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Extremely aggressive player I just encountered.

Any comment welcomed

I'll be looking to comment on this.

(It's somewhat tough to find free time however as our kids keep us awake in the night and I need to get some sleep at nights.)

((Also, I can't seem to win in this game myself, so I don't feel super-confident about commenting other people's hands, but I guess I'll give it a go anyhow. :-))

iplaylimit....
I watched the entire video.
I think you had a very good handle on your extremely aggressive opponent.

You made lots of interesting adjustments to his play,
all of which I agree with.
I learned a lot from watching you play.

I have two comments, questions....which I may also make a seperate post about.
Because both ideas seem to be repeating themselves lately, in my play
and in vidoes(admins and members).

1)this opponent was very SD bound and liked to put in lots of bets
on his way to SD, with or without a hand.
He liked to c/r or raise the turn often.
my question is...I did not like that you raised PF with hands like T3o etc,
hands with no SD value. you also raised a couple flops or put in more action on the flop sometimes then I think was a good idea.
Dont we need a SD type hand at all point in the hand including(and especially) PF and on the flop, as we are the ones most likely to be folding before the SD?
You mentioned limping more buttons, I think thats a good plan, in fact I like a plan of putting in as few bets as possible until we know we can SD. do you agree?

2) AIR FACTOR AND BAD TURN RIVER CARDS.....
reading boards...you do it well, this is obvious.
I am working on it, along with my ranges which are weak.

In HU poker when both players can and ussually are playing every hand AND ANY TWO CARDS.
doesnt board reading take a backseat to metagame and "how to outplay this particular opponents style, betting patterns, leveling" type considerations?
I mean, a board of say 8c7s4s...the Js is a bad card under normal conditions when the opponent has a "peeling range" or peeling tendency. But in this case and in most HU hands, the other player has ANY TWO CARDS....(especially this opp)...so the Js while looking scarry and filling lots of draws, is just another card closer to seeing what he really has, 92o! we have no way of knowing what cards hit or miss his hands as he is playing and peels everything.

I am not good at explaining what I mean, I hope you understand what I am getting at. I tried asking DD in one of his HU videos, but he did not understand my point.

do you take requests? I'd like to see a video of you playing 2 tables of 5/10 6 max if possible.
thats the limit you play isnt it? and any comments you can add about ranges on the video would be appreciated also...thanks iplaylimit ...good luck.

1)this opponent was very SD bound and liked to put in lots of bets
on his way to SD, with or without a hand.
He liked to c/r or raise the turn often.
my question is...I did not like that you raised PF with hands like T3o etc,
hands with no SD value. you also raised a couple flops or put in more action on the flop sometimes then I think was a good idea.
Dont we need a SD type hand at all point in the hand including(and especially) PF and on the flop, as we are the ones most likely to be folding before the SD?
You mentioned limping more buttons, I think thats a good plan, in fact I like a plan of putting in as few bets as possible until we know we can SD. do you agree?

I think against aggressive player I usually just fastplay the good hands, because they sometimes give unwarranted actions, they also tend to think that you have a draw more often than you actually have a good hand.

T3o example: I think you have a point here. If villain is going to c/r every flop OOP, that's very similar to him 3bet pre-flop a lot (in terms of number of bets put in and who has initiative). I didn't think of the analogy until later, so I didn't make that adjustment. However, if villain is just SD bound, T high is still good sometimes so I don't mind playing it as long as he doesn't play back too much.

In HU poker when both players can and ussually are playing every hand AND ANY TWO CARDS.
doesnt board reading take a backseat to metagame and "how to outplay this particular opponents style, betting patterns, leveling" type considerations?

This is mentioned in some video somewhere, and I understand your thinking which is what I think when I tilt. The point here is not just what your opponent can haven, but it is how likely your unimproved Ahigh (or K high, or Q high for that matter) is good given the board texture. Let's use your example, 8c7s4s. And we have Ahigh. Now we are only behind an 8,7,4, PP, and better Ahigh. But the turn is 5s and we don't have any spade. Now we are losing additionally to any 5, and 6, and any 2 spades. To make matter worse, now any hand that has a single spade may outdraw us. So our equity, in a vacuum, probably drop by more than half. So although it is a pretty perfect bluff card from him, we can safely c/f because it must be a losing proposition putting 2 bets to win a pot which is something around 7 BB on this board. Js is a somewhat bad card so I'll c/c, c/probably fold to make him fire 2 barrels.

Now to say he has 92o and will float you on the flop is a little bit extreme, but there are certainly those players. However, even against those players (usually bad), they don't always bet the turn or river if you check to them, especially if a broadway comes in the turn. If someone is going to float you and bet the turn always, he'll actually be difficult to deal with especially when he colddecks you.

