Quote:
Originally Posted by Avaritia
Very entertaining thread. As I've mentioned before (I believe in the llsnl forum) your style resembles that of the best 5/10 player in my room.
Everyone thinks he's a spewtard monkey but I realize him for what he is.
I actually bum-hunt him for several reasons.
1). He creates deep/actiony tables, pretty much singlehandedly.
2). I want to understand how someone can raise AA to $30 over 7 limpers, get 7 callers, and be happy.
3). And because he's funny as hell and makes the game fun, a rarity these days in casino poker.
Thanks, Av. Appreciate what I think is a compliment
. And if 5/10 ran more here that would prob be my main game, but my style would be a little bit different, especially when it comes to giving proper odds to draw (player dependent).
After god knows how much live and online poker I've played in my lifetime, I still love the game. Since I'm having fun I hope other have fun, too.
I know at times (some may say always) I can be annoying, there are occasions when I just put my headphones on, settle in, and grind out a session with little interaction. (I also have fun doing this... Sometimes u just want a bit of alone time despite being at a table with 9 others (and a dealer).
Sometimes I even put the headphones on just so I don't have to hear myself talk.
I try not to push the limits of table chatter too far. If I ever get to the point where I am actually hindering someone else's playing experience, and I have at least a modicum of respect for that person, I'll usually apologize and tone down the "personality." Course there are also times when perhaps there are some less than warm feelings and I'll just do what I can to make them want to throw their chips at me in anger until they run out of ammo.
I can't say I'm thrilled when I have AA in EP, I make my standard micro raise and get a whole table of callers, but I generally prefer that to everyone folding.
The reason my variance is what it is is that in a vacuum, in order to get away with the small ball **** I pull preflop and OOP with (shall we say) less than premium hands, I have no choice but to balance by playing my preflop monsters the same way.
Now I will admit I have little tricks I sometimes do in certain situations. In a simplified scenario, say I have JTs on button in a 6-way limped pot, my goal is to get all 6 players to call me pf. I may adjust my raise amount a bit to get the action I want. But I will balance that play later on, when necessary.
(Balancing at 2/5 certainly isn't something people generally have to be overly concerned with. Especially with a larger player pool. Because this player pool is small and the better regs know each other's games very well, I prob tend overbalance.)
I know the way I play hands, in what position, and when I decide to (seemingly) arbitrarily go off the deep end with Q3s preflop and start blowing **** up OOP leaves people scratching their heads. I end up with hands I simply can't have or shouldn't have and it leaves some people shaking their head about how this idiot just won a $1.5k pot with Q-****ing-3 after he snapped a 3-bet pre UTG.
(BTW, I am very well aware that the above paragraph sounds just like some uber fish at the table explaining his recent 2-game heater to a daily grinder while said grinder just site there and shakes his head in disgust and contempt.)
I get away with the above because I'm not afraid to, as the great Doug Lee (or maybe it's the fake great Doug Lee) says "bet small to win big."
So I play AA pre the same way I play Q3s pre the same way I play 88 and 67s (you get the idea). The difference is in knowing when to press forward with the hand (either for value or as a bluff) and when to release and just "Let it go" (sometimes (oftentimes?) incorrectly). And that is the "trick." No so much the preflop play, but calculating the risk/reward scenarios and options that arise post flop.
For me a key is to keep entitlement tilt at bay. When 2 short stacks get it in pre with AA vs KK, and KK wins, the KK player is no more lucky or unlucky than the holder of AA.
The player with AA happened to be extremely fortunate to get AA preflop (my sources say that the odds of getting AA are greater than 1 in 25, tho obviously I get it much more often). He was even MORE fortunate that another player picked up KK while he held AA, and now must make a "decision" whether or not he wants to call a 5 bet shove...(duh).
OTOH, the player with KK is extremely UNLUCKY he got KK when someone else has AA. The odds of this occurring, my math friends tell me, is even greater than someone getting dealt AA alone. (I'm assuming the odds are like 1 in 30 or something crazy like that.)
When the player with KK happens to hit a K on the flop, he just got lucky at a different time than AA. Both players would have played their hands the exact same way, and someone, after all 9 cards had been dealt, was bound to be lucky and another player unlucky. The AA has no more of a "claim" or "right" to the pot than KK, he just happened to be the one who got unlucky in this case.
So, when I have AA and I get drawn out on, I try not to look at it as "That was my POT I had AA the idiot called me pre and hit the goddamn miracle!" But rather I got lucky pre, he got lucky post. It all balances out. No one was more entitled to the pot than anyone else. In the end, (as in the begging) luck decided who would win and who would lose. (Course I may still curse him, stand up and throw some cards at the dealer before I kick some chairs over and smear feces on the walls, but who wouldn't?)
So, to answer what wasn't really a question, I guess I don't really like getting 7 callers when I have AA, but I'll take whatever the dealer gives me and try to work from there. I feel I have an edge against most players post flop, so hopefully I can use that edge to make the correct decisions on later streets. I'm just happy to see a flop with a good chance at winning the pot.
And whether u respect me as a player or think I'm an uber donk, there is no doubt I tend to juice whatever table I am on. (As you noticed with your player.) The one thing that does piss me off tho is when a tight-ass "short stack specialist" "bumhunts" me (with or without quotes) and comes in, nits it up, and takes advantage of a situation I may have spent several hundred dollars or hours building by isolating me out of a situation when he shoves his short stack against the very player I had been setting up for god knows how long.
You want to reap the rewards, then do your own damn work and don't vulture off of someone else's efforts. When this does happen I have no qualms in making that person as miserable as possible, and will go out of my way to make their stay an unpleasant one. (A few people reading this will know the exact person (people) I am talking about, and in fact may be a guilty party themselves.)
So, in conclusion, I ramble a lot. Both when writing and when at the table.