2-10 spread limit poker is a structure that is common in my area. I have A7 of diamonds in the big blind. Villain opens from middle position. Villain doesn't seem to limp and opens the max (a $10 raise on a $2 blind) about 20-25% of the time. Everyone folds. I call in the BB. After the flop the game usually plays as if it is $10 limit holdem.

Flop 885 with on diamond on the board. I check, he bets, I peel. Turn brings 3 of diamonds giving me a nut flush draw. I check, he bets, I check raise, he calls. River brings a 5 of diamonds. I bet, he calls. Questions:

1. Did I not play this perfectly? I think I did. Point out my error if I didn't.

2. What if the river did not improve me. Do I bet and fold to raise? Do I check and fold or do I check and call?

This was one of those hands that just kept on improving and kind of played itself. What I am really curious about is what I should have done if the river whiffed.

I'd fold preflop for that price but you know his range better than I do.

The game has a feature that rewards speculative hands, the fact that you can sometimes play them for $2 and collect $10 bets later. Think about 4/8 where you pay $4 in hopes to only get $10 bets later. It has two things that can punish said hands, the small blind/ante and the potential small return due to a max PFR -- it probably has a single $2 blind and when someone raises the full $10 PF, your turn and river bets are still $10 if you hit.
You are facing a 5x open with an implied odds hand. Due to the nature of the game, you couldn't get paid off much in proportion to that bet sizing. I think it is a pretty easy fold, unless he gives up easily post flop. Even then, his 5x raise and you being out of position make it good to be picky. You have to call $10 in a $12 pot.
I'm not sure how he sees you. If he thinks you're decent, how often does he think you defend the BB? You have a 8853 board or a 8853? Would you have 65 to have turned a pair plus combo draw? Are you only representing a slowplayed 3 of a kind? The other strange thing about slowplaying in this game is that the turn bet doesn't double. You waited for your hand to improve to a draw, but you're just letting him build the pot before deciding to bluff. If a scare card had come on the turn, it would make more sense to bluff.

The way you posted this, you sucked out on something like AA and were berated. You said he $10 opened 20%-25% of the time, and I'm not sure if that's "of the times he raises" or "with a 25% hand range". My experience of spread limit games is that people give off a lot of sizing tells, and they don't max open Q8s or K6s. If he's only max opening premiums, you're getting a terrible price and you can just exploit him by making a bunch of super easy folds in small pots.

This doesn't mean he played well (max raising AA) and you played terribly -- you just adjusted incorrectly to his poor preflop play, got terrible drawing odds, bluffed in a spot where it made no sense, and got there.

Turn raise reps A8s/98s/87s/88/55. I don't think anyone will fold 99+ getting 7:2 to call down, but in a regular LHE game (where the action would have only given him 5:2) it might have worked and in NL it may have as well.

I would never have gotten to the turn, though, except maybe with 7d6d.

Fold preflop and bluffcatch more imo.

You have to be careful bluff catching vs people who just never bluff. I'm not sure based on our hero's description, but my mental picture in these games is that people who bet big and barrel off have the goods pretty often. Maybe he's "bluffing" AKo.

Just think a small stakes NL game where people both don't bluff enough and don't value bet enough. A passive player bets 3 streets with what?

The read is that the guy has a 25% range. Even though we don't know if this is average or positional, 25% doesn't strike me as a typical passive player.

Also it seems that you're defining bluffcatcher as something weaker than I am assuming. I say that because you mention him "bluffing with AK." Sure if we go ape **** on the flop and check raise any pair, then we only have Ace high or worse to bluffcatch with. Thus we should fold a lot postflop. However I think that's a pretty bad strategy vs a 5 big blind preflop raiser. Nobody wants to check call 77 three times here? That's exactly how I'd play it.

Also if the opponent never bluffs, it may seem bad for your bluffcatchers on the surface. If we look a little deeper we see that our opponent is missing profitable bluffing opportunities. That means we're realizing showdown equity every time our opponents fail to bluff when they should. I know we had this conversation before regarding the profitability of checking relative to folding. I still maintain that there's money in the pot and when our opponent lets us get to showdown with bluffcatchers for free, we gain ev. The money in the pot then becomes an undeniable part of our winrate.

