TAG not working out for you(me neither)

I know that a TAG(Tight Aggressive ) game is the way to go for a beginner. But what does TAG look like? It took me some time realise it.

Example 1
In a 100$NL FR you pick up AK/AQ/AJ in middle position and of course you raise it to 4$ (of course raise to more if there are limpers). You get one caller and you have position on him, the flop misses your hand, what to do? Raise to atleast 2/3 pot to take it down right there. The same goes for OOP! If he calls you, slow down he might have a piece of the flop... If the flop come drawish and the turn is a blank (not completing a draw) you might wanna take another stab (just mix it up, 60% check/fold, 40% stab).

Another thing that Miffed and Fnord made me realise just the other day.
Dont play big pots with AK on a Axx flops(Kxx)! Why? You TAG raised( 4-5 x bb) pf with AK/AKs and the flop is A9x. You TAG bet (2/3 pot) and vilian calls

The turn comes another blank. And you bet your obvious one pair hand, bt now he min-raises. Can you fold to the min-raise? I really cant In this particular hand he had trips. Posted the hand and Miffed made some good replies, that made me think.

Originally Posted by Miffed22001

But overall, noone but a fish is going to take a long look at this flop and think yeah, the 6bbs preflop raisor missed that.

That is a very good argument!

Originally Posted by Miffed22001

If someonewants to play a big pot here your probably f***ed because you will represent the obvious one pair hand and still get raised.

So after we TAG bet and get called we absobloodylutely have to slow down (not always!). If someone is holding AQ/AJ they will prob call too, but this is a pot you wanna keep under control.

Example 2

You're in a 50NL FR game and you tip the top of your cards and see QQ/JJ/AK. Someone raises to 2$ before you. What now? I usually think: Call I have a monster hand(well not with JJ/AK)... Nah you absobloodylutely have to reraise him here both in position/OOP. Of course if you're a rock at laying down QQ/JJ to AA/KK, when the flop comes all lowers: 8xx then go right ahead and call. When you're a beginner or just suck like me then this is the way to go.

Why? If your opponent has AA/KK they would prob 3 bet you and then you can with peace of mind fold QQ/JJ/AK
If you call and the flop comes: xx you have to TAG bet(2/3 pot) your QQ, of course. But what does AA/KK do? Usually call, but also reraise you and if you're beginner, you dont fold(well some gifted players fold their small overpair). The turn: x and you TAG bet QQ again but this time he moves all in. WTF? Can you fold it( I certainly have trouble doing so)

Therefore: RERAISE preflop!

The plays you describe, such as not managing pot control, going broke with the lower overpairs, failing to let top pair go after a raise on the turn, NOT re-raising AK/QQ etc. are HUGE leaks. If you do plays like these you are not playing a solid TAG-game. For the tight player it is very important to build big pots since he is mostly ahead of his opponents when he enters a pot. The key is to know when to build a pot and how to achieve this. Tight players should play large-ball, but to still to an limited extent. Particulary against solid opponents you simply can't build big pots just because you have TPGK. You always have to play within reason, realizing when an overpair might suck and act accordingly. Noobs trying to play TAG (actually they mostly play weak-tight/passive) might be able to squeeze out some $$ at the lowest micro stakes, but even at NL50, hell maybe even at NL25 it's not that easy to grind out a profit just being selective with starting hands.

Internet poker is becoming more and more tight, and much more aggressive. There are still a HUGE amount of donks to be found, but you have to adjust to the new pace of the game. Solid TAG is still succesfull, as is solid loose play, you just have to adjust accordingly to your surroundings. I remember back in the days when going AI preflop with QQ/AK was +EV and pretty standard. Don't get me wrong the fish is starting to get SOME clue but still most people have no idea of how to play No Limit Holdem properly. Information is everywhere and you basically have to live under a rock to not get at least some valid advice within all the existing public poker content. One last notion; as you all know, today it is very very common with tightish guys playing a very basic ABC-game at multiple tables, trying to grind out a decent profit. And many are successfull doing so. But I am 100% SURE there are ppl who loses out of the simple reason that they play too many tables.

