How to beat a maniac at the poker tables

[fundiver199]

We have all met those poker players, who go under the name maniacs. Someone who is involved in almost every hand and also bet or raise to large sizes all the time. Some people struggle against these players, but they are actually really easy to beat. You just wait for some sort of decent hand (not the nuts), and then you get it in against them and hope to win at showdown.

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This hand is from a $7.5 PKO on pokerstars, and the opponent was playing VPIP 88 / PFR 44 with a 31% 3-bet over 25 hands. As we can see from the replay, he also used very large sizing preflop raising UTG. I look down at 99 in the big blind with a 50BB stack, which the maniac cover. Against a normal player using normal sizing, I would usually just call 99 in this situation and see a flop.

But against the maniac I have an easy shove, and this is not a bluff, its a shove for value. I would never do this with a bluff hand against this specific player type, and I would never shove in 50BB over a standard raise against a good player. The result speak for itself, and the only thing to add is, that sure sometimes the maniac will bust me from the tournament. Even the crappy hand, he called me with this time, had 32% equity.

But I am ok with that. I dont play $7.5 PKOs to prove to myself, what an amazing poker player I am. Or to try to outplay someone by making them fold a straight, when I raise them on the river to represent, that I have a flush or a full house. So if this player hit his top pair or a flush or whatever and bust me, then I dont go on massive tilt and need to end my session for the day or post about it in "bad beats and vents". I just close down this tournament and play another one instead.

 

[hardongear]

Honestly I think you under sell yourself as a player. I think you're better then you give yourself credit for. I know plenty of higher stakes players I'd consider decent who would over shove this type of villain with 40bb. You will certainly find that type of player in that $7.50 PKO. In my opinion this is at least a good play and I'd consider it a great play against only that type of villain.

I consider it such because dude is a weak ass player and the fact is if one wants to have any chance of running deep and winning such an MTT he has to win flips and hands exactly like this. Yours being a bit on the more extreme side with 50bb compared to 40bb.

I say well done and well played.

Cheers!!!

 

[comeburras]

You're absolutely right—maniacs can be some of the most profitable opponents at the table if you stay patient and stick to a solid strategy. The key is not letting their aggression tilt you or drag you into marginal spots. Wait for a decent hand, let them do the betting for you, and capitalize on their overplays. Discipline is everything against these types.

 

[fundiver199]

I know plenty of higher stakes players I'd consider decent who would over shove this type of villain with 40bb.

It would be a little bit more clean, if I started with 40BB instead of 50BB. But we have to remember also his opening size, which was almost 5BB. This gives a much better risk/reward, than if he was opening to say 2,5BB. Its still a bit of an oversized shove, but then again what are the alternatives with specifically 99? If I just call, I am out of position in an already bloated pot, because he opened so large, and most flops (including this one) will have overcards, which puts me in tough spots. Also as I say, this is not a balanced play. And if he is calling off this wide, there is really no reason to not get it in with a hand as good as 99.

 

[hardongear]

It would be a little bit more clean, if I started with 40BB instead of 50BB. But we have to remember also his opening size, which was almost 5BB. This gives a much better risk/reward, than if he was opening to say 2,5BB. Its still a bit of an oversized shove, but then again what are the alternatives with specifically 99? If I just call, I am out of position in an already bloated pot, because he opened so large, and most flops (including this one) will have overcards, which puts me in tough spots. Also as I say, this is not a balanced play. And if he is calling off this wide, there is really no reason to not get it in with a hand as good as 99.

Completely agree with everything you're saying. And exactly with a VPIP 88 / PFR 44 your 99 is a monster against most of villains range. As in the long run it's hard to hit flops in holdem. And he has a VPIP 88 lol.

Cheers!!!

 

[tagece]

Maniacs are everywhere. There is a specific kind of player that loves gambling and doesn't cares about odds or strategy.
I had one on my left today, and you really need to be careful about then. You can't bluff then, because there is a huge chance they call you with a third pair or an single Ace. And even you had a monster hand, there is a chance they win with 67s.
The game I refereed was a 50/50 sit and go, where players tend to play it tighter. He played almost every hand with overbets and shoves. He called shoves with nothing. And, after winning some hands with shit cards, finished in ITM. The luck factor is always there. As I wasn't dealt with the best cards, I just avoid to fight him, and got ITM too.

