One of the most difficult challenges for some poker players is adapting to games with less than a full table against aggressive opponents. Playing short-handed – that is playing in a game with six or less players at the table – forces players to play more hands lest they be eaten up by the blinds and antes. Loose, aggressive players thrive in these types of situations.

Let’s discuss the adjustments we need to make as players playing in short-handed games and dealing with these types of players. 

Short-Handed Poker Games

The first thing to remember about short-handed games is that you are playing the same game as full-ring, except a number of the positions are missing. The strategy of a Big Blind versus Cutoff situation is the same in a 9-handed game as a 4-handed game. The only difference is that the situation comes up much more frequently in short-handed games. If you are overfolding on any street, or not playing aggressively enough in wide-range spots, your mistakes are going to be exposed and exploited at a much higher rate in short-handed games.  

In full-ring games, players can often get away with just folding and passing on a lot of close spots in these wide-range scenarios. Tight players can avoid these late position-versus-blind battles for big pots with weak hands and often bide their time playing patiently. In short-handed games they will be eaten alive if they continue passing on all these spots.  

If you are the type of player who feels uncomfortable getting involved and mixing it up with weak starting hands and battling postflop, then exposure is the best remedy. Playing heads-up games online is great practice for short-handed play, as you will quickly see the penalty for overfolding and get used to playing pots with garbage starting hands. Making big hero calls with weak holdings and running multi-street bluffs may take more time, but exposing yourself to these types of scenarios and getting in the repetitions is the best way to improve. 

Over-Aggressive Poker Opponents

Aggressive players thrive in short-handed games. These types of players would rather play with as few players at the table as possible. Sometimes, their mistakes of playing too many hands or too loose in a full-ring game suddenly become the right theoretical play as you remove players from the table. 

I can think of a few opponents myself that I would rather play in a 9-handed game than a 4-handed game. Just as overfolding and playing too tight is a detriment in short-handed games, playing too loose and aggressive in a full-ring game can be costly. It’s simply the mathematics of how many players are being dealt in on a given hand.  

How do we beat these opponents? Well, we start by not overfolding preflop! Familiarizing yourself with the preflop ranges for short-handed scenarios (late position vs late position and blinds) and finding the right amount of continues via 3-bets and calls is the starting point. Finding 3-bets is particularly important as we do not always want to be on our back foot playing defensively against these types of players.  

Secondly, it is paramount to identify where these players are focusing their aggression. Many aggressive tournament players will front-load their aggression so you will see them opening incredibly wide, 3-betting wide preflop, continuation betting too many flops, check-raising too many flops, but slowing down on a lot of turns and rivers. There are also players on the other side of the spectrum, where they will be applying more pressure on turns and rivers as they identify certain board mechanics or feel weakness. Identifying which type of aggression and which streets you are most likely to face it on is huge to playing profitably against these types of players. 

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