Lately on the $100 PLO tables on UB I regularly find myself playing one or two opponents (often regulars at the 2-4 or higher) who play an extremely lag game. They raise the max before the flop almost every time and continue with a full pot bet on the flop most of the time and take the pot down.

Many people will call the preflop raise hoping to double up, but this does not succeed often - in case the lag player gets called down he either has the goods or a lot of good outs, or folds to a raise on the flop when he has absolutely nothing. But since others lower their requirements considerable, the lag player will more often than not bust others who call him down with a mediocre hand.

I always thought that this kind of laggy play would lead to insane variance, but from what I've observed, this is not the case; rather, these lag players usually build a huge stack in a short time.

First question: what is the appropriate response to such players? I try to have position on them and tighten up a bit. My main problem is the following. I'll call raises with good hands, but most of the time I'll miss the flop and only have an overpair in a 4- or 5-way pot, so that I cannot continue. This costs 5-10% of my stack at a time, so it makes me too dependent on hitting the flop hard enough. Should I reraise preflop trying to isolate with a hand like KKQJds? What do I do when I miss the flop and face the inevitable pot bet?

Another problem is that these players are good enough not to pay you off when you have something, so that waiting for the nuts is just not a profitable strategy (unless you are so lucky that you hit something huge in a multiway pot).

Finally, a recurring pattern is that I will bet/raise the flop with a set, but the board is draw heavy. In this case the lag player will often call hoping for a scare card on the turn. By the turn, I have, say 30% of my stack in and face the decision whether to call all in on a flush board or not. Sometimes the lag player is on a complete bluff, sometimes he actually picked up a small flush or straight and any of this is equally possible, given that he plays every hand.
What do I do to counter such strategy? If you only hit one or two flops during a session you can hardly afford to either lose a stack here or to pass on your only opportunity to double up.

Second question: would you advocate learning to play in such a laggy style? It seems to me that it is highly profitable, but puts you under constant pressure of correctly reading your opponents.

Any thoughts appreciated,

Pieter