Playing Donks

Have you ever been at the table with a complete moron? How is the most profitable way to play them - aggressive or slow? I usually go slow, but protect my hand when nessecary. Discuss.

Hardest thing for me is not firing really hard at a ragged low flop against calling stations because these generally are the hands they hit. Just sit back play aggressively preflop and the wait for them to make a mistake because they will!

In a game where there are a ton of calling stations preflop, I tend to raise more hands preflop that do well in multi-way pots (suited connectors above 78 and sequential cards above 89). Also, I limp a lot more than I normally would. A lot of the games today are loose-weak. This meaning that there are a lot of people in every hand and there is not a lot of preflop raising and re-raising going on. By limping more, you are disguising your hand and you will get paid off big time when you flop a hand like top set, top two pair, or a straight...

Playing straight up poker is another way to almost guarantee success. You have to learn though that your AK is going to lose to a hand like 69 sometimes...

I personally tend to mix my play up and play more hands, I usually can outplay my opponents post flop.

There are many flavors of moron, but in this case I'm guessing you're referring to people who will call down with nothing (and lo and behold, your A-9 suited which made you a huge favorite with a 9-7-2 flop killed you on the river, when he paired his J3o).

DMan's advice is sound, and it really is the key: Wait for their mistakes. However, what you also have to realize (which is sometimes difficult in the example I gave above) is that they are constantly making mistakes. You lost that hand, but you had positive expectation the whole way. You'll lose many hands, but they'll lose more.

I really don't think you should go "slow", depending on what your definition of slow is. Don't smooth call with AA, etc. If you're the favorite, if you think you have the best hand, you have to bet. Your way of making money against these kinds of players is by winning enough money when they don't suck out on you (which most times they won't), so you can afford to pay them the times that they manage to hit their four-outers. If you don't bet when you're ahead, you're costing yourself money in the long run.

But, and this is a big but, you can't take it personal when they manage to hit their draw. You have to be able to lay down your pocket rockets when you realize that they hit a full house with their 63o. If you're the favorite on the turn, however, it's equally important that you jam the pot, and not figure to take the safe route and wait for the river before deciding if you like the card or not. If you're ahead, you bet.