Villian bought in for half stack. Villian stats are VPIP 45/ PFR 4
I stacked him once already.
He was min bet when he had marginal hand.
He would also shove river tho I never called him down.

Game started at: 2017/2/23 6:16:34
Game ID: 850496286 0.10/0.25 Atomy 4 (Hold'em)
Seat 2 is the button
Seat 1: gipper PK (30.92).
Seat 2: ronih (12.52).
Player ronih has small blind (0.10)
Player gipper PK has big blind (0.25)
Player gipper PK received card: [Kd]
Player gipper PK received card: [Kh]
Player ronih received a card.
Player ronih received a card.
Player ronih calls (0.15)
Player gipper PK raises (0.50)
Player ronih calls (0.50)
*** FLOP ***: [3d Ks 7d]
Player gipper PK bets (0.95)
Player ronih calls (0.95)
*** TURN ***: [3d Ks 7d] [8d]
Player gipper PK bets (2.15)
Player ronih raises (6.45)
Player gipper PK calls (4.30)
*** RIVER ***: [3d Ks 7d 8d] [10c]
Player gipper PK checks
Player ronih allin (4.37)
Player gipper PK calls (4.37)
------ Summary ------
Pot: 24.54. Rake 0.50
Board: [3d Ks 7d 8d 10c]
*Player gipper PK shows: Three Of Kind of Ks [Kd Kh]. Bets: 12.52.
Player ronih shows: xx.
Game ended at: 2017/2/23 6:17:24

vpip/pfe is meaningless hu
check flop, unless you have extremely strong reason not to (that reason would be him never folding AND never bluffing)

Other than the obvious flush draw this is a pretty 'safe' board to cbet into. If you feel that V will call 'all' cbets then fine, fire away. But normally you would check top set on this board. You do have the fear that you can't bet big enough to get the whole stack into the pot by the River if you check as well.

Not sure your question ... you may need to move this the Brag section ... GL

I'm uncomfortable checking made hands on two tone boards. When the 3rd suit falls, like it did here, then I am left guessing. What advice do you guys have to counter this thought or what do you do on this board if you checked that flop and villain bets or raises turn and/or river?

poker is not about feeling comfortable, but about making +ev decisions. Top set is literally the worst made hand to barrel with, as you block pretty much everything that can call down multiple streets, and hands that can pay you off will bet themselves. Your emotional attitudes towards cards are completely irrelevant. You default here should always be check/calling till the end (possibly check/shoving diamond turns, so undersets won't get aways on 4th diamond).

Pretty sure you should c/r when it bricks

But yeah, everything Tute says here is right. It's not about being comfortable, it's about making money, and when you have 2 kings it's quite hard for villain to have a hand that will call more than once -- maybe flush draws, but he should bet those quite a lot anyway.

Don't be scared, flushes are hard to have anyway.

I think the flop is a pretty simple c-bet.
You are going to bet your air on that board, you are gonna want to bet flush draws, you have a board texture with some draws, you can def get called by worse made hands, and there doesn't seem to be much cause for doing a lot of check calling with bluff catcher/show down val hands as you can prob just turn the weakest made hands into bluffs and you can bet hands like TT and such for thin value vs draws, second pairs, etc.

I think you should be making a range bet on this flop as pre-flop raiser. I think the more interesting problem is how to size the cbet. On one hand, there is some texture to the flop (some gut shots, lots of flush draws, etc) which would make it seem OK to bet sorta on the large size but on the other hand you are going to want to bet a merged not polarized range here which is a good argument for going smaller. If you think it out even further you'll find that there really are not THAT many draws in villains range or semi bluffs in your range so that small sizing is looking good HOWEVER you actually do have a huge hand that would love to get max value AND it can at least appear that you are betting bigger because of the two tone flop.
I'm thinking the better your opponent and more balanced you need to be the more you should bet a wide and linear range with a small sizing and the worse (specifically more stationy) your opponent is the larger you should bet.
I think i'd settle on something like 3/4 pot here.
I like the flop bet
On the turn we catch kind of a bad card not only because we could have just been out drawn but also because its gonna be so hard to get value from worse hands now.
Also, what if we bet and get raised? It's gonna be super gross because we will have full house/quad outs vs flushes and our opponent may be raising worse hands for value like combo draws and two pairs so we will have a very hard time not over calling or over folding vs the raise.
Additionally, if we are worried about free rolling equity by letting villain check back when he picks up a back door draw we have to think about how many of those back door draws may bet when checked to and we can also be behind where we are actually the one who wants to see a card on the cheap.

