Aggressive style. Betting Aggressively in Poker Using Chips as Weapons

Ability to play aggressively- an important quality, especially when it comes to playing online poker. Aggression is the opposite of passivity. Aggressive play style suggests that instead of constantly checking and calling, you will bet or raise more often. Compared to passive play, aggression provides more opportunities.

If any of the terms in this article seem unclear to you, we advise you to refer to the poker dictionary for their interpretation.

correct using aggression at the poker table opens up more prospects and overall chances for success in your poker career, which you can't achieve if you use a passive approach to the game. This is why many successful players try to play their hands aggressively.

It is very important to learn how to play poker aggressively. However, being aggressive in poker doesn't mean that you should bet and raise your opponents' bets every hand.

Aggressive poker involves you betting and rearranging other players' bets when you have an advantage over them. The advantage is that you have more strong cards, the best position or experience of the game. Aggression in poker works to your advantage only when you apply it in a sober mind and carefully choose the right situations for this.

An example of the use of aggression in poker

Imagine that you have the flop and you are heads-up with your opponent.

Using Aggression to Buy a Position

Buying a position can only be done preflop. This can be done by betting/raising which will force opponents in position on you to fold preflop. As a result, you will be in position for the rest of the players who decide to take part in the draw.

To give a small example, you are in middle position at a 9max table with . All players before you have folded except for one player who called. If you raise to 4BB and the CO and BTN players fold, you will "buy position" for the remainder of the hand. In other words, you will be the last to decide in the hand. And as you know, playing in position gives you a very strong advantage over players who will play out of position post-flop.

To reiterate, aggressive play has clear advantages over passive play, because if we had called in the example above, it is likely that CO and BTN players would also have entered the game. In this case, we would lose the positional advantage in playing our hand.

Using aggression to get a free card

If you play aggressively, then your opponents are more likely to just check to you than to bet themselves, as they would like to see what you do next in this hand. Villains will be less likely to bet with medium hands because they will be afraid that you will raise and they will have to call a large bet. They will do the same with strong hands, because they will hope that you will start bluffing.

This can work in our favor, because in situations where we have a straight or a flush draw on the flop, we can take a free card and try to complete our draw as cheaply as possible.

Using Aggression to Get More Benefits

If you constantly play in an aggressive style, opponents will no longer give you enough credit for your actions. Sooner or later they will think that you can't always have a strong hand when you bet or raise, so they will start calling with weaker hands to catch you bluffing. This will work for you in situations where you have a strong hand, as your opponents will pay all your bets. But you also need to be careful not to get too aggressive on dangerous board structures as your opponents will also slowplay their nuts.

Conclusions on the use of aggression in poker

We hope you realize that the use of aggression in poker is one of the factors for profitable play in Texas Hold'em and other poker games. Whether you play loose or tight, you should use aggression as it has many more advantages over passive play.

Passive play will very rarely win big pots (because passive play is hard to form a big pot), so learn to play aggressively.

A long time ago, when I first started playing online poker at the micros, all the regulars that I met every day were extremely passive and tight. So passive that every time they 3-bet preflop or raise postflop, you could be 99% sure they had aces or a set.

But times have changed, and now even at the lowest limits you will sometimes meet very aggressive players. They will 3-bet you light, and they will raise and float you post-flop with all sorts of hands.

In this article, I'd like to share with you some of the key ways you can beat aggressive regulars in low stakes cash games.

Don't get involved in a war with regs

One of the most annoying things in poker is having a very aggressive player to your left. That's because he's 3-betting you all the time every time you open. And more often than not, you will be in the red due to lack of position.

It quickly gets boring, so in such cases I usually either change the table or move to another place. But more often than not, I stay at the table for one simple reason - Fish sits to my right. Therefore, I do not want to leave such a table.

So, if you do decide to stay at the table, what do you do with this aggressive "thorn" to your left?

So first let's talk about what most people do.

Most players let their ego get the better of them and they lightly 4-bet and 5-bet aggressive players with all sorts of stupid hands. They also start calling out of position 3-bets and then float postflop with some trash.

Both of these strategies are doomed to failure, and here's why.

If a player has position on you every time, it will always be a losing game. This is the same as voluntarily agreeing to a fight with your hands tied behind your back.

The aggressive reg to your left will always have a big advantage over you every hand as he will be the last one to act. In other words, he will first see your action before accepting his own.

You will be accepting all my decisions are blind, without the slightest understanding of how the opponent will react. And this is too big a handicap for the opponent so that you can overcome it.

Moreover, you will not play against a fish, but against another reg, who will probably not be very far from you in terms of skill level, and therefore, your edge will be minimal.