A strong player might be able to grind out a higher hourly rate playing multiple tables, but these days I see (almost) complete beginners starting out playing "TAG" at four tables or more. This is a sure way to not only getting bad habits, not developing your game but also to lose money. My piece of advice to players trying to playing a TAG game but constantly losing is to really CONCENTRATE. If you are playing +3 tables, play less. THINK about your actions and your decisions. WATCH the other players. Don't always continuation bet because "that is what you are supposed to do". The player you are betting into might be the biggest calling station on the planet. Keep a close eye on the other players at the table, try to work on your "reads", such as betting patterns instead of relying only on cold hard statistics. Pratice your handreading, always. Post hands on places like FTR, discuss, analyze and study. In my opinion the style of play you wrote about in your post are a perfectly accurate description of the confused "TAG"-player who yet haven't grasped some very basic concepts of the game.

what a lot of small stakes ring game players dont understand yet, usually from a simple lack of time spent at the tables is that most players play certain hands in certain ways.
No matter how predictable our TAG 15/7 ish type stats are at a full ring table at 100nl or less, our monsters will still get paid. Our problem to becoming not just a winning player, but perhaps a big winner comes from our ability to not pay off other peoples monsters or to pay off their better hands with our own strong hands.
Once you know what a miniraise on certain flops means or a turn check/raise reps you know when to dump your hands so that theyare no good.
Also, we then start to get into the beginnings of deception play where we arent raising just Ak/AQ and TT+ but also pps and scs in position.

having said all that, theyre are still certain places where we lose stacks regardless. set over set etc in raised pots is just one.

Nice FP ElNinho.

Welcome to FTR.

Originally Posted by swiggidy

Nice FP ElNinho.

Welcome to FTR.

Second that. If swig hadn't mentioned it I would've never thought that was a first post.

Good post by the junkie as well. One thing I'd like to add, though, is that it is absolutely crucial to figure out those opponents who are aware and those who are not. Spot the fish.

Thanks. Long time lurker here, I used to post a little on other forums, such as 2+2 (still does to some extent). I always found the atmosphere at FTR much friendlier tho, and there is some pretty good content also, dunno why I "stayed a lurker" for so long. HalvSame makes an obvious but excellent point when he stresses the importance of spotting the fish. While I believe it's important to figure out who the good players are and (possibly) stay away from them/play back at them accordingly, I guess you can't argue against the importance of finding and exploiting the fish Sure it's important to know that "that guy", like the one Miffed mentioned is a 15/7/3 nit but most of our money obviously won't come from him anyway (though he sure is exploitable and probably will pay off some of our monsters). But my guess is that you dont lose much by not exploiting rocks/tags allt that much as long as you concentrate on skinning the fish mercilessly. Most of the players we encounter will (hopefully) belong in or somewhere close to this category anyway.

Great thread. Junkie you did a good job summarizing a few very important points about post flop play.

Excellent post El Ninho, I didnt realize you werent a veteran until swigg pointed it out. You should start your own thread discussion what limits/where you play. You sound like you have a lot to contribute! Of course you can always help improve your own game by posting Hand Histories in the forums as well.

Originally Posted by El Ninho

Internet poker is becoming more and more tight, and much more aggressive. There are still a HUGE amount of donks to be found, but you have to adjust to the new pace of the game. Solid TAG is still succesfull, as is solid loose play, you just have to adjust accordingly to your surroundings.

This is very true, and we are all struggling to adapt to this play. This needs to be discussed much more. One basic strategy is raising all pp's pf at tight tables. It helped me take a few stacks last night. There were also some very loose pf players making a killing at the low limits last night as well. Exploiting predictable players requires playing less tables, and paying closer attention.

.toma

Originally Posted by Miffed22001

No matter how predictable our TAG 15/7 ish type stats are at a full ring table at 100nl or less, our monsters will still get paid. Our problem to becoming not just a winning player, but perhaps a big winner comes from our ability to not pay off other peoples monsters or to pay off their better hands with our own strong hands.
Once you know what a miniraise on certain flops means or a turn check/raise reps you know when to dump your hands so that theyare no good.

How do we aquire this skill, knowing when our TPTK is beat, QQ is dead on a 74x rainbow flop etc? By keep playing and posting hands here?

Would playing limit help improve this ability, b/c in limit your good hands are getting beat more often b/c you cant protect your hand like you can in no limit, therefore you have to lay them down more often...Perhaps it would be better for beginners to start out in limit holdem instead of in "the cadillac of poker?" Perhaps it would help me improve my NL...

Real hand(reversed from Vilian to Hero):

100NL FR. Dealt to Hero AK. Hero is BB, vilian calls 1$, opp raises to 4$, Hero calls 3$ and vilian calls 3$.

