Very limp-cally game going on which has been relatively slow compared to the usual lagfest.

Hero is an hour old on the table. Have been on a roller coaster ride running my 1000 BI up to 2k then down to 600 and am now sitting on a 1500 stack to start this hand. I have been very active so far have 3 bet twice and took down the pot with a 3/4 PS cbet on the flop both times and have not shown. (Had KK first time and AKo second time).

Main villain is unknown to me sitting on a stack of like 700 and haven't seen him play a hand since I've sat down. He's in late position I think 2 off of button.

UTG villain is a very solid pro who seems to be short stacking tonight. Just rebought for 500 after getting stacked the hand before where a gambley player rivered two pair but UTG did not show his hand. Plays short stacks very effectively.

Villain 2 is OTB, a pure LAG gambley player (the one who stacked UTG last hand). Will call 3 bets pre with anything and then purely play poker after that. He puts tons of pressure on anyone and call massive bets with draws. He plays very well for doing this though and seems to be a winning player overall somehow. Covers everyone.

On to the hand. I'm in the SB.

UTG raises to 25. Which is a weak raise for this game but have seen this same move from him with small suited connectors up to premium hands. Being UTG I figure its weighted towards much more premiums (AJs-AKo, 77+)

Main villain calls 25. Button calls 25. I look down at QsQc in SB. 100% raising here. What do you guys think is the best raise size here?

I went with 125 which is a little smaller than my normal 3 bet OOP. At this point players have to be getting suspicious to my 3betting (3 times in 1 hour) so I was almost hoping one of them would re-raise so I could jam on the short stacks. The only one I was slightly worried about is UTG, but I'm not folding QQ for 50bb if he does 4bet shove. Villain 2 OTB would definitely 3bet any big hands before me. And with no info on main villain I'm not folding for 700 either pre.

Anyways, UTG tank calls, Main villain calls, and button calls.

Flop (510) Ks10s5d

Check/folding and bet/folding seems weak to me, is there any other way to play this?

Comments/criticism on hand pre and on flop is appreciated.
Thanks

If UTG re-raises then you are very likely to be behind his range, but if he just calls the $100 raise, you can almost be certain that will invite the other 2 players into the pot. So honestly you're just bloating the pot while being OOP in a 4-way pot. I say either make a suspicious steal-looking raise like $190 to get heads up with someone, or just call and play it deceptive (I like the first option MUCH better). I see no merit in raising $125 since you are pretty much guaranteeing to play OOP with a very vulnerable hand. I just think if there were one less player in the pot and if it weren't UTG that open-raised (STRENGTH) then your $125 is fine. I just think you'll never get a fold out of a UTG raiser from the SB here, and the others are getting a decent price to see a flop.

As played once you get to the flop I think b/f'ing is fine.

Pre is fine. Post is a tough spot. UTG is not a solid pro if he's a) buying in short in a weak call happy game and b) calling a 3 bet oop w/ 375 behind. It honestly looks like most are set mining and I don't see AK being in anybody's range here although there are bad players who will flat AK with a $700 stack here. I think I'd bet reevaluate here. Pretty good chance you have the best hand a lot of the time. If you bet $375 into 510 and the main villian shoves for $325 more there's enough draws and right price at 5-1 for u to call. Especially with the active image factor. If you bet $375 and the $1500 stack plays back it may play out different and if you check and there's significant action you can just fold.

raise bigger pre esp. with image

just give up on the flop, you're up against 3 players OOP and even if any of them is capable of bluff-raising what can you really do??

check fold on a 4 way imo

Raise significantly bigger pre. Edit: didn't realize it was 4 way. 4 way I can buy an argument for cbetting and deciding or checking. If it was 3 way with your blockers I'd definitely start by betting.

Ok so on the flop I bet 350 with the plan to fold if raised.

UTG folds painfully and main villain wakes up and goes AI for 300 more to me. Button folds and it's on me for 300 to win 1510.

Didn't really pay attention to stack sizes when I made my bet there but I can't fold now right? Should of bet around 200 but wanted to look strong.

Thoughts?