Once you start playing with regs, you will forget about the main reason why you are sitting at this table, because of the fish! And this is a problem.

Thus, with all of the above, it is very important to be able to remain calm and sane and avoid the so-called "reg wars". Even if you win one battle, you will still lose the entire war.

Narrow your opening range and widen your 4-betting range

The rational approach in this case is to realize that your opponent is lightly 3-betting you and simply narrow your opening range. And don't look at it as a sign of weakness.

This is nothing more than a balanced and rational reaction to the prevailing circumstances. This is especially true in late positions and the blinds, as this is where aggressive players start to get especially brazen with 3-bets.

So, for example, from your standard stealing range of 30-40%, exclude a lot of weak speculative hands, especially those that do not have a strong high card, that is, suited and offsuit connectors (ex. 5 4 , 6♣5♣, 7♦6♦, 9♠8 , J♣T♦).

Get rid of the dominating Broadway and trash aces and kings too. These are hands such as: Q♦T♦, K T♣, A♣8♦, K 9 .

On the other hand, you should expand your 4-betting range as well.

Since we know that an aggressive regular will 3-bet us with all sorts of broadways, pairs, suited connectors, and suited aces, we know that most of the time he won't be able to continue against our 4-bet.

So if you normally only 4-bet with hands like AA, KK, QQ, JJ, and AK, now add TT, 99, AQ, for example. Also mix in a couple of blocker bluffs, like suited aces (A 3 or A♠5♠).

From time to time with fairly strong hands, you should also call 3-bets out of position to balance your ranges.

Yes, I know that in my books, articles, and videos I have always advocated against calling 3-bets (and just open-raises) out of position. And if you play at NL10 limits or lower (or just new to poker), then I do not go back on my words - that's how it should be done.

However, once you get to NL25 and beyond, where the regs are already a lot stronger, you can't just 4-bet and fold out of position, as you will make yourself a very exploitable target. So, as you move up in limits, you still need to develop your OOP calling range a bit by supplying it with relatively strong hands.

How to play 4-bet pots out of position?

Well, an obviously aggressive player won't fold to your 4-bets every time. Sometimes he will call. Just like we will sometimes call his 3-bets.

So how should we play our postflop play in these situations? Let's first talk about what we do as preflop aggressors.

When it comes to 4-bet pots (assuming effective stacks were 100bb at the start of the hand), we don't really have much wiggle room. I mean the stacks will be very short.

Typically, the preflop raise order would look something like this:

• 3bb open raise > 10bb 3bet > 22bb 4-bet

So, before you see the flop in a 4-bet pot, about 1/4 of your stack will already be in the pot.

Since the current pot size will be close to 50bb (if you have one opponent), if you c-bet, there will already be about half of your stack in the pot.

And this creates such a low SPR that if you hit an overpair, top pair, or a good draw, you have almost no chance to fold.

Most of the time I'll just c-bet and push with any made hand. Draws are a little different because I don't want to just call with them. So most of the time it will be a good spot to check-raise all-in on the flop, putting maximum pressure on your opponent and getting maximum fold equity.

How to play 3-bet pots out of position?

Playing 3-bet pots out of position is a difficult task. Most of the time you will miss the flop and have to act first in an overblown pot.

But since we're in such a mess, what should we do?

So we're up against an aggressive player with initiative, so if we check we'll just get a c-bet from him most of the time.

3-bet pots are completely different from 4-bet pots. The SPR will be much higher here, so we can still get away with a lot of our hands if we think we're behind.

However, we will often have to fight for the pots too, or calling out of position will be a disaster for our red line and for winnings in general.

This is where most people play wrong.

Here you will need to mix a lot of lines such as:

• Check/Call
• Check/raise
• Donk bet

When specifically you need to use this or that line, this is already a topic for a separate article or even a series of articles. Although I will say that a lot here will depend on how a particular opponent reacts to a particular line.

That's why I'm a big proponent of installation so that you have all the information you need at your fingertips and you can quickly use it.

But generally speaking, you should just balance your game with all types of hands, from top pairs and medium pairs to draws, semi-bluffs and bluffs (in some cases).

Against extremely aggressive regs (those with high 3-bets and frequent c-bets on the flop and turn), you can simply smash them with your check-raise shoves on the turn with lots of value hands and strong draws.

However, don't get me wrong, you don't have to fight for every sweat. A good number of times you should just fold on the flop. Trying out of position to take every pot from a competent reg is not a good idea for your win rate.

Final Thoughts

Fighting back aggressive players to your left is never easy. In fact, it will be very frustrating, no matter how well you play.

