can get key factors on his/her flawed logic by reviewing their line and showdown hand.

4. Flop/turn play; how my opponents play flop and turn is how I make my plans to bust them. Examples; villain cbets with air and gives up ott, villain won't cbet bluff but will delay cbet. I float the first example with a big part of my range in position and steal pots from him. The second example I check back flops to induce/steal and raise his lead ott.

How do you identify fish?

The simplest way to identify fish is by their physical shape and appearance. Everyone can easily recognize a shark or a dolphin because of their distinctive shapes. Different species have different profiles when viewed from the side, top or front. Some are slim and elongated, others fat and rounded.

Observe its behavior, whether it is lying still on the seabed, swimming freely individually or in schools, and the company it keeps. Even if you do not recognize the fish, taking note of these characteristics will help you identify it later.

Quite similar to yours too.

In addition, I pay attention to table talk.

For example, if a player comments that he (or others) loses because of bad beats when it is obviously clear that the hand was played badly, then I would tag him as a fish (pending confirmation from other reads)

when people talk strategy at the poker table and throw around poker terms that they clearly dont understand or talk about ridiculous -ev lines they usually take

when people say they have lucky and unlucky hands

General demeanor, do they know what they are doing at a poker table or not? Do they know how to handle cards/chips/flow of game? I can also often pick up on reg fish by their determination to get into the game fast. Good players are more then happy to watch a few hands before getting in unless there is a known whale at table.

Hopeless bluff bets. This is mostly trying to double/triple barrel a rock or a station off a hand. This is particularly useful for telling good LAGs from maniacs and other fish that just assume aggression is always good.

Drinking (alcohol obviously). People who are more concerned with getting a drink then getting into the game or who are buying a stream of drinks are usually fish. I don't assume that everybody drinking is a fish though, there are quite a few decent players who can drink a beer or two.

If he's well dressed, and he doesn't know how to cut his chips, he's a turkey. He's just not going to be a good player. In general, you know what bad players do. They check their good hands. They try to trap with good hands. They lead off and bet their mediocre hands to find out "where they're at." ..., lol, lol

AK

first one is really good.

second one's okay. aggression's pretty good.

third one i don't know if i'm willing to draw any sort of correlation between drinking and being a fish. now, if they're on their 6th, 7th plus drink i'd be looking to gauge their "over it" factor and try to decide whether they're becoming spewy or not, but if you're like me and you're drunk you're just going to become irritable and are actually a good person to start bluffing because ****ing live poker, i'm so over it, it's so boring and slow and i never get a hand anyway and when i do get into a hand i always get coolered. when somebody bets my hand is always beat. i'm an irritable nit when i'm drunk. other people seem to play just fine while drunk, too, and i don't blame them for getting drunk because it is fun and live poker is boring and slow. you have to be some sort of jedi to come from online and just chill and enjoy some live poker for a good long session.

i don't think trying to categorize what kind of fish people are into loose categories really has much merit. i mean you can't say 'nit' 'supernit' 'aggro' are really helpful and personality type would probably be a lot more useful as far as terminology goes. i think it boils down to tendencies which don't really cohere into a larger picture which is easily translatable most of the time, but i think if you stuck with it with some determination and accrued a lot of player tendencies and kept notes you could actually make a useful writeup of how tendencies come together to form player types. like octavian said, people who try to trap you is a good tendency that a lot of people exhibit, but it's not much of a category of player since the trappy person may have a really sound game wrt all other facets of his game.

i think there's merit to looking at what somebody actively does. like when someone check/raises alarms should go off since that's probably their move, and the best way to exploit someone is just recognizing that they are capable of a series of moves, and since few think about things like ranges or balance you can just know that this move is as simple as attacking weakness or their hand sucks or some simple idea like that and not trick yourself into thinking they're making this move with a lot of consideration. there are probably useful categories of different player types, and then apart from that you need to just know what people are capable of as far as 'moves' go. i mean you can identify a player as being a part of a category of thinker and it's going to be useful, but as soon as he does something like overbet the turn or 3bet pre you need to just know that they're capable of that move.

I assume everyone is a fish until they prove otherwise.

+1

When I sit down I'm trying to categorize fish more so than identify fish. Who is limp calling every hand, who just chased 3 barrels with a gut shot, who just cbet $10 into a pot of $60 with a missed AK.

