Game is Full ring, running around 2-3 spots at the table. I have a fairly tight image and am winning $12k in the game so far. Whale is vpipping close to 50% and is the spot in the game. UTG+3 is a skinny indian kid, seems fairly good TAG/LAG, capable of 3!ing wide and making some sick moves. Definitely seemed a bit cocky.

Stacks:
Me-$22k
Whale-$20k
UTG+3 reg-$18k

I Open UTG+1 with AAdc to 150, whale UTG+2 calls, and UTG+3 makes it $850, all fold to me, I make it $1950, whale folds, UTG+3 flats.

Flop 632ssc

I cbet $1800, he flats.

Turn Kh

I check, he bets $4400, i call.

River Qc

He Jams $12k, I tank call.


Tough hand, I ended up calling just because from his 3! range from that moment in the game, I only saw him valuing KK and KQss. If I only need to be good 1/3 of the time, with 3 combos of KK and 1 of KQ, he only needs 2 bluff combos for me to break even?

seems like a mistake by villain with his huge 3bet. and you made a mistake by not capitalizing on it with such a small 4bet. your hand seems face up by river.

also what is a TAG/LAG?

OP, you probably 4bet smaller to try to keep the whale in?

4bet bigger. Your hand is going to be face up if you don't have a super spewy image, whether you make it 1900 or 2700.

Given that your hand is face up the river is a soul read spot:

his range- AK(less combos bc your had),KK,QQ or random SCs(since you gave them great price IP).

I don't see how he can have KQ given that he called the flop and you said he was decent.

If he has QQ he might check back the turn a lot.

It comes down to how you think he views you. If you think he thinks you are a station fold, if you think he thinks you are a nit then call.

I also like a slightly larger open raise sizing once stacks get this deep.

Why did you check call the turn?

moar pre

Where was this if you don't mind me asking.

Jam turn ap.

I like check jam turn, cooler if he has a set

Seems like an easy call pre to keep the whale in, this also allows you to balanced your flatting range.

easy call pre? Against described whale and villian this is probably the worst idea here. 4b this MUCH bigger. Whale is calling anyways.

You have qqq/kkk all in your range as well as some kqs that are ez calls
X flop
Bet turn
4b bigger oop

TAG/LAG means he's good at switching gears and plays TAG during some parts of the sessions and adjusts to LAG during other parts.

I 4! On the smaller side to bring in the whale. This whale was very special, cold calling 3! All the time with trash and if he saw anything under $2k I was sure he would call; I'm very surprised he didn't end up calling.

You got it

Commerce

your 4bet sizing is whack. i don't think your inducing anything here w/ such deep stacks villain #3 is just going to call ur small 4bet w/ his entire range here. don't know who whale is but he's in for only 150 and u basically make it 2k i think he folds more often than calls pre but don't know who he is so I'm going off ur read.

as played i like the flop size. turn check i like. on river those ppl saying Villain #3 can have AK here and shove it is pretty lol. obv he's checking back ak for showdown.

anyways ur hand looks like AK/AA here and i just don't see a good tag/lag player trying to bluff u off the top of ur range here for ~400 bbs in a big live nl game. i think when he shoves river after u ck/call turn ur pretty toast.

i would fold and keep ur last 12k and add 10k more so u cover whale and stack him cause he's gonna give it away eventually. def much better spots for you to put yourself in this bizarre large live nl game.

Opening for 3bb seems small with a whale to your immediate left. He's likely to call any size you make so I'd probably tend to open a tighter range here for a larger size and incorporate a limping range besides. A larger open might discourage overcalling a bit as well so you "isolate" the fish a little bit better.

I'd be tempted to flat the 3-bet to keep the whale in. It's hard to have a reasonably balanced 4-bet range in this spot since anything decent in your range is gonna want to keep the fish in. Your 4-bet range just looks like KK+ only so it seems unlikely that a smart player would play very poorly vs a 4-bet. That said, it wouldn't surprise me at all if 4-bet was a substantially higher EV play in spite of blowing out the fish. Clearly if you expect the fish to call the 4-bet (what fish is that bad these days?), then 4-bet.

I like a smaller flop bet. The board is so dry for your ranges that you need to encourage calls from AK AQ. When he calls 1950, it seems difficult for him to have no pair unless it's a flush draw.

As played on the turn I like another small bet. Your range is extremely strong here so if you check he's likely to check back. Betting wins the most from QQ JJ and flush draws. He might even check back with AK, which would be a disaster. I'd plan to bet again on most rivers, but the Q is bad enough for you that you probably can make a really gross c/f.