Allowing your ego to come out and return fire with fire is usually a mistake, simply because you will almost always be out of position.

In general, it’s worth killing with regs, of course. I do it all the time myself, so I make them tilt. But this must be done especially carefully and with a cool head.

No need to fight constantly "on their territory." Meet aggression with more aggression (or beat the enemy with calls) when you are in position.

If you are out of position, the only correct decision you can make is to hide. However, you can also expand your 4-betting and calling ranges out of position if you play at higher stakes.

In the course of no-limit hold'em, a raise, which is necessary for isolation, can work much less frequently than in the case of limit, I wrote about this earlier .. You also need to pay attention to the strength of your hand and how these things are with your opponents. If you make a mistake in this, then there is a high probability of paying a considerable price for your carelessness.

When you "raise" (for isolation), you can get a "re-raise" from a third gambler in response. There is no doubt that opponents will have more power in their hand. Therefore, it is obvious that because of this, it will not be easy for you to play No Limit Holdem Poker. In the case of a "fold" and the rejection of all existing investments in the bank, there will be big losses, if we draw analogies with the "limit".

Isolate an inconvenient enemy

Considerable value in the no-limit mode belongs to the size of the stacks that the opponents have. So, with short stacks, it is much more difficult to complete isolation. If the opponents have long stacks, then in most cases you have to go all-in, and this does not give any guarantee that the cards will be folded. But, if you have a short stack, all possible losses will be significantly reduced even with an erroneous assessment of the strength of the hands of all opponents. The short stacks of maniacs are often indicative of the risks associated with isolating, which do not pay off with the profit made from winning, even with the whole stack.

The most rational way to achieve your profit in such a form of poker as No Limit Hold'em is to have a stack in the same size as a maniac. In the case of both short stacks, the best strategy is to wait for a good hand and go all-in immediately after the maniac decides to "raise". If both stacks are much larger than other gamblers, then it is better to play only from late positions. This will work when no one except you (excluding the maniac) will show their own aggressiveness. It is also important to be ready for your opponents to push all-in if you have a "re-raise". With even stacks, they can play the same way as when playing Limit Hold'em. It's important to remember to "re-raise" in the big blinds and "re-raise" when the raiser bets. You need to be prepared for a big loss if fortune turns away from you.

Material from the site, the free encyclopedia of poker.

Aggressive style(English) Aggressive style) - a style of playing poker, in which the player constantly makes a large number of bets, thereby putting pressure on opponents and forcing them to give up a large number of pots. Today, the aggressive style is considered the most profitable and strong among all possible.

Advantages and disadvantages

Advantages of an aggressive style:

• Hand movement control. An aggressive player constantly puts pressure on opponents and forces them to play by his rules.
• Using fold equity. Showing aggression allows you to take full advantage of fold equity, thus significantly increasing the mathematical profitability of your game.
• Difficulty of scoring a hand. Since a player of this style plays both bad and good hands equally aggressively, it becomes difficult to assess the strength of each particular hand.
• Paying strong hands. For opponents, an effective way to deal with the aggressor is to show even more aggression. Thus, the pots grow in size very quickly and good hands are more than paid.

Style disadvantages:

• Relative complexity of execution. To play well in an aggressive style, you need to have a good understanding of both the game itself and the opponents at the table. The latter will very often set traps or outplay with aggression - all these situations must be understood and analyzed in order to avoid a costly mistake.
• Vulnerability to traps. Good players like to slowplay strong hands against aggressive players. Such situations need to be noticed and stopped aggression.

Playing against an aggressive style

Aggressive style is very popular among players in today's poker world, and in order to play poker successfully, you should understand the possibilities of dealing with it. There are two basic approaches to beating aggressive players:

• More aggressive play. In this case, the aggressive moves of the player should be answered even more aggressively. Seeing an opportunity to "steal" the pot, an aggressive player will almost always bet. We should re-raise this bet to show the strength of the hand and win the pot along with the aggressive opponent's bet. However, if we make such moves too often, the opponent will play even more aggressively. The theory of such a chain of reasoning is described in the article Level of thinking.
• Creating traps. The method is based on the use of the player's aggressive actions against himself. The most common way is

You are a novice player and are still mastering the micro limits. You know very well that you need to fold weak hands, but after an abundance of folds, you suddenly notice that the game is not going as well as you would like. What's the deal here, you ask? And the problem is that your opponents are very likely to playaggressively(that is, actively betting, raising, reraising, even all-ins), conquering pot after pot, and the blinds will begin to eat more and more of your stack.

