It has already been explored how to handle tilt and what you should do if it happens to find yourself in a situation where you are no longer playing at 100% of your capacities.
The topic, this time, will be instead how to get the most out of a titled opponent.

Obviously playing versus a player on tilt is a huge opportunity to make a big win, so if it happens, just take the chance.

Yes, there’s a moral side, but we are playing for making money and make a way up into the poker system, so given everybody is responsible for their cash and behaviors, do not feel ashamed to exploit this situation.

How to play versus a tilt player: preflop

A “preflop” tilt could happen either playing every hand very aggressively or calling to any raise just to see the flop. In the first case, often this player will not care about the sizes, raising or 3betting very big and his only purpose is “scare” players off. Spoiler: it won’t happen. In the second case – the passive tilt – regardless the size of a raise, he will just call it hoping to flop good.
In this scenario, you should:

  1. keep playing a strong range if he’s in a “3bet-rage”, because you want to go for pure value; also, do not call wide his raises and 3bets because you do not want to put yourself in a marginal spot
  2. playing a wider range of hands if he is going to call no matter what, because you want to play as many postflop hands possible, just keeping in mind that you still cannot play trash hands, because he literally will have any two cards in his hand.

How to play versus a tilt player: post flop

Depending on which kind of tilt your opponent is:

  1. if he’s in a raging aggressive tilt, then just play the spot every time you have decent showdown value. For what you know he might have Q-high on a board as AK854, so if you have a K and the sizes are reasonable, you can even call three streets.
  2. if he’s in the passive type, just bet for value. On a board as above, AK854, KT has strong showdown value and can compete decently in the spot, so just go ahead and bet, keeping the sizes reasonable; even half pot is ok because you do not need to avoid giving him the right odds, he just wants to reach the river

Catch the fish!

On a side note, if you are playing a full ring table you can definitely apply the above rules, but be aware that if you have a spot heads up with the tilted player postflop, you might want to get the most out of it, before anyone else has the chance to clear his stack.

You can evaluate small risks and make sure you are the one who gets the juicy chips, just don’t be too greedy and put yourself in a situation where you might end up losing money to the tilted player.

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