Playing Aggressive Poker with Friends
Students of the game of poker know that aggressive poker is winning poker. The players who go after the chips aggressively and who don't back down tend to win the most. However, what happens when you are playing at a home game with friends? Or when you and a friend sit at the same table at a casino or in an online poker game? Is it ethical to play aggressively?
Aggression Ethics in a Casino
In truth, if you are playing in a game with one or two friends but mostly strangers, it is unethical not to play aggressively if aggression is your typical style. This is called softplaying. It is unfair to the other players at the table who can expect to get your best game and it is considered a form of cheating. This is particularly true in a tournament, where the rising or lowering of anyone's chip stack affects everyone who is still in the tournament. If you can't play your normal aggressive game against a friend, you should avoid that game. If you can't avoid the game, you should try to avoid getting involved with hands with friends. If you find yourself playing less aggressively against your friend, try not to draw attention to it.
Aggression Ethics in a Home Game
In a home game where all the players are your friends, there are a different set of ethics. However, if you are reluctant to play aggressively because you are worried about earning the resentment of your friends, you shouldn't be. There is a big difference between aggression in life and aggression in poker. Aggression in poker is simply a tactic used to assist in winning and says nothing about how you feel about the players in real life. Would you not take an opponent's queen in a chess game because he is your friend and might get mad? Would you not take an open shot when playing basketball? Aggression is just part of the game. If your aggressive play is causing a problem between friends at home games, you need to either lower the stakes so that the tension level is lowered, or not invite those particular friends to poker.
Final Notes About Aggressive Poker with Friends
Remember that in poker, aggression means nothing more than betting and raising strongly when you are in a pot. It does not mean verbally taunting your opponents before or after the hand or otherwise attempting to intimidate other players into conceding the pot to you. Doing these things would be ethically questionable. Contesting every pot with strong betting is nothing more than good poker.
- Date posted May 7, 2008
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Clark Jensen
The world of poker
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