 

[WinnersCircle]

In the interest of spurring thought and discussion, I'm going to play devil's advocate here. When you see a vpip/pfr of 88/44, even over a tiny sample, we can be reasonably confident that this player will fall on the maniacal side. But even if this was over thousands of hands, do we think every position is 88/44? In all likelihood, in the earlier positions, both numbers will be smaller.

In tourneys, our tournament life is something that we need to protect dearly until we are short stacked. The cash mindset, ChipEV, probably isn't the best model for all stages of a tourney. 50bb is a LOT of chips, so we should be hesitant to be all in, especially early. That being said, we want to have a very big edge in this situation.

Our main focus isn't taking down a few big blinds when our maniac friend folds here. It's about what happens when he calls, unless he's going to fold an absolute ton of the time (which isn't our premise). Just as a baseline, I attached the flopzilla info for him calling with ALL broadways, ALL pocket pairs, and ALL suited aces. We are a 56% favorite. If this is a cash game, we have nothing to talk about. We're a favorite when called, and profit when he folds. In a tourney, is this enough?

 

[SPANKYSN]

You're absolutely right—maniacs can be some of the most profitable opponents at the table if you stay patient and stick to a solid strategy. The key is not letting their aggression tilt you or drag you into marginal spots. Wait for a decent hand, let them do the betting for you, and capitalize on their overplays. Discipline is everything against these types.

I recently went to a local casino poker room to play $1-3 NLHE. A new table was opened with 8 new players. There were 4 or 5 young aggressive players at the table. I was in the Big Blind the second hand of the session, holding AA. I was considering slow playing the aces so I would get more than just the small blind...didn't need to make that decision, UTG goes all-in for $150, the Button called and I went all-in for $300, which gets called by the Button. My aces hold up and I'm $450 in the profit right away. Played some KQ, QJ and KJ hands over the next half hour, losing about $100. Then pocket Queens...also held up for $200 pot, so I'm back to my $450 profit. There was probably not a single hand that did not get raised...very aggressive players at the table, so I folded all my junk hands until I got pocket aces again and found my self up against the original raiser (rebuy) from the first big hand. He bets $150 all-in again and I snap call and win another $200. All totaled, I played 3 hands to the river, winning all 3 and going home up $630. The aggressiveness of my fellow players did all the work for me. The moral of the story...if you can be patient, you will benefit greatly from the over aggressive players at your table...there's probably nothing more boring than a bunch of conservative playing what my son calls "Boomer" poker.

 

[fundiver199]

Just as a baseline, I attached the flopzilla info for him calling with ALL broadways, ALL pocket pairs, and ALL suited aces. We are a 56% favorite. If this is a cash game, we have nothing to talk about. We're a favorite when called, and profit when he folds. In a tourney, is this enough?

At the early stage of an MTT definitely yes, because in this phase chips won are just as valuable as chips lost. And if we bust, we can just reenter in most MTTs. So we are pretty much playing, as if it was a cash game, which is usually referred to as chip EV. In this hand I had just over the starting stack of 5.000 chips, so this would definitely be a chip EV hand even in a regular MTT. Risk aversion is for later in the game, when we get near the bubble and near the final table.

Moreover this was a PKO, and in PKOs there is negative risk aversion, because chips won are usually worth more than chips lost. In this hand I could not win his bounty, but dubbling up puts me in a much better spot for winning bounties in future hands, especially when the blinds have gone up. And because he could win my bounty, it is also reasonable to expect a maniac to call off even wider than the range, you assigned him.

I will admit, I was a little surpriced to see a hand as weak as T3s opening UTG and then calling off. But there might also be an element of playing the rush, because he was the table chip leader, and he had already knocked out some players and won some bounties. In general many players adjust poorly to bounty tournaments by either not adjusting at all, or by overadjusting as clearly this player did.

