How to play pre-flop with fish and squeezers? (5 Viewers)

[dylanthepiguy2]

Was playing a $.25 blind, 8 handed, 50-200ish BB home game last night and was card dead.

For the playable hands I did have, eg ATo, I would open UTG to 3bb and have 2 callers from passive fish with 100% VPIP, and a squeeze to 2.5x from the LAG BTN (with different size squeezes every time) and then 2 more callers from LAGs.
What the hell are you even supposed to do? ATo is it garbage hand for playing multiway, although some of the fish have garbage ranges so beat them, but the squeezer is squeezing with a "fairly looser than GTO" range (I'm guessing - they squeezed quite often), so ATo vs that range is just shit, esp with 4 other players.

Apart from being carded, the annoying thing is I think everyone is burning money, but they're just exchanging money between each other.
I ended up folding this hand.

It's basically impossible to not have a multiway flop, and there's like a 75% chance of getting squeezed if I open from UTG which puts all the offsuit broadway combos into a terrible spot.
How should you adjust strategically pre-flop to such an annoying mix of players?

Should I be 4-betting like crazy? The 2/3 of the LAGs would pick up on this and wouldn't mind 5-betting back with some garbage hands

 

[ChipMonster]

I like to tighten my range in early position against those players. They don’t fold, they call nearly everything and you can’t bluff them so I only play super premium hands in that position or just start limping some hands and at least if the button squeezes it ends up being about where you’d be at with your initial raise.

 

[dylanthepiguy2]

Yeah I already play tight (a little bit looser than GTO but not by much). It's pretty boring to play when you just have to fold everything.

What about later positions when you're facing an open UTG from a LAG with 2 callers. What do you do then? Squeezing will just make the pot bigger and will not get heads up unless its's a 20BB+ squeeze.

Also to add I thought about larger raise sizes, I see raises from the LAGs of even 12BB preflop and the fish just call anyways. It's so infuriating that they're lighting their own money on fire and also lighting mine on fire at the same time

 

[dylanthepiguy2]

I did have a feeling that tight and boring was the optimal way to go though . Frequently leads to some boring nights

 

[NotRealNameNoSir]

The 2/3 of the LAGs would pick up on this and wouldn't mind 5-betting back with some garbage hands

Isnt that wonderful though? You're just saying their range is weaker than yours almost every time. Tighten your range and play back, knowing you've got the better hand most of the time.

 

[dylanthepiguy2]

Isnt that wonderful though? You're just saying their range is weaker than yours almost every time. Tighten your range and play back, knowing you've got the better hand most of the time.

That's true, i should definitely be calling 5-bets wider than usual. Scary tho esp when I could get exploited, but I suppose I'll wait until that becomes a problem first lol.
I'll try the more frequent 4-betting and see how it goes, as much as I don't fancy playing all in or fold.

 

[NotRealNameNoSir]

That's true, i should definitely be calling 5-bets wider than usual. Scary tho esp when I could get exploited, but I suppose I'll wait until that becomes a problem first lol.
I'll try the more frequent 4-betting and see how it goes, as much as I don't fancy playing all in or fold.

So they're playing way looser and scaring you, the way to exploit it is to tighten up and remember they're playing that looser range. You've correctly identified that they're putting you in tough spots because they know you're a tighter player and will fold while other apes with even worse ranges may not. You got this, trust your post-flop skills knowing you're starting from a position of strength.

Its definitely scary, but call and 4bet more while putting an even higher permium on position. You want these apes to act before you.

 

[chippitydoodah]

Unfortunately those players will also call down up until the River as they rabbit hunt and when they hit with their shit holding you wanna blow lol.

 

[l33tf0b]

Tighten up and play pocket pairs / all suited aces and kings. See more flops In position. Be prepared to get the money in with overpairs on good boards.

 

[Coyote]

Just coming from an online session. It is just impossible to win, even with great patience, playing only high pairs.

 

[dmoney]

tight and boring

Important to note that "tight" is NOT the same as "boring".

In my view, playing tighter ranges, ESPECIALLY in a loose/fishy/passive environment, allows you to re-raise/jam more often, which is not boring. By playing tight ranges alone, you can punish limpers and callers by re/raising and even getting stacks in pre, with the understanding that you'll more often be purely ahead, or have some reasonable equity e.g. 30-50% when you're behind.

 

[Kain8]

Sometimes you're card dead in a session and it's utterly maddening when you see the same bad players being in pot after pot.

If a normal raise isn't getting any respect from said poor players preflop, you have the green light to increase your sizing. Doing this gains a couple benefits:

• It traps more money in the pot earlier, allowing decisions on future streets to be easier given stack-to-pot ratios.

• The better players in the game will be more reluctant to play back at you (or even flat) given your larger initial raises.

You want to find the sweet spot with raises where the poor players are still willing to call you. If say a 6 bb raise preflop is even making some poor players fold out, then you can fine tune from there. If you're not thinning the field at all with that new larger sizing, rinse and repeat.

 

[ekricket]

Position is key here. Don’t tighten up everywhere.
You need info in this game. When they will call three bets with junk you never know where you are.
Top ten hands when in early position
Don’t play any middle positions
Top ten or bottom ten in late position