This is my first video at Red Star Poker, which would eventually become my main poker site. I moved a part of my bankroll to Red Star in order to take advantage of the deposit bonus and great 33% rakeback offer. I originally was planning on clearing my bonus dollars and moving on to a new poker room, but the players were so bad that I stayed for the next 3 years. Because the players at Red Star Poker played so much differently than at Full Tilt Poker, I review how you can adapt your own poker strategy to your opponents’ play style.
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Adapting to New Opponents
One of the interesting things about No Limit Hold ‘em is how you can play the exact same hand differently depending on who your opponent is. While the cards in our hand and on the flop are important to how you should play your hands, knowing your opponent’s tendencies can drastically change your normal lines of play. Against weak passive opponents, we must be the ones making value bets because they won’t do it. Against loose aggressive opponents (see LAG Play), setting traps by checking or betting smaller than normal can be good plays.
You can see how I adapt to new opponents by the shift in tone from Trikkur 10 at Full Tilt Poker to this video at Red Star Poker. At Full Tilt, I had to increase my preflop 3-betting range because I had to combat the regulars that were trying to steal my blinds frequently. I was also able to use more bluffs and advanced moves like the squeeze play against thinking opponents that were capable of folding a made hand.
On the other hand, once I started playing at Red Star Poker, I had to tighten up my game considerably. There were a lot more loose passive opponents that were willing to call my 3-bets and squeezes because they had hopes of getting a lucky flop. Because of this, I started calling when I had position on the weak players and taking a flop. Once you catch a big hand against a loose passive opponent, you can make 80-90% pot bets on the flop, turn, and river for great value. Red Star Poker quickly became very profitable for me once I learned to adapt my own poker strategy.
What is your opponent thinking? Image by jscreationzs
Thinking from Opponent’s Perspective
In order to take your poker game to the next level, you have to think about more than just yourself and your hand. You also need to think about your opponent’s hand range and what his future actions will be. I use this technique to know when I should check back instead of make a continuation bet. If you know that in your opponent’s shoes, you would call a continuation bet on a flop such as 
; then you need to just check back.
I’ve also used this to know when to check to induce a bluff on the river. If your opponent has a lot of drawing hands in his range, but likely doesn’t have much showdown value – then you know they will want to bluff you on the river because they can’t win any other way. This is the perfect spot to check to the villain and call their river bet.
Play at Red Star Poker
I might be a bit biased because of all the money I won while playing there (very subtle, I know), but I can recommend Red Star Poker for players all over Europe and pretty much anywhere that isn't the US. There is a large number of Russian players on Red Star Poker and they enjoy loose and crazy gambling a bit more than other countries. I know our Russian PokerTrikz members (Hi Podbelski and others) will have something to say about that, but it remains true for the majority. Also to update what I said in the video, the newest version of PokerTracker has added compatibility for Red Star Poker and other Cake Network skins. If you sign up for Red Star Poker through PokerTrikz, you will receive the normal 250% up to $1500 deposit bonus PLUS an additional 36% rakeback deal. This is one of the best rakeback deals available and was the primary reason I moved to Red Star Poker when I was playing poker full-time.