These are really easy to spot, and really easy to take advantage of.

This.

And gills. Look just under and behind the ears.


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Actually, instead of looking for fish, I look for "good" players. They're easier to spot. Usually sitting behind 200bb+.

Can't believe this hasn't been mentioned yet:

Stack size.

Only thing important is "how to play" against a fish.

Does it matter if a player is a fish but is kicking your butt?

+1

Yea agree. This is actually my only true immediate identifier. If someone sits down at 1/2 with <$200, or 2/5<$500, they suck.

I'd say a good 85% of players in 1/2 buy in for $100-$150

Thread is pointless

Buy in amount is huge, also if they change their play with stack sizes as well as their bet sizing... Worst part about 1/2 normally is not being able to play your best because of the complete randomness of some players , much harder to put on a range

#5 Calling PFR OOP w RIO hands and TPMK stack offs. Fish are notorious for calling preflop raises OOP with KJ, QJ, Ax hands and will call pot sized bets to include stacking off with TPMK. And I don't just mean KJ on a J 4 9 2 2 board. I mean T8 on a 8 4 2 7 2 board. EDIT: Assume PFR is from tight/strong player.

#6 Reading players for EXACTLY two cards, namely AK: Fish are adamant in their psychic ability to read you for exactly two cards, it will almost always be the two cards they can beat and the fish favorite is to put all preflop raisers on AK no matter what happens post flop.

#7 Playing Monster Draws Passively even in position. When I see a fish call a preflop raise with T8 and then the board runs 9 7 4 2 5 and there is weakness shown throughout the hand and at no point do they retake the initiative with a raise or even bet out, I now know they are a fish. They let the river check through in position and they lose to Ace high or even King high and they think nothing of it and blame the dealer for not giving them their card.

#8 Results Oriented Thinking. Fish can't help but to use results to dictate what they should have done. When they fold to a overbet on turn and then hit their card on the river they will say, "Man I should have called". Or, when they are facing a small bet on turn and they fold the nut draw and the draw misses on river they say, " I made a good fold".

#9 I Know I'm Beat, I Call...: Fish are just biologically incapable of folding made hands. It causes them physical pain to fold TPWK, baby flushes, or idiot end straights despite insane action that screams they are beat. Once you witness a fish do this, do not try to bluff them no matter how scary the board gets. Just value town and prison rape them.

In addition to everything that's already been said I think behaviors such as switching seats based on luck, asking for deck changes, berating dealers, straddling, playing their favorite hands when they obviously shouldn't and announcing typical things like "I lose with AA 90% of the time" or "I hate pocket Jacks" seem to all be strong indicators of a bad player.

Going to have to echo this...

Only benefit of this thread is learning how to not look like a fish, but what's the point?

I think this "might" be pointless to those of us who already know how to ID fish.

But 2+2 is comprised of players of different/varying levels and they can see something in this thread and think, "Man, that is me and 2+2 thinks I'm a fish. I better rethink my approach, philosophy, etc"

Also, part of the learning process is putting into words various concepts that are innate or intuitive to us. Many times, we never really ask ourselves why we think what we think or know what we know.

Lastly, it can help some develop their own process for ID fish and may provide some better insight into "using" the observable info that is out there for all to see.

Still doesn't explain how identifying fish is of importance.

Are you trying to relate this to game selection?

And what's wrong with looking like a fish?

I don't actually identify players as fish...I look for leaks.

I start off assuming any unknown is too loos and too passive, as thats what my ABC bet fold thin value play is going to be based on.

I then start looking for places thier range are too wide or too tight....
They raise a couple of times in a round....they may have too wide a preflop raising range..
they raise a lot and cbet a lot...cbets are too wide a range...
they limp fold...limping too wide calling too tight...look too confirm...

raise preflop get one caller...check folds flop...cbets too tight a range...(I plan on increasing my calling range preflop against them and taking hands away when they check).
checks calls flop...check folds turn...cbets are polarized, likes pot control...call them a lot and make there lives miserable once they have checked once...also raise more flops when the cbet.

this type of thing....
My reads are looking for leaks that I can change my ABC game against and take advantage of later....its not weather they are a fish...its what part of their game is fishy which too me means where their range is unbalanced.

I think its pointless to play spread limit games. But that doesn't mean your gonna stop playing them.

I spot a fish when the player in question says they spotted a fish by means of something mentioned in this thread....

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