I think the play is to c-bet flop and then check and call the turn. I would be looking to check all rivers and have some river cards that i check and call, some that i check and raise, and some that I check and fold. If villain bets turn and we call I feel like we ought to have a pretty easy time making good decisions on the river. We can check raise our boats/quads, we can check and fold if it's a bad card AND villain bets it, and we can check and call on most bricks.

On this particular river I think check call is fine the way I play the hand.

So my opinion; c-bet flop, check and call turn, check and call river.

As played, I would just say this; IF your opponent is aggro enough that you can feel comfortable bet-calling the turn and then calling the jam on the river then you should almost surely be check calling the turn instead (if villain is aggro enough to be bluffing or raising second best enough of the time to bet and call then the better adjustment would be to check to induce/pot control and then call him down.)

sorry, but that's all wrong. Check flop.

why are we checking the flop?

I'm trying to understand if this opinion is being made on the basis of some feature of game theory and sound strategic reasoning that is outside my current understanding, or if the thoughts and ideas generating the desire to check this flop are more like antiquated relics of an older approach to the game where the object of the game seemed to be tricking your opponents, betting for information, finding out where you were in a hand, garnering info and spreading disinformation, etc.

I don't know everything about NLH strategy and am here to learn first and foremost (secondarily to share what I've learned with others) and I would like to have a "light bulb moment" of clarity here where I understand why checking this flop is the right play. If I could get my head around this being a mandatory check on the flop then it would change the way I play this and other situations and I'm sure there are other players who have and/or will read this thread and feel more or less the same as I do.

I'm not 100% sure but this seems like about as thick and slam dunk a value bet as one could hope to find. Why should we check top set (AS DEFAULT) on a two tone flop in a heads up situation on a board where we would want to c-bet a huge % of our air?

basically i want to ask if you are saying;
a) It is usually best to check top set as pre-flop raiser. It's going to be the best way to play top set unless there are compelling reasons to not check top set
or
b) It is usually correct to bet top set heads up but there is something specific about this situation that makes checking top set better than betting it.

If b), what is the reason?

It's not obvious to me which side of this you are coming down on??

Are you advocating this as a "safe board to c-bet" and worried that checking would make it hard to get stacks in by the river?
or
Are you suggesting we should "normally check top set on this board"?

I was thinking maybe there was a typo in there somewhere but maybe you are just saying there are factors pointing in both directions and you don't have strong feelings about c-betting or checking either way??

it's a), for a simple reason that I've already wrote down itt, it's because you block most of the hands you can 3 streets of value from

this is especially true for top sets on Q-high to A-high boards, top set on 237 is a better candidate for betting, as there are still quite a few overpairs in callers range.

Yes, you have to consider both sides ...

The general rule is to 'always' check top set (especially when OOP), especially on this type of board since it should be very difficult to get 2 (much less 3) more streets of value. Top set on a dry board is very different than top set on a wet board that smashes both players ranges.

To step away from the general rule you need to look at opponent dynamic. If this V will 'always' call a c-bet, then fire the Flop and get a street of value .. but seriously consider checking the Turn. It's more difficult to get that second street of value when OOP.

To effectively bet this Flop you have to ...
1) Have a loose image yourself
2) Have an opponent who will play ATC
3) Have an opponent who auto-calls c-bets when IP

That's a lot to ask for with this board. In order for V to call a c-bet he needs to think he's ahead or has a reasonable chance of catching up and that's hard to expect from an ABC viewpoint.

Your bet sizing (and timing 'tell') here can also sway an opponent into calling a c-bet. Just remember that trying for 2 straight streets of value in 'any' hand is a tough task ..

It's no fun to have such a strong hand and have to work 'so hard' to get some value from it. Your image and V dynamic will lead you down a path here, just don't expect a King's ransom very often. GL

I'm OP.
I can understand now the check flop given V won't continue on A, K, Q high flop and I will miss getting 2 streets of value.

Against a thinking V I understand this line.

After playing with V for 30 mins I felt that he wasn't at the level where he was thinking about my range.

He was just calling most flop.

Not to spoil hand, but in this case V caught middle pair and in HU action most will call C bet.
'
V didn't have a flush draw, but rather spiked 2 pair on turn.

But this hand was a good lesson for me as now I understand that in most situation when flopping higher top set better to check.

On wet flop may expect more likely call however.

if there's ever a guy to bet flop against, it's this guy