The way you played it, I wonder if you couldn't technically just c/f turn. He's not at all likely to bet a worse hand for value, nor to start turning strong pairs into bluffs. Over 90% of his range probably checks back turn, so his betting range will be very KK/fd heavy.

I agree with what everyone was said on the 4! sizing, although I 4! a lot more than the average player at this stake. Moreover, by making it a smaller sizing, as you mentioned, he should be calling very wide. Which is why when I show up on the river with AA and only lose to 4 combos, if he can just have at least two bluff combos (spades, esp hands like 75ss).

I also may just differ from most regs on how to play live deep, but I don't like making the 4! sizing that much bigger. I am very comfortable with the size of the game and correctly valuing and bluff catching AA in spots. (He is going to be calling very wide another 24 big blinds against my AA, which he has a huge equity disadvantage against with any two. I also give him a lot of room to 5! bluff since i 4! a lot and he knows that. I think the "face up AA" with a smaller sizing is incorrect. I think flatting the 3! is very plus ev, but i dont know if its the most plus ev). I more posed this question for the live deepstack high stake poker veterans and to get their opinion on 800bb pots where the reg is repping 3-4 combos, do they always just have it or what?

meh. some inconsistencies in line of thinking. not sure how accurate your reads are but you state in op your image is fairly tight and winning.

you open utg and 4b an ep's squeeze. your line is so strong that even a whale can correctly fold and you are surprised about it.

who knows this? never heard of a fairly tight player that "4bets a lot" and induces 5b bluffs.

your 4b sizing lays him good price to call with deep stacks and position.

wanna keep the whale in and disguise strength of your hand? call 3b and play poker post.

Yeah, maybe I'm too much of a fish stomper. Call pre and lead 80% of flops is really appealing, but it's hard to argue with putting in an additional bet pre with AA when given the chance.

Does anyone else like checking our entire range OTF on this texture vs this oponent given 4bet pre? Planning to c/c.

I think given whale in the hand calling the 3bet preflop is what I would do, but higher variance and possibly just bad, but thats what I would do. I'm calling the 3bet pre and attempting to get 3 streets of value vs whale on most runouts. Although I guess there's a few spots where we end up with lead, whale calls, villain calls or raises and we're in a really ****ty spot... 4b pre is probably better, but I still just call.

Hey let's try to be +ev in a 25/50 game w no 4b range or any clue how to play well in 4b pots

As much as I appreciate all the feedback, I want to know GIVEN how I got to the river, what would you do OTR..

Nh op.

Pre: I might open bigger given positions. Like 4x

4-betting AA here is most definitely more EV+ than flatting but it really screws over your flatting range and the things that you have to do to balance it out even a little might not be. So overall given the position, stacks, the people involved, I would not 4-bet here, but if you have a better, well thought and calculated range, by all means 4-bet away. Sizing seems ok. You're going to get flatted a lot but if you're comfortable with it, continue.

Flop: A lot of money behind, bad flop, c-bet this x/ if you have As.

Turn: Fine

River: I call the river. Q is quite blank actually even though your opponent might not realize it and bluff it too much. A lot of villain's bluff range got here this way.

They do exist.

In a perfect world, the river should be a complete blank. In the reality of live NL though, they'll have some QQ here. Even if the river were a complete blank in terms of villains range, it's not a blank for yours. So there are still realities in which it would be a c/f due to expecting villain to give up enough of his bluffs. After all, you could have QQ.

I think I find a fold on the river as played. I just don't believe he bluffs with pairs on the turn, nor floats 2k on the flop without at least a flush draw or AK. AK isn't value betting, so you beat flush draws and lose to KK/QQ/KsQs. There are probably more KK/QQ combos than flush draws, and flush draws check turn sometimes and give up river sometimes.

Appreciate all of the input guys.

I'm most concerned with the exploitability aspect of this hand on the river. If I am going to 4! aces and cbet flop, check call turn, and check fold river (on this exact texture and other similar board runnouts), then I can easily be exploited by folding big hands like Aces otr when he is repping such few value combos. I mean if I am going to do that he should be floating and bluffing a huge chunk of his range. I'm more interested in professionals who have played deep live games and have been in similar spots. Everyone is talking about topics like balance, which from my experience is not as pertinent as you would think in live high stakes games (I would be more concerned balancing my range at 100-200nl on stars than at a 5k NL live NLH game).