Micro-stakes Tables: Simply a Crapshoot, or Can You Actually Win?

The bad players at the micro-stakes tables may make the game frustrating, but will make you money in the long run.

Many people are showing their interest in sa gaming at the casino. The gaming requires the skills and intelligence of the players to have more real cash. They can use the platform to understand the terms and conditions and start playing at the best games available. It offers the desired results to the players. 

Micro-stakes tables are a peculiar online poker arena. These tables, where the blinds are only a few cents, are populated by every manner of poker player, some good, most bad, and some crazy. You will be sure to hear tales from supposedly “good” players who claim that the insane calls and bad play of the cretins at the micro-stakes tables cause the good players to lose more. More than a few players have claimed that poker rooms favor bad players at micro-stakes, or that they never win with AA at micro-stakes, because everyone else is an idiot.

Of course, that makes no sense whatsoever. If everyone is so bad, wouldn’t good players win more often than normal? Of course they do, but there is one major factor that prevents people from realizing this, it can best be described as “blurred vision.” Where at higher stakes you tend to find better players, and can actually make well-informed decisions about what they do, because they are unlikely to do crazy things or make illogical decisions. You can much easier put players on ranges and calculate outs and equity in order to make decisions. However, when playing against players who are simply too stupid to know when to raise, call, or fold, your decision-making process becomes blurred, because you are far less certain about what, if anything, they are trying to do.

Play the Opponent

There are some players out there that think that every now and then you can find a micro-stakes table where the players aren’t completely clueless and tend to make logical plays most of the time, but are not really good enough to understand strategy and levels or realize when they are being taken advantage of. Sure, you may find a table like that once a week or so, but they are few and far between. Otherwise, all those tables with horrible players making idiotic choices will just ruin your bankroll, right? Wrong.

Many so-called “decent” players think that micro-stakes games are impossible to play because the other players make illogical and frankly idiotic decisions, and can never be read or anticipated. However, that is not true, instead the problem lies in the “decent” player, who is failing to adjust their strategy and thinking for these kinds of opponents, who do not fit the standard poker strategy mold.

When assigning ranges to other players, it always depends on what strategy and player type that opponent is. If you think that your opponent only has a very rudimentary understanding of poker, why would you ever assign him a range of only logical hands? Don’t try to narrow the range down to a logical level the way that you would for a “better” player.

If the flop comes T72 and a weak micro-stakes opponent bets, you can’t just put them on AT or 77. You have to include hands like J9 and 72 as well. Many players are incredibly frustrated by this problem, but it is actually wonderful for value betting. If these bad opponents don’t fold hands they should, then over time, your value bets are going to make you a lot of money. And when you expand the range to include somewhat illogical hands, you will actually have a better idea of hand-equity and fold-equity than if you simply assigned only the logical hands to these obviously illogical opponents.

Micro-stakes Betting

When you are at micro-stakes tables, a good rule of thumb is to value bet quite often but for small amounts. That way you won’t get a lot of folders, and make a good amount of money off value bets over the long term. While there are certainly some good, regular players down at the micro-stakes who can be bluffed, bluffs are best used sparingly or not at all. Always remember that at every level you play at, you should pay attention and play according to the specific opponent. That, more than anything else, is a quality that every good poker player has.

One other thing to note is that many players seem to flounder and only break even at micro-stakes tables, but flourish when they move up to higher stakes. Likewise, some players simply can’t cut it at $2/$4 NLHE, but just don’t lose at $.02/$.04 tables. It’s important to find what level your strategy is best at, whether it is micro-stakes or regular small-stakes. But most important of all is to be able to adapt to different stakes and styles and be able to win at every level.