Need some advice on maniacs in freerolls / tournaments.

[forest_leaves]

I mostly play cash games and its not as big as an issue to go bust cause you can just buy back in and make the money back, in tournaments though I'm having some trouble.

Mostly play some free roll tournaments as I'm not very comfortable with buying in tournaments as my best case scenario is making into the money and busting out soon after.

So early in free rolls you are in a table with many players sitting out, you have a maniac out of position putting 25% of his stack in out of position trying to steal the blinds, the problem I'm facing is that I am forced to play really tight here because when he's raising with any two cards I can't really put him on any range and have no clue if hes connecting with the flop. The maniac cbets as well even if I call, I could bluff raise or go all in but then I risk getting knocked out.

I'm not sure if this happens in a lot of buy in tournaments too,

What I do is to play really tight and wait for others to risk it all, but that eventually puts me in short stack positions too often.

So what exactly does one do here?

 

[TulasMoreno]

What i do is play tight, wait for a good hand and hunt him, wishing that good hand is a top pair or AK, AQ only. Thats the only way you can knock those trash players.

 

[korneel]

The one thing you can't do is bluff those players, since they will almost call with everything.
The best thing to do, is to wait on a good starting hand and when let him raise preflop, so you can reraise. In the best scenario he will go all-in and you will have a great advantage preflop since he raise with every possible hand.

 

[Psyanide14]

A player putting in 25% of his stack in a freeroll. I consider that player to be tight. Lol. Very rare to not have at least one player go all in every hand during the first few rounds of freerolls. Not much to do but wait it out unless you got AA. Will eventually settle down a bit.

 

[henriquemaduro]

Thats freerolls dificult, try to play some tournaments that are paid, get a little bit better.

 

[Andrei Korolev]

Freerolls horror when you get into these millstones.Play with monsters and call if not raise in position...

 

[BentleyBoy]

The first thing to remember is that freerolls are totally different in terms of style of play to reasonable but in tournaments. Many people have the view that with a decent hand you should be shoving regardless of your position and seeing what you hit, after all it cost you nothing to enter so you may as well make the most of trying to win it and losing nothing.

The other advice already given is when you are up against a maniac is sit tight and choose your spot carefully and when he goes all in again hit him with a shove of your own and hopefully take him down.

 

[playinggameswithu]

Well freerolls have literally no investment in them and people tend not to care so they usually just jam questionable hand to get a gamble feel from the result. Play the MDS and see how totally different the play is. It's only like $265 and a superb value.

 

[veritasi]

it depends on blinds structure and speed, i play like a maniak in 888 ST freerolls))

 

[Miketheman190]

The really crazy maniacs are usually gone by the first 25% of people. I play tight but try to get in any hand you can for a good price with a decent hand because you can also stack a lot of those players really easily. Even by going all in with top pair and a good kicker. They will call with middle pair or even a gut shot or something. I kinda look at it like Im the casino and they are the gamblers. Try to get them to gamble for their whole stack when Im ahead.
Also play really tight the first few levels and just to gain chips so my whole stack isn't at risk. They are actually the best players to play against just try to gamble as little as possible. You will get the hang of it and will realize when you can widen your range and still be ahead of theirs.

 

[Liquified]

Play loose and be willing to gamble with them to chip you up and put you in a good position to win.

 

[Eric Salvador]

freerolls are just all over but if your making into the money and getting busted you're probably playing too tight. You need to up your range once it gets near the bubble to take down pots and build your stack