Pot: 11.5$

:As:

Hero bets 7$ and vilian raises to 30$ and hero folds b/c he don't wanna play a big pot here. That is a standard fold versus 10/6(me ).

In the hand hero didn't fold, he moved allin and vilian calls.
Vilian shows: 22
Hero shows: TPTK

Originally Posted by Stripclubjunkie

Real hand(reversed from Vilian to Hero):

100NL FR. Dealt to Hero AK. Hero is BB, vilian calls 1$, opp raises to 4$, Hero calls 3$ and vilian calls 3$.

Pot: 11.5$

:As:

Hero bets 7$ and vilian raises to 30$ and hero folds b/c he don't wanna play a big pot here. That is a standard fold versus 10/6(me ).

In the hand hero didn't fold, he moved allin and vilian calls.
Vilian shows: 22
Hero shows: TPTK

the above spot is diffciult because it could be a flush draw using folding equity.

The line for this is often to call the raise and lead a diamond free turn for 1/2 pot type bet and fold to a further raise/push. On a diamond turn you obviously check/fold to any more betting.

lhe is a double edged sword for nl players. Its especially pertinent to 6max games becuase decent lhe players can often take middle pair to showdown when its good along with other marginal stuff. But as said its a double edged sword, it can make you quite calling station-y which is often bad rather than good.

Knowing tptk is beaten is an experience thing imo. If you take certain lines with certain hands in certain situations and on specific flops you can get away with losing say only half or a third of a stack vs getting stacked because of learning from the info someone is giving you by their betting patterns.
the $30 raise in hand 1 makes me think AK no goot, but id need to know how the guy normally plays a flush draw.

Alright... To call his flop reraise, you've invested total: 34$. The pot is 50$ and turn is a blank, you ½ pot investing another 25$, which is a total of 59$. Vilian repushes, you fold. To me that would seem like alot to invest (50-60% stack) with TPTK, but is that standard(on a flushy board) versus TAG ?

1. Wouldn't only a fish play like that with a flushdraw?

2. If the flop in the above was rainbow it would be "more" of a clear fold or what?

Originally Posted by Stripclubjunkie

Alright... To call his flop reraise, you've invested total: 34$. The pot is 50$ and turn is a blank, you ½ pot investing another 25$, which is a total of 59$. Vilian repushes, you fold. To me that would seem like alot to invest (50-60% stack) with TPTK, but is that standard(on a flushy board) versus TAG ?

1. Wouldn't only a fish play like that with a flushdraw?

2. If the flop in the above was rainbow it would be "more" of a clear fold or what?

if the flop was rainbow yeah i think i find a lot of reasons to fold.

The $30 raise is large in comparison to your effective stack sizes. SO id be wary first because all the money is probably going in on the turn regardless which doesnt suggest a flush draw, it suggests a set/two pair/monster combo draw. So yeah, the big reraise suggests fold, becuase your opp wants to get it all in quick. (that isnt to say however that players will play a flush draw like this, they just often dont)
If you were raised to say $21 it doesnt appear its all going in on the turn with money left behind so id be more willing to takle the call lead danger free turn line. But on a flushy flop like this shown expect to lose a stack at times pushing tptk vs what seems to be a flush draw but is infact a set. Its a common situation where losing a stack will happen enough times to piss you off and at times making a misread/good read here is part of the game.

It really makes sense now... But the problem is that only a small margain would play trips like this, right? Slowplaying it instead...

A hand i posted earlier...AK. I raised alot pf, and bet 2/3 pot, he calls, turn: i bet, he min-raises and i already got half my stack in the pot. I have trouble folding this...But i guess that i have think like this: i have announced my hand(which is good b/c then we better know if we're beat?) and he still likes it(which mean +++strength)... On the turn I wanna keep the pot smallish. I feel better eqipped to play now. thx

If you don't know what to do postflop after missing, you shouldn't be playing 100NL. Go down to the minor leagues and figure it out. No offense intended.

Would playing limit help improve this ability, b/c in limit your good hands are getting beat more often b/c you cant protect your hand like you can in no limit, therefore you have to lay them down more often...Perhaps it would be better for beginners to start out in limit holdem instead of in "the cadillac of poker?" Perhaps it would help me improve my NL...