Now, even against someone who peels you really really light, it does not mean that you should just go auto bet bet bet. In 6max/FR that's often ok, because when you're the aggressor you usually do have a hand, so when your opponents call you're often ahead. Not so in HUHU. If your opponent floats you with 92o, he's not going to call a turn or river bet unless he catches something. Therefore, say you have a hand that you intend to SD, but is weak (AHigh or bottom pair). If you area always betting the turn and river, he'll be playing close to perfect against you, as he'll seldom be calling a weaker hand both streets. On the other hand, say you bet the turn but check the river. He will bet most of his better hands yes, but he could also bet some hands for value (when actually is not, say worse Ahighs) and also bluff some of the hopeless hands.

Therefore bet/check is better than bet/bet when the probability that he bets with a worse hand is bigger than the probability that he calls with a worse hand. You also get a bonus if you can freeze him to check with a marginal hand that is better than yours. This becomes much more important in HUHU, where pots are smaller and you don't want to valuetown yourself. In addition, there is some balance issues, that you don't want to let your opponent bet with his 92o with impunity because you can never have a calling hand when you check. I don't have everything down perfectly yet, so feel free to ask more and we'll both benefit.

As for limit 6max vids..... I don't mind doing one in principle (and I'm interested in your comments as well), but I'm busy and it seems that not many are following. I only play 6max when I think tables are good, and if I feels like talking I'll make a video out of it. Just not promising when it's going to happen

Here are some comments on the video. I have to warn you though that they are not completely thought out. I just fired up notepad and stopped before every decision and scrambled my thoughts. So they will certainly contain a lot of mistaken thought-processes. Also, the fact that I comment on many hands doesn't mean that I think you make that many mistakes. Many of them just provide a different take on the lines, not as more profitable lines absolutely.

I've watched through around 20 minutes and I still plan to watch the rest of it.

Again, I've switched the audio off so you might have covered some of the issues here, so don't mind about that.

00:17, You call down with Q7o on K322 board (assuming that you call the turn bet with the intention of calling the river bet) based on recent history with the opponent, I guess, and it's a fine play. The only minor downside is that the villain is probably going to valuetown with better queens and aces, but nothing you can do about that. His river bluff is pretty hopeless.

00:44, You check-raise the flop of 2 3 9 with 6 T and I think it's OK, even though it's unlikely to get him fold Ace/King high, but with the equity you do have, you don't need him to fold much at all to make this profitable. And if he doesn't fold even Jack high, he's going to lose value against your made hands.

Turn is 2 and you check-raise as a semi-bluff. It's not completely hopeless with the equity you have, but the board has come so that you still aren't going to get any high card hands to fold (so drawy and low board) so I think this is a bit on the hopeless side. If he 3-bets the flop with overcards, this is not the board where's going to fold them to turn raise and river bet.

01:28, I think you can profitably peel 883 flop with J4. He's pretty much guaranteed to bet again on the turn with this board (and J/4 hitting on the turn), so you have this sort of "implied odds" to peel lighter, effectively almost 7:1. (It's usually the case with players who always 2nd barrel.)

01:46 You fold QT on K4392 board, after villain check-raised the flop and lead turn and river. I would fold too, but I think it's pretty close as you're getting 7:1 and it's still a probability that your opponent just turned FD with his air and bluffs the river. Had the river been 3h, say, instead of a 2, I would have called, expecting to be behind most of the time, of course, but still being marginally profitable.

02:05, You defend with T5o and check/call flop of 9 5 6 and check/raise 2 turn. I can understand why you want to do this, but with this board I think you should just check/raise the flop and go with that. (Or just check/call all streets, given that the villain has showed the capability of three barreling.)

The thing is that I would expect this player to be much more likely to spew on the flop than on the turn. He might even get away with some hands against turn check-raise and while it's frustrating that you have to fold so often before showdown with this type of player, I think you still maximize your value by letting him bluff if he wants to. And as a value play, this turn check-raise is very thin.

At around 03:00, you have 75o you get check-raised on Q72 flop and villain leads A (which turns a FD) and J . You might have had a different feel for the villain as you have had played few hands already, but the river call is again is a bit on the hopeless side, though not surely a big mistake. Surely he 3 barrels liberally, but I wouldn't expect him to do it as frequently on this type of board and action.

03:36 You defend w A3o, call two streets and board comes: 6 7 6 9 3 and you lead out the river. I would just check/call again. I would expect the villain to value-bet strong ace highs on this board and perhaps three barreling with air. It's not entirely certain how he would play mediocre ace highs and king highs on the turn, but I would expect that he would check behind with those some portion of the time. Given that you can't fold to a raise, I think the value-bet is a bit too thin.

As a sidenote, every time the villain has shown strength with raises, esp. on big streets, he's had a hand. He did three barrel with a bluff, but do remember that these represent a bit different sorts of aggression, ie. it's different sort of maniac who spews on big streets. He just seems bluff-happy. So I wouldn't necessarily label the villain as a true maniac just yet. (At around 04:20 or so, the villain check-raises w 76o on AK6ss board and while this is somewhat spewy, it's not completely unreasonable.)