In other words, you can’t do without the ability to play aggressively even at micro-limits. It will help not only to fight off the attacks of other aggressive players, but also to replenish the stack. In this article, we'll walk you through the basics of playing aggressively at the micros.

When does a tight game stop being profitable?

foldis the right decision only if your opponents playnot aggressive enough. However, sensing that you will play tight and fold all the weak hands, they will start to boss the table, raise and take the pot or the blinds, knowing that you will not call. And if the opponents play too aggressively, the blinds turn out to be expensive, so at one point you will have to decide on a change in the strategy of the game.

Why can't you just respond with aggression for aggression?

Then many beginners respond to the aggression of opponents in the same way. And what do you think? This strategy also turns out to be losing!

And that's why:

1. Your advantage is not enough. If your opponents play aggressively too often with weak hands and you also begin to play large bets with all sorts of hands indiscriminately in response, thenyour hand range appears to be roughly identical to your opponent's range. It turns out that the game ceases to be winning for both, since a wide range provides a wide sample for variance, equalizing the chances of both of you. The advantages in such a game are scanty.
2. If you run an ultra-aggressive game with only one opponent and, as it were, play an "arms race", you untie the hands of the remaining participants in the table who are not involved in your "graters". They will calmly wait for strong hands, call at the right time and take pots from you. Usually,playing aggressively against one or even several specific players is a disadvantageous venture.

The main task in the fight against aggressors is to reveal their bluff

Is a raise always necessary?

A smart strategy against aggressors is to play passively - but only in the right cases. And yes, for the bulk of challenging players, passive play will cause a painful restructuring of their own style.

Why painful? Because such players play too aggressively, thinking that they are just playing aggressively. It happens like this: at $0.1/$0.25 limits, you can win by slightly expanding your range of hands preflop and starting to play aggressively postflop in some important moments.

So, this game is too aggressive:extra hole cards preflop give more weak hands postflop. Although this works on an aggressive bluff, this strategy will lose to an opponent who sees you through and plays similarly.

Let's add that aggressive players are most afraid of those who play tight preflop, respectively, they often catch strong hands postflop and often and unexpectedly open their bluffs.

Actually, you understand how to play, right? In order for the opponent to try to understand what kind of hand you have, you need tocall his bet more often, bringing it to showdown.

An example of a preflop to river continuation bet to expose

Let's take a concrete example. You play $5/10 with a $2,000 stack. A very aggressive opponent raises to $50 from middle position. The button calls; you also get involved in the distribution from the big blind, holding J 10 in your hands.

Flop: 8♠ 7♠ 2. You check; the preflop raiser bets $100, the button folds. You call. In the bank - $355.

Turn:J♣. You miss a move, the opponent remaining in the game again bets - $ 300, you call. In the bank - $955.

River:K♠. You check again and your opponent bets $800.

All-in is not our method!

Why is king of spades bad on the river? He will first giveflush(if the opponent has two peak cards), and secondly, isthe highest card on the board. There are chances that you are behind. But let's look at pot odds, or pot odds: your call will be worth $800 when there is already $1,755 in the pot. We get the ratio: $1.755:$800 ≈2:1 . Therefore, the gain is needed a little more thanin 31% of casesto justify the call.

Methods for determining a bluff on the board in the absence of a strong hand

Pot odds of 31% at the micros is an unreasonable hope. Microstakes regulars would never play aggressively without a straight or at least a flush. They could, of course, famously bluff, but the probability of winning here was not even close with 31%.

However, experienced "aggressors" realize that a good bluff can be made on such a river. And that's why:betting from street to street on such a flop will be many, regardless of the cards they received. So, a jack on the turn can be considered the most senior card Which means they have to keep bluffing. And after calling on the turn, they can't help but make a third bet. And that's why, by making a call on the river in this case, you will receive in response to the showdown of any two cards with which you entered the distribution, andno matter strong or weak handthey will eventually have it.

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Do not let the aggressors rob you!

Thus, your opponent's aggressive play is due to the cards on the board and, in particular, the ability to hit outs on the turn and river - and not at all by the strength of his hand. Assuming that the opponent bluffs a little less than in the above example, your winning percentage will still be higher than 31%. So calling on this river is the right decision.

Don't let the aggressors knock you out of the hand!

Let's summarize. Learning to play aggressively gives you the right understanding of poker. So, if at micro-limits you need to constantly show aggression in order to be in the black (and when aggression is in your direction, fold weak cards if they come), then at higher limits you need to understand the following: it is important for your opponent to knock you out of the game, and you need to understand when the opponent uses a bluff to do so. And a good weapon against such an aggressive bluff will be a simple check