Im not sure if I understand you correctly here, but in limit the opposite is actually more true. In limit when you have a big hand you have a higher chance of being outdrawn because you will be called more often, that is indeed true. But in regards to laying down your big hands more often, this skill is much more crucial in no limit. In limit when the pot is big your opponent called you down and the likely draw hits you will still very often end up paying him off, and correctly so. The reason of course being that the pot will be big, and his bet will only be a small fraction of the pot. When the amount to call is very small in relation to the potsize you simply have to call down very often, even when you strongly suspects that you are beaten. In no limit, at the other hand, the bet probably wont be that small, and hence your decision will be much harder.

Regarding playing limit to become better at no-limit; this is an argument I heard many times before, and while Im a firm believer in playing mutliple variations of poker, I dont believe "playing limit will make you a better no-limit player" to be true. Limit and No Limit teaches you two different skillsets and the game differs so much from eachother that the transcition between them are not always that easy. Many limit players start off playing no limit way to aggressive. They are used to pushing very small edges, and they are used to almost always have the right prize to chase with any reasonable draw. They are, however, not really that used to keep the potsize down with some good but still probable second-best hands and they are not used to lay down some pretty big hands for one final bet on the end. The opposite is of course true also. No Limit players will fail miserably at a Limit game without the necessary adjustments. In my mind it's all very simple; you become good at whatever you are tying to be good at. It's a principle of specificality.

Originally Posted by Rondavu

If you don't know what to do postflop after missing, you shouldn't be playing 100NL. Go down to the minor leagues and figure it out. No offense intended.

I know why you said that, but i hit the A on the flop Just forgot to write it. I do suck, but not that much...

Originally Posted by Stripclubjunkie

Originally Posted by Rondavu

If you don't know what to do postflop after missing, you shouldn't be playing 100NL. Go down to the minor leagues and figure it out. No offense intended.

I know why you said that, but i hit the A on the flop Just forgot to write it. I do suck, but not that much...

Fair enough. The way you put it came across kind of newbish. My bad.

Originally Posted by Rondavu

Originally Posted by Stripclubjunkie

Originally Posted by Rondavu

If you don't know what to do postflop after missing, you shouldn't be playing 100NL. Go down to the minor leagues and figure it out. No offense intended.

I know why you said that, but i hit the A on the flop Just forgot to write it. I do suck, but not that much...

Fair enough. The way you put it came across kind of newbish. My bad.

hes struggling with pot control etc.

stupid sng'ers j/k

Originally Posted by Miffed22001

hes struggling with pot control etc.

stupid sng'ers j/k

No you're not

Originally Posted by swiggidy

Originally Posted by Miffed22001

hes struggling with pot control etc.

stupid sng'ers j/k

No you're not

just you go play with your llama's

Originally Posted by Miffed22001

Originally Posted by swiggidy

Originally Posted by Miffed22001

hes struggling with pot control etc.

stupid sng'ers j/k

No you're not

just you go play with your llama's

they're cute though...

Originally Posted by Stripclubjunkie

Originally Posted by Miffed22001

Originally Posted by swiggidy

Originally Posted by Miffed22001

hes struggling with pot control etc.

stupid sng'ers j/k

No you're not

just you go play with your llama's

they're cute though...

Thanks junkie, they make me laugh

Originally Posted by swiggidy

Originally Posted by Stripclubjunkie

Originally Posted by Miffed22001

Originally Posted by swiggidy

Originally Posted by Miffed22001

hes struggling with pot control etc.

stupid sng'ers j/k

No you're not

just you go play with your llama's

they're cute though...

Thanks junkie, they make me laugh

You own them...?

Originally Posted by Stripclubjunkie

Originally Posted by swiggidy

Thanks junkie, they make me laugh

You own them...?

lol, no the pictures make me laugh. Altough if I ever buy property outside of a city I would probably buy some then.

Originally Posted by swiggidy

Originally Posted by Stripclubjunkie

Originally Posted by swiggidy

Thanks junkie, they make me laugh

You own them...?

lol, no the pictures make me laugh. Altough if I ever buy property outside of a city I would probably buy some then.

Drop me a PM when you do

Originally Posted by Stripclubjunkie

Originally Posted by swiggidy

Originally Posted by Stripclubjunkie

Originally Posted by swiggidy

Thanks junkie, they make me laugh

You own them...?

lol, no the pictures make me laugh. Altough if I ever buy property outside of a city I would probably buy some then.

Drop me a PM when you do

We're talking 15-20 years, but sure thing

Time to take this back to the commune?

Originally Posted by HalvSame

Time to take this back to the commune?

Meh...