Whale UTG (1100) opens 35, Hero CO (2k) AA 3bets to 110, ABC reg BTN (covers) 4bets to ~400, whale flats. Hero?

I think if you ever 5b here you just literally only ever have AA and you could conceivably flat the 4b somewhat wider with the whale in.

Can't really think of a good reason to flat. I make it ~950.

Your image and your dynamic with the reg matter a lot here.

With a tighter image I'd flat (and lead small on a lot of flops) and with an aggro image I'd make it ~725. That was if reg flats and fish YOLOs it in with whatever stupid hand he has, you can ship in the last 1300 vs the reg.

Lol $400.

I'd $925

With these effective stack sizes, doesnt the reg have to have a hand here? I think a flat and an attempt to check raise them both all in is pretty sexy, the fish is priced in to call off the regs cbet with pretty much anything and the reg should have a hand he can throw the last 8 or 900 in with. depending on how my sports betting has been going, i might flat in an attempt to win 3100 here, instead of turning my hand face up to the reg and trying to win the whale's last 700. I am old though.

I suppose it really depends on what you think happens when you reraise. Does ABC reg ever fold kk? Does whale ever fold anything after putting in 400? If there is a legit chance both fold to a raise then you should flat. If I were you, no reg is folding ak/qq to me so I'd just tank ship it. However flatting is definitely viable, but I'm not a fan of 725 if reg isn't clueless as this could be a massive tipoff to your hand (plus they could both flat and fold if they wiff the flop?).

I just think that the reg has to have a hand here. We have two blockers two blockers to AK, and I really doubt he is trying to iso our iso of the whale. I think any decent reg is going to be very leary of a 5 bet that basically commits you to the hand, and will tread lightly if not insta fold the range I put him on.

Not agreeing or disagreeing with your post, but just want to point out btn "having to have a hand here" is more of a reason for a 5bet, not less of a reason.

I flat in spots similar to this a lot, we just don't have position so dumb things can happen on the flop with still a decent chunk not committed when it's pretty clear it could have been. If we were btn and btn was sb then flat has way more merit or if we were UTG and whale had 3bet then I'd definitly flat a btn 4bet but here we are in a dumb spot (yes I realize we'd have "relative position")

When a reg announces to the world "I have QQ+" and a whale announces to the world "lolz only $400?" I try and get more money in pre. Sometimes you have to take face up lines with the nuts. This is live poker.

As timebomb says if he's ever capable of folding QQ+ here a flat would have a stronger case.

I do think the bigger discussion would be 5bet sizing, a tank shove does look "bluffiest" but most live players play in terms of money not thought.

So I would ask OP if reg cares about money...would a tank shove look bluffier than $925 or is he sigh calling $400 everytime more but tank folding to a shove out of its sheer size.

I'm pretty confident shoving is a large mistake.

In the Reg's spot here I would have absolutely no problem folding TT-QQ to a normal 5 bet, and probably KK as well. Does that make me weak tight? Really, in live poker the fifth bet in a 3 way pot is pure aces isn't it? To me calling even a modest 5 bet is the same as going the whole way because there is no way I am folding the kind of hands I am calling pre with to a 1/3 to 1/2 PSB on the flop, with no money left behind.

You wouldnt have made it $400 to go with any of those holdings or with anything for that matter I hope. Stop applying your thought process to btns thought process.

What do you do with AK here if you hypothetically had a lock read btn has QQ/AK

Didn't really think about it like that, but you are right. I don't regularly play 5/T, 2/5 200 bb max is my usual NL spot. I agree that my thought process starts breaking down in these 3, 4, and 5 bet preflop situations. That is probably because I don't face a lot of them at my level. Trying to learn though.

Shove against both? I think that is related to why I would flat call after so heavily discounting AK as a part of his range.

This x's a million.

I'm probably flatting far less though even w/ a tighter image live though if reg is just a reg and nothing more in an effort to ensure im iso'ing the whale as much as possible (which is what we should be doing fairly wide anyway so we should have a hard time being perceived as nitty tight and only capable of showing up w/ AA/KK here once you add opponents ability to level themself).

That said i think Avarita already mentioned but its worth mentioning twice that to folks on this forum, 5betting and turning our hand "face up" is sometimes optimal and I wouldnt be concerned about shutting reg's equity share (however small it may be) out of this pot pre when we're this deep and risk the % of times whale folds as well.

Assuming the reg has a fairly snug image/has it a lot here, and the whale is going to call a raise that isn't huge, this is a trivial raise, even if the BU folds KK. It's pretty exciting getting the BU to fold a hand that can flop a set and getting the whale HU with a reduced stack to pot ratio.

It's not like if we flat here and find a way to pour the other 3600 in postflop against the reg we auto stack KK, unless the BU is really bad. He probably understands he has a tight perceived range and if you try to get 360 BBs in postflop against that range he should not be excited about his one pair hands.

Oh just saw we had 2K, not 4. Closer now but I think just tank and shove and try to get put on AK by someone who has a pair. Whale is probably not folding with a third of his stack in the middle, letting him get away on bad flops sucks.

Would be nice to have more info on reg, he probably isn't very good/thoughtful so I'm going to assume he has kk and 5 bet jam get called by bu and fish calls too cause pot odds or whatever. I don't think I'd 4 bet almost ever as bu and have a massive flatting range.

Stacks of ABC & Fish?

Nevermind. Misread it. W my typical image I always click it back. read based decision tho

/

Every time I do this fish flats. In this instance it isn't so bad for us but when I do it its like fish flats 300 with 250 behind and I'm 2k+ eff and then things aren't so easy.