This gain is not insignificant. If we go even further and make exploitive folds with a good read, we gain even more.

If we bluff catch our A high hands like this one vs. an opponent who doesn't 3 street value bet with TT, we're giving up one or two $10 calls that he doesn't deserve. That, unless he bluffs AK... So then our bluff catcher doesn't beat bluffs and his value range is super strong.
It is great that he misses value. Once he bets, we have to decide how wide to call down. If his range is jacked to be hyper big-value, we can sometimes
These spread limit games are more profitable than normal limit games, in my experience. We just have to be aware of opponent tendencies, especially bet sizing tells. The blinds are really small compared to the effective limit. When the game is super limpy, our implied odds are large compared to the first call. This can be a great game, as long as we don't reward nits for being nitty.

I'm fine with folding no pair no draw in the flop here. I took exception to cali saying that he never has a hand that makes it past the flop which I think is bad poker.

Maybe we read his post differently? Also with a single $2 blind facing a $10 open, this is a game where being silly-tight comes fairly correct. Saying "I don't have many hands that I call preflop that like this 885 flop that aren't also monsters" should be far from bad poker. The villain 5x-ed preflop and then bet 1/3 pot on the flop (on a low, dry board) in a limit game. MDF is going to be low.

I took his post at face value to mean that he doesn't check call anything on the flop. I ask how do you play 77 here?

"Saying "I don't have many hands that I call preflop that like this 885 flop that aren't also monsters""

He specifically said "never" and gave the exception of 76 with a flushdraw.

We all know by now that cali has a penchant for nitttery so when he says "never" I take it literally.

"we bluff catch our A high hands like this one vs. an opponent who doesn't 3 street value bet with TT, we're giving up one or two $10 calls that he doesn't deserve."

I agree that we can exploit this player. My point here was that we don't have to exploit to gain ev.

Hi, welcome to the small stakes limit forum.

No, I don't think you played this perfectly. Mostly because you did not even have a plan on what to do on ~80% of rivers! You should always keep in mind how strong you are in your range. If you think you have really thin showdown value, you should not be turning your hand into a bluff.

Would you call him with AdTd?

Yes.

The real answer in this question comes from range vs range equity. I would, because of assumptions about how much better ATs does than A7s vs. normal ranges. If The villain's range were QQ+, AQs, AKo you still just snap fold due to taking the wrong end of a 70/30 while getting zero odds.

You said something about 25% in the OP. Still not sure if that's 25% of the times he raises or 25% of all hands. Raising 25% is fairly wide for a live player, but you get
66+,A2s+,K6s+,Q8s+,J8s+,T8s+,A7o+,K9o+,QTo+,JTo

A7s is a 52/48 dog vs. the range. ATs is a 57/43 favorite.

I think that is a reasonable range to give him. Now assuming I have AdTd how do you play that flop? Betting out seems a little fishy. Check fold seems weak. Peel or check raise?

I think this is a mental game leak. I'd fold because I think calling is unprofitable.

Also I think it's a clear call or fold decision.

Second Helpings, you should be doing these sims. I'm totally with Bob that a line being weak is a bad reason not to take it, look at poker hands through the lens of profitable/unprofitable. If your villain cbets his entire range

Board: 885
Equity Win Tie
UTG+1 55.51% 50.68% 4.83% { AdTd }
UTG+2 44.49% 39.66% 4.83% { 66+, A2s+, K6s+, Q8s+, J8s+, T8s+, A7o+, K9o+, QTo+, JTo }

You're a decent favorite. Now the game actually favors reverse implied odds hands, as A high calling down is on the list of possible plays. It depends on if your villain is actually max opening and barreling off. You should download equilab and make some assumptions about lines the villain might take.

Before you get to "I'm ahead so I raise", you should consider if any better hand ever folds and how many worse hands call you. My guess is that you're in the middle, where he might (unknowingly) value bet worse and bluff some. It could also be that he turns his hand face-up and you could put his "I think I'm winning range" in to see if you have enough equity to call down. After rake, there's probably $29 in the pot after he bets. You're calling $10 getting meh odds if drawing.

It could also be that he's the PFR and will bet 100% of flops, to then maybe give up on some hands on the turn? It depends on how he thinks about poker.

25% is almost any ace.