04:30 You defend with 66 (you might sometimes want to 3-bet with it) and check-raise the flop of 4 Q 5 and villain 3-bets. Turn is Q . Villain bets and you raise. I think this is a mistake. Better hands aren't folding for sure, against a hand like A K the play isn't that much of value and with non- hands, you are just better of letting him bluff. The pot is big, but hands that are behind and don't have a , don't have that many outs (so they're still making a mistake by betting).

Against made hands, like Qx, 4x, 5x, any flush, assuming they're all firing again on the turn, you might be somewhat of a favorite, something like 53-47 at max, you're still in a bad spot in that when you do get 3-bet, you're always behind, and he's almost always going to 3-bet you with hands that are ahead (except for pocket pairs 77-TT). You'd need a bit more equity to make this as a value play. Finally, as you can't fold to a 3-bet here, it should make
you all the more inclined to just call on the turn.

At 05:00, you raise QQ on the btn, get check-raised on 9 8 3 and 3-bet right away and this is what I would do also. With this hand and board, it's best to just induce action right away and not loving to see something like K pop up on the turn.

I'd defend 46o on the BB.

You limp w 86o on the button, which I don't love since you raised on the next button and I don't see this player as particularly aggressive 3-bettor. You raise the flop of 654ss and the villain 3-bets. You call and raise the turn
of J. This value-play I like, because now the villain's range is basically just 6x, 5x, 4x of which you are a clear favorite over.

At 06:50, you defend A3o and check-raise K52r flop. I think you can just check-call and go from there. There's not much value to get him fold 89o or whatever. Also, there's little or no chance to get him to call down with a worse hand on this board.

You do end up maximizing value against his pure-rebluff raise on the turn, but on average in I think this is still too thin and doesn't usually accomplish anything too much for you. This is by the way the first real instance of the villain spewing uncontrollably. It's not completely unreasonable spewing, though certainly a mistake in my opinion, because he's probably thinking that you're just taking a stab at a dry flop and just wants to re-bluff.

I think you're right that this player is overly aggressive, but I still feel that maybe you're over-generalizing here a bit. He does spew, but it's important to note that the tendency here is to bluff aggressively, but that he also gives up on the hands too. So you do want to get to showdown with high card hands, but I would be more inclined to play passively with them, letting him bluff.

08:25 or so, you defend with A7s (which I would 3-bet), and check-call the flop of 3 T 9 . Turn is A and you lead out. I'd just check-raise this. The times that you induce bluff-raise on this board are
pretty rare and he 2nd barrels this turn card pretty much 100% of the time if checked to.

I like the flop cap at 09:40 with A 6 on the monotone flop of AJ7.

As another sidenote, I think the villain just has got a lot of good cards so far. A lot of top pairs and so on. He does fold some flops and turns so he isn't completely maniacal or SD bound.

At 13:30, you defend with 97o and call twice on the board of 4 2 5 T A . I think this could be a spot to try re-bluffing on the river, because Ace is a card that you can "represent" easily and the fact that he just keeps firing at such a scare card, makes me think he either has a real hand or just air and the air represent a reasonably large part of his range. But check-folding is fine too.

With QJ, at 14:20, on the flop of 32Q, you call the flop raise and check-raise the turn, which is fine, but you could consider 3-betting and going for a bet/3-bet on the turn. I think your hand is just that strong against a spew-machine like this. The river 3-bet is a good play, his most likely hands are Qx or lower two pairs (the only slightly realistic set is 55).

16:00, you open with T3o, villain check-calls Q 5 7 board. Turn is 8 and you check behind. I think you can 2nd barrel this one, because you have no trouble folding to a raise and the opponent does peel super-lightly on the flop it seems and folds to a decent amount of turn 2nd barrels.

17:30 or so, you cap preflop with QJs which is not completely unreasonable, but puts you in difficult spots often against this type of player, forcing you to make call downs. It's good for value-raising preflop, but you must remember that
you tie yourself into calling down often UI. I would fold the river, but I think calling is fine too. (The villain had 63s, which makes me think that he likes to "mix" preflop 3-bets with these sort of hands, not that he necessarily 3-bets with a huge range per se.)

19:20, you raise w Q9, get check-raised on 8 5 A board, you call and turn comes A . Villain bets and you fold. I would happily call this turn bet, you have decent equity against 8/5, there is a draw and lot of potential gutshots on the flop. I would also consider calling brick rivers (not a or a middling card). You get value-owned by kings but nothing you can do about that.

45o I would defend.

19:40, I'd still c-bet K4Tcc flop.

Watching more into the video (and perhaps the hands you played before you started recording), I can see the more maniacal tendencies of this villain. Some of the bluffs are quite spewy, but in general that's the kind of stuff you have to do to adjust against competent aggressive players. These kinds of bluffs make you look stupid, but are often profitable, because you win so much and risk so little. He didn't quite adjust to the fact that you were really SD bound and your 3-bets came primarily from hands that were going to see showdown pretty much no matter what.