You block a lot of QKs combos and if we consider him not having KJo, that leaves a lot more combos of sets, flushes and straights. You can def call vs that range after a cbet. Check fold would be my line vs 3 villains.

yeah a bet of 200 probably gets the job done on the flop, and avoids this weird spot a lot. While the QQ creates blockers to KQ, having the Qs takes a lot of combo draws out of his range. I'm not sure if it's a fold or a call.

getting 5-1 I think it's a call if he's shoving a few gutters and a few Tx as a bluff and a bunch of spade draws as a semi-bluff. take those out of his range and I think it's probably a fold.

Text results appended to pokerstove.txt

Text results appended to pokerstove.txt

31,680 games 0.000 secs 6,336,000 games/sec

Board: Ks Ts 5c
Dead:

equity win tie pots won pots tied
Hand 0: 34.162% 33.79% 00.37% 10705 117.50 { QcQs }
Hand 1: 65.838% 65.47% 00.37% 20740 117.50 { TT, 55, AsJs, As9s, As5s, KQs, KcJc, KTs, QJs, JcTc, 9s8s, 8s7s, 7s6s, AcKd, AcKh, AcQd, AcJd, AcTd, KQo, KcJd, KcJh }


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What would you raise to pre? You're up a aginst a $700/500/1500 stack so raising $125 allows smaller stacks to shove which we want. What are we accomplishing by raising bigger? Is our goal to take it down pre b/c we're out of position? Just curious on the standard raise bigger pre response that most are responding with.

the smaller stacks can shove over anyway. raising this small is going to result in everyone calling and probably making a correct call based on position, stack size, and equity. essentially we're creating a situation where with our chosen play we're encouraging everyone to make optimal plays against us. I'd rather just call than raise to 125.

I'd probably raise to something like 180-200, leaning on the high end of that. That way we'll likely get at least one if not two folds. Even the shortest stack can shove over if he wants. And the raise looks a little suspicious like maybe we're just trying to steal the pot preflop and we might encourage a loose shove with a hand like 88-TT that just called pf. Or the LAG makes a loose peel which is great in a bloated pot where we're crushing his range.

ideally two guys fold and one guy calls and we have an SPR of 1.5 with QQ and our flop play is easy peezy. or everyone folds and we take down 8BB without seeing a flop which is a pretty big win for us.

don't get trapped into thinking about raise sizes based on conventions or standards. Make the raise or bet that will best exploit the current situation and put us in +EV spots. In this case we need to raise bigger considering our hand and our position than we would if we had a stronger hand or if we had position.

Great post thanks!! I definitely agree with you with the preflop sizing. I figured small open, small 3 bet would work but all it did was invite everyone along for the ride. It wouldn't of mattered anyways since i called the all in and main villain ended up having AKo for tptk.

But thanks for the feedback guys it's not a huge hand but it's a spot I find my self in a lot and just don't know how I can play it better against short stacks.

Given that the opener has 500 I think the 3bet to 125 is not bad. The average effective stack here is relatively shallow. If you make it 200 then UTG knows he has no fold equity and won't often shove worse. Maybe 145 is ideal IMO. Flop is really close between bet and check. I don't mind a bet of 285 and call if UTG shoves his last 375 or if main villain shoves his last 575 and probably fold if BTN raises even though he has the widest range. I really think both villains except UTG are going to have very wide ranges here so there's quite a bit of value to be had with a bet.

I think you're giving live villains too much credit for considering fold equity and stack size when determining whether or not to shove their hand. I don't think a villain is going to look down at AJ and decided he can't 4bet bluff shove because he doesn't have any fold equity. He's just going to look down at it and decide it's either good or not and make the requisite play.

145 is better than 125 but still creates the same problem in that pretty often everyone calls (even though we have the benefit of having the short stacks in front of the deep stack) and we end up OOP in a $600 pot on boards like the one we often get.

IMO (and I could be wrong here) short stack villains described are either going to jam or not based on their hand and probably not whether we make it 145 or 180. So I want to raise a size that might get a couple of folds and will get me HU with one of the villains so that I can more easily navigate the pot. If everyone folds then it's a result that is well above my average expected win with QQ and I'll happily take the 8bb of dead money.

*Grunch

Raise pre to ~200. Like you said, we don't mind getting it in w/UTG's 500 stack.

This size raise makes UTG shove or fold. Shove by UTG should fold out other 2 villains and then we call. We also have the option to raise over UTG shove if others call.

We don't want 4 handed here OOP w/QQ.

As played c/f.