Help - I need a bonus-chasing strategy: quickly!

[Misunderstud]

I’ve recently left the comforting bosom of PokerStars to seek my fortune in the big wide world of bonus chasing and I’m not enjoying it one bit.

Although the first week went well at +70BB, since then I’ve dropped 140 and at this rate chasing this bonus is going to be costing me money.

Game selection is pointless, since every table plays at 24%. Everyone is just playing ABC poker at fast forward - 50% more hands an hour than Stars. My pfr is close to 100% of hands played, since I don’t cold call and am therefore always either 1st in or (re)raising. Family pots are rarer than dodo droppings; nearly all are HU, sometimes with the BB along. This is not poker as I have ever known it.

I play pretty tight anyway - about 15% - but even this seems too loose in these circumstances.

It seems to me that this bot-like play should be pretty easy to exploit, but I need to work out how to do so pdq. I’m not even especially worried about winning - just breaking even would be fine. Any advice?

[Fenris78]

Apart from the obivous advice of looking for a better site, as the games on the one you are currently playing seem ridiculously tight, I would at least think about a LAG approach.

Most of these players are horribly weak tight and often aren't paying attention, so 3betting them light preflop when they come in from MP2 and later, will get them to lay down a lot of hands. You could 3bet stuff like QJo, or T9s and watch how they react. If they don't adapt, you can crush them with a controlled LAG style. The only problem is, that this strategy is rather high variance and not for the faint of heart.

In fact in these games you can even cold-call sometimes and float them on any flop. When your opps are weak tight enough you can win several points by betting when they check to you on the turn.

Of course I have no idea if this strategy works on this site with these players but I think you should at least give it a try to see how they react. Also, it will be quite fun to play more hands for a while instead of sitting tight and waiting for rockets. I doubt you can make a lot of profit on these tables playing ABC TAG poker when that is what everyone is doing. Just experiment a little with a bit laggier style and if it doesn't work out, you can always go back to a TAG style.

[Willem]

Beating a full table of rocks is almost impossible. What site are you playing? Switching from one site to another is always somewhat difficult since you need some time to adjust. Maybe you post some hands you thing you misplayed.

[Bullajami]

The title of your post is misleading. You are not asking any questions about bonus chasing, but about how to beat tight tables. Do not relate the two in your mind just because you are now playing tight tables as a result of going to a new site that offered a bonus. Bonus chasing is simply going to play at poker sites that offer a decent reduction of your rake by returning it in the form of a bonus.

Its not an uncommon mistake. When bonus chasing was more prevalent (pre-UIGEA) we would get quite a few posts from people who had decided to give up bonus chasing because they didn't like playing three or four tables at the same time. That would be a choice to stop multi-tabling, not a choice to stop bonus chasing. Piemaster once wrote an article called A Sideways Look at Bonus Chasing - which was not really about bonus chasing, but about his observations that bonus chasers don't always make the best poker decisions - playing suboptimally to expedite clearing a bonus. The article was brilliant, as most of Piemaster's writing is, but I still don't think it was about bonus chasing per se.

Nothing about bonus chasing inherently forces you to play poker any differently than if you were not bonus chasing. Some people may choose to, but that's their decision. Nothing about bonus chasing forces it.

Happy Chasing!

[Bullajami]

[Misunderstud]

This is at Eurolinx, which is a Prima site. I'm kind of locked in there now until I clear my FD bonus - I'm halfway there.

I've experimented a bit with reraising light (limpers are rare), but have often run into trouble - high variance, as you say.

I think I might have to single-table for a bit and really pay attention. I'm probably trying to clear it too quickly - that good start lulled me in!

Thanks for the advice.

[Misunderstud]

[Bullajami]

[Big Boiler Dawg]

I too have been playing Eurolinx, and I don't find it to be any tighter than Stars.

What games are you playing?

I've played a little 1/2 FR LHE , but mostly I've been playing .10/.20 and .25/.50 NLHE, both FR and SH.

My NLHE strategy is to buy in short (about 20-25 BB) and then try to exploit a situation where I can double up. Its much easier to double up when you're short stacked,. Then I play my regular game.

I also play some SH .10/.20 PLO, and these games are MUCH looser than the NLHE games. It's not uncommon for all six players to take the flop. Then, you can play a TAG game.

[Misunderstud]

[MacTaiga]

I'm far from one of the best players but I spend the majority of my time on the crypto $2/$4 limit tables and these are _mostly_ tight (the odd lunatic turns up and you need to adjust when you realise).

18-25% players seeing the flop is normal, tighter during the week, looser on weekends generally.

Having explained the basis for my opinion here's how I play:

Preflop I see more hands than most, usually at least 20% and often up towards 30% depending on how the table is reacting to me. In late position I'm looking to raise a lot, suited connectors and A-rag are almost auto-raises if no-one has joined the pot yet and on the button any two will do if I've not been too aggressive recently. I'll throw in MP raises with just ok hands if the table seems to be giving them a lot of respect (they look scarier than button raises). Having said this it's important to ease back sometimes, I don't have a particular way of gauging when to ease off but it's generally when I find I'm getting called too much (I think this style of play relies on stealing the blinds a fair amount to counter the fact that I play weaker hands).

Postflop it's usually against a single player and they are likely to have missed so it's about applying pressure. When I'm check raised it's usually legit and all too often it's when I've got a good second best hand, folding these would consistently improve my earn rate. I find people will fold on all streets so I bet unless I've some indication of strength (some players call so fast you know they'll call you to the river). Of course this means I get trapped more than most but it also means that I get paid off more often as people tend to believe me less when they have decent hands and I've hit a monster.

I'm not up loads, most month's I'm just above even but plenty I'm down slightly. Importantly though I clear $800+ in bonus each month so in the long run it works for me.

The swings can be big though, sometimes the tables are onto you and then you tend to get caught too much.

Can't guarantee it'll work for you of course, it may only work because the crypto players will lay a hand down if they think they're beat.

[Misunderstud]

Mac, thank you.

Overall, I think I'm probably being too tight pre-flop by trying to emulate the other players, and too loose post-flop by calling down too often their 'bluffs' which aren't. Again this might be emulation, since the world and his wife seems willing to call down with their 44 when my AK misses every street (not to mention when it doesn't and they spike the river!).

[Psychological aside - I've noticed this before, actually: when conditions change and you run bad it's easy to fall into the trap of believing that everything you do must be wrong and everything everyone else does must be right, so you end up copying bad play instead of keeping faith in what has served you well so far. This has usually happened when I've changed limits, but I can see this is a very similar situation.]

I usually subscribe to the raise-first-in school, but perhaps I should be calling more pairs and suiteds in EP/MP1 - I've noticed the table often folds as easily to one bet as two - and believing people more often when they tell me I'm beat post-flop.

[Taardvark]

Have you thought about playing other games besides hold em? Although I haven't had bonus chased at a site in a long time because of all the issues getting money on sites,etc., I used to play a lot of stud when bonus chasing. Since there is an ante on each hand, the bonus clearing can be accelerated.

If you are playing hold em, especially low limit games, you absolutely have to multi table to clear bonus in a reasonable time frame.

[Misunderstud]