In general with bad players you cant expect logical ranges. Its not like, a player like this has looked at a GTO chart and decided to expand it, so that he is now playing 98% of hands from BTN but only 68% from UTG. Its more about, how many chips he have, how he feel etc. And this is also true for bad players, who are more on the passive side AKA fish.

Just because someone have stats like VPIP 38 / PFR 9, you can not assume, that when they come in for a raise, its always a top 9% hand, and when they limp, its not a top 9% hand. Even though they almost certainly dont know, what the word randomize mean in poker, they actually do it quite a bit and largely depending on, how they feel.

If their limps have been raised a lot, maybe they are little tilted, so next time they come in for a raise with 75s, even though its not a top 9% hand. Or maybe they decide to limp AK to "trap" someone behind. So with these players we should not get to caught up in trying to assign them very accurate ranges, or overinterpret, what the HUD stats mean. They are mostly a way to identify player types, and especially over a small sample like 25 hands.

For information the opponent in this hand lost all his chips during the next 2-3 orbits and then reentered twice, where he was placed in the same seat (thats not always the case on PokerStars). And having now been felted and with around a 30BB stack, he started to both limp and open ship. So once again with these kind of players its all very random and depend on, how they feel at the moment.

 

[puzzlefish]

I don't know if I can get on board with this. So basically jam into the maniac with a hand that you think is good enough and hope that he doesn't have a better hand this time and that he doesn't somehow Houdini his way out of the situation with a worse hand. It's not a solution that works all the time for all maniacs but rather an example of this solution working this one time against this particular maniac.

And yes, I have done this before and haven't tilted and posted my bad beats when the board prints the maniac a straight - or even something equally tilting where it chops so that AK = A2 for $200. However, in retrospect maybe I would have done better by sticking around and playing rather than punting my stack.

But definitely, it is something to keep in mind, to sometimes just roll the dice and try to double your stack or resolve yourself to not playing against that maniac when you bust out instead.

 

[fundiver199]

But definitely, it is something to keep in mind, to sometimes just roll the dice and try to double your stack or resolve yourself to not playing against that maniac when you bust out instead.

If you are ahead of his calling range, which I think is fair to say was surely the case here, then the more common outcome is, that you dubble up. And since this more than dubble your EV in a PKO, whats not to like? After all poker is about long term EV and not about surviving in a particular tournament. Or at least thats my way to approach the game, since I am not playing only for entertainment.

But you are right, that there is also some "future game" considerations, which I did not even get into. This maniac was on my direct left, which mean, I basically dont get to play a single normal hand, as long as he is there with a big stack. Every time I open a hand, he will call or 3-bet, and I will never be able to have a non-showdown winning or get to a relatively cheap showdown with medium strong hands.

So there is also added value in getting rid of this situation by either busting yourself or help the maniac to get rid of his chips. Which this time he actually did, since he basically lost the rest of them to other players with AA and QQ within the next two orbits. This is specifically, because he is on my left though. If I was on his left, that would be a very profitable situation, which I would not want to end prematurely.

 

[mssmotilda]

Especially in freerolls, for some reason, maniacs often catch their outs.

 

[dzsire]

I usually leave this opportunity to others. I've been busted too many times because I thought it would make sense to fight the maniac with a strong pair. But when the maniac is constantly all-in, he can knock out anyone with a simple 7-3, no matter how strong your hand is.

 

[recerveau]

Just play your A game and wait for him to mess up.

 

[dreamer13]

It is important to understand that not all maniacs are the same. All they have in common is that they play very aggressively, loosely and very negatively. The specific playing style, tendencies and motives will vary greatly from player to player.Bulldozers are not maniacs in the classic sense of the word. They are certainly loose and aggressive and will generally continue to bet until they are met with resistance, regardless of their hand. The difference between this and most other types of maniacs is that if you give them enough resistance, they will tend to slow down and even throw away their weak hand.You should be happy with the Maniac just like any other fish because they will be the ones that will make up the bulk of your win rate.

 

[bullkk]

To defeat a maniac, he must be unbalanced.