If I know, he/she also knows...

A theory has been rattling around my head for dealing with the varied types of players players at the cash tables. For every piece of information I know about an opponent's tendencies and playing statistics, they also know a comparable amount about mine. This sounds like a truism but from this I can modify my game play, stay aware of my table image and make the occasional play against regulars that I would not make against most fish. I was raised by a regular opponent in position recently, so I popped a 3 bet preflop with rags and was able to 2 barrel an ace high board to take it down. This move worked because I know enough about my opponent to know that he would likely be getting out of line in late position, therefore he knows enough about me to know that I would only ever 3 bet good aces and medium pairs+ so the flop probably helped me. This sort of move does not give me license to spew chips, but demonstrates a point where a small edge in a game can be ground out.

The further conclusion of this theory is that if I know nothing about an opponent, all they know about me is my actions in a hand or two. If I decide to call a hand down, it looks weak, if I decide to bet it looks strong. It is for this reason that if unknown fish are still on the line and you have shown aggression twice then it is quite often correct to check-fold. It is horrible weak-tight poker, but time and time again the third bet is just spew. Our approach to continuing with aggression should be to look at the flop, decide whether to bet 1,2, or 3 times and then plan a line based on the passivity/activity of the fish in question. This morning I played a slight losing session where I tried to isolation raise an aggrodonk when I was in position, so I could skin him before he went broke. The trouble was I had was a passive fish in the big blind that kept calling my raises with 45% of hands. In one pot I ended up heads up in position to the fish, with a small pair that missed the board. The board read K89 two hearts. Here my line is to decline to c-bet, check back the flop, and check fold the turn all day of the week. The reason for this weak play is what hand can my opponent call with preflop that will not also call a bet post flop that I am still ahead of by the turn? Only small pairs and weak aces. Since I am behind most of his small pairs ( I had 44) and having watched this fish for a few rounds of the table I know he would check down a missed ace all the way. That leaves Kx, Qx, Jx 109,108, 98, 97 etc. all of which are happy with the flop, will certainly call and will likely improve on the turn. Furthermore this fish had also ran a check trap play since sitting down at the table and so would likely check all his kings+ hands on flop for sure.I was happy that I had shown aggression, backed off at the right time and made the right play for this particular opponent in this particular spot.