Exploiting weak opponents
No Limit Holdem
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Marcus Bateman /
13 April 2011 /
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Most great skill games have areas that are extremely counter intuitive. Put another way, they have nuances where the correct play seems to defy common sense in many ways, and goes right against the grain of how our normal brain works. One of the best examples of this in poker is in making plays that seem very bold and risky to exploit weak opponents, and if they work, doing them all over again straight away.
In most walks of life, if we do something risky and bold, we expect our opponent(s) to counter very quickly, and not take such a move seriously the next time. If we make a sneaky attack on enemy lines from the flank, we expect this areas to be better protected next time. However, in poker this is frequently not the case, and particularly against weak players, when you make these types of plays and they work, your first priority is not to back down and try to use them occasionally, but to start making them constantly.
Most weak poker players have very set ideas about the game. If you make a play that to you seems a little out there but it gets a quick and easy result, you have probably found a move that they have very set ideas on, and as a result of this static state of mind, they will take huge prompting to change their mind and behaviour.
Say you check raise the turn against a weak player who seems overly cautious and get a pretty much instant fold. Many poker players reason along the lines of: 'Oh well I have done that once he is probably sceptical now so I shouldn't bluff check raise the turn again'. This is nearly always wrong. If you find a chink in someone's armour, exploit it. Keep attacking it until they close it or go broke.
Most of poker goes on under the surface, and as such, things which you consider very simple and obvious are often things opponents may literally have no idea about. Concerns to you about not being exploitable or staying balanced frequently have pretty much zero place in another player's thinking.
When you are up against these types of opponents, you might as well just keep firing away until they defend adequately - no matter how much your common sense wants you to back down. Bad players can't defend against what they don't see, and all the best exploitative players not only know this, but attack these blind spots with a ruthless zeal when they identify one.
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