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How to Beat the Fish at
Loose Tables
Written by Haunted Poker for exclusive
use.
With the continuing influx of inexperienced players
flooding the online poker market, both ring games and
tournaments are getting wilder and wilder every day.
Many new players flock to online poker from television
advertisements. The only poker strategy they employ is
what they have seen the professionals do in big
televised tournaments. Inexperienced players often
bluff, play any two cards, and are willing to draw
against the odds for all their chips. In poker lingo,
this type of player is typically referred to as a “fish”
or “donkey”. I prefer to use the term fish, since it
goes so much better with the poker cliché of the
rock-solid shark. Strive to be the shark at your table
who, naturally, feeds on tuna, swordfish, octopi, and
any other aquatic life form in sight. Usually, the fish
is exactly the type of player you want at your
table and, of course, we’d prefer a half dozen of these
to WSOP bracelet winners.
Most of the time, the fish go down smoothly with a
couple tablespoons of tartar sauce and a healthy helping
of chips. However, naturally studious and conservative
poker players have become increasingly frustrated with
the bad beats that seem to occur much more often in wild
online games. Not only can fish frustrate you, but they
can be deadly to your bankroll when they hit their
miracle draws on the river. In the following article, I
hope to educate you on how to extract the most money
from online poker fish while avoiding the bad beats as
much as possible. Even if you’re already a
tight-aggressive player, I’ll show you how an even
tighter and more aggressive approach will
make you the most money online.
The first key to beating the fish is starting hand
selection. Sure, the concept may be old hat to you and
I’m sure that most of you read all about starting hand
standards when you picked up your first Texas hold ‘em
book, but how many of you actually adhere to them? It
may be tempting to play any two cards after you see the
table maniac get lucky a few times with his trash hands,
but it isn’t profitable over the long run. You should
stick to playing premium cards from early position and
slowly expanding your range as you get closer to the
button. While it may be boring to keep folding hand
after hand, it’s the kind of discipline that you need to
be a winning poker player. You simply won’t be involved
in many hands. The few times that you may get lucky
playing garbage hands won’t make up for the countless
times you won’t hit.
One of the most important and profitable concepts of
hold ‘em (and especially online hold ‘em) is: play the
opposite style of the rest of the table. Doyle Brunson
advocated this style of play 30 years ago in Super
System and it’s still good advice. Since most online
tables are wild and loose, that means that you should be
playing even tighter. It doesn’t work to go into battle
every pot with the fish. Pick your battles and get in
the pot when you have the best of it. Again, you should
drill this concept into your head: play the opposite
style of the rest of the table. At a table full of fish,
that’s going to be a tight style.
So what should you do when you finally pick up a premium
hand like pocket Kings or Aces and want to get into the
hand? You should raise, raise, raise against loose
opponents… and then raise again! Not only should you
almost always raise your premium hands against bad
players, you should raise them more than usual.
Why? Well, think about it. If online players are so
willing to play any two cards, why should you let in 4
or 5 players cheaply with trash hands? Premium hands
don’t play well against several opponents, and you don’t
want to make it easier for your fishy opponents to catch
a raggedy 2 pair on the flop.
Since the standard raise in no-limit is 3 or 4 times the
big blind, raise to 5 or 6 times the big blind in
particularly loose games. While many bad players will
call a small raise, your substantial raise actually
makes them think twice before they try to draw out on
you. You should never slowplay a big pocket pair against
loose opponents! If you limp into the pot with pocket
Aces and lose your entire stack to a loose player who
made two pair on the flop, you only have yourself to
blame. You’re the one who played the hand badly
in that situation.
While I mostly recommend that you stick to premium cards
and raise them up at a loose table, there are a few
situation where you can open up your starting hand
requirements and limp in. If you’re in late position and
there are already 3-5 limpers in the pot, you’re getting
great pot odds to play any pocket pair or suited
connector. If you hit a set on the flop, you should bet
it strongly with this many opponents. In no-limit play,
suited connectors play great against multiple opponents
because of your draw to both the straight and the flush.
I’ll play them down to 3-4 or 4-5 if I’m getting good
pot odds. Throw in the minimum bet and try to flop a
monster or a monster draw. Just have the discipline to
throw the hand away if you only catch part of the flop
or a thin draw. Remember, you should only play these
speculative hands cheaply from late position with a lot
of callers.
The key to beating the online poker fish and avoiding
bad beats is simple: play an even tighter, more
aggressive game than usual. You should only get into the
pot with premium starting hands, and you should raise
more than normal when you do play. You need to lay the
foundation and thin the field preflop in order to do
well and protect your hand postflop. Of course, the
idiots will still occasionally call you down and draw
out on you, but you’ll drastically cut down on that by
making them think twice preflop. Finally, you should
never get greedy and try to slowplay a big hand preflop.
Don’t be afraid of raising and not getting called. You
won the pot, didn’t you? That’s all that matters. It’s
always better to win that small pot than risk
losing a big one by slowplaying. In our next section,
we’ll cover what you should do on the flop and beyond
against bad players…
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