Somewhat common spot where my decision often alternates between calling and jamming. Spot (with main villains bolded):

V1: Big time fish. Ultra loose passive pre, doesn't raise his big hands enough post (but raises bluffs, interestingly).

V2: My friend / 2p2 lurker / well playing TAG.

V3: Loose bad player that does absurd stuff pre like cold call 4 bets w/ 65s, cold call a tight UTG raise w/ K8, 3 bet a tight UTG raise w/ A6, etc. Postflop, they like to fancy play their big hands no matter what via slowplay.

V4: Somewhat loose player whom I've posted a HU hand against before. Straightforward (as he should be) in big MW pots.

V5: Fun loose passive fish.

We're 9 handed.

Hero holds K3 in the BB

Action:

V1 limps UTG, V2 raises MP, V3 calls HJ, V4 calls BTN, V5 calls SB, I call BB, V1 calls.

Flop (6 BB): T85

Checks to V3 who bets, V4 calls, V5 folds, I check raise, V1 cold calls, V2 folds, V3 3-bets, V4 cold calls...

Any merit in 4-bet-barreling off in this already big pot, given our immediate hot/cold equity?

No

No

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Yes - I do think there's merit.

I dont see any merit.

This hand will go to a SD for sure so barreling off your draw is useless.
You got some value on the flop but when it get 3 bet with 3 other players i am pretty sure it goes to a SD and you have $h!t
You have a good draw but in huge pot your bluff ration should be likely close to 0.
Better draw exist you could have to cap and barrel off like J9c,QTc,etc. anyway.

If you bluff this one and all the flush draw and maybe some others i am sure you bluffing too much .
I am not saying jamming the flop with draw for equity value is wrong but to barrel off, it is vs 3 other loose players.

It is great to jam with sb to tight them to the pot ( tho it is not necessary vs loose players but here you jam for value so..) to get your IO when you hit, but bad to bluff with big bets in this situation when you miss the draw on turn and river.
i mean getting raise on turn with a draw is pretty aweful too ...

After you cap, there will be 22 BB in the pot on the turn. Even if you are miraculously HU on the river vs V3, what better hands will he have that he'll fold? And it doesn't even look like you'll be HU anyway.

Jam the flop and then bring down you heart beat rate unimproved.

Since so far it's 4 to 1 against jam / barrel, could I ask if you'd want to expand on this?

I'd 4 bet the flop with V2 out, but would call the 3 bet with V2 in specifically because I'm gonna check the turn unimproved no matter what, which would be a liability with a good tag in the pot. With nothing but bad players remaining, I'm not worried about them reading me when I check the turn unimproved.

Had V2 called the flop, I think calling the 3 bet and hoping to check raise a turned flush is much better because of the bad players that will be calling on the installment plan, and because we get to face the only good player with two cold.

I like MTLcorp's point about having too many bluffs if you barrel bluff this. That can be ok if you have a read that villains fold too much. I find typically loose passive players call too much on the river because "pot is huge".

It's pretty hard to "call too much" if villains are often arriving to the river with their own draws, no?

I agree that 4 bet / barreling this flop makes you bluff-heavy. FWIW, though, I think KT is likely to be a value 4 bet in this spot against this villain.

I don't know about the barreling-off part, but 4betting for value 4 ways with 7-10 outs can't be terrible. Not sure why balance should be considered against 2 terribles.

useless nittery but v4 didnt cold call on flop

My thoughts are you have a candidate ideal to be draw heavy and not have his strongest hands he would slowplay. I don't think it's terribly unlikely V3 has a draw often or I've even seen something like 77 do this play to drive out V4. V4 doesn't have to have a strong hand given the action, he kind of gets roped in. Oh and we have 12 outs a lot of the time as has been mentioned.

Our equity is strong, we have candidates for weak hands in a huge pot, V3 will have to be thinking about V4 behind him to act on the river, and we can put a cheap bet in on the flop and barrel off some turn/river combos. If the J comes out on the turn, I'm checking. But when it comes a 5 on the turn and 6 on the river, we can definitely fold out some better hands.

We will have too many bluffs in this spot (most likely), but I'm also 4 betting here a ton with a lot of not too strong tp+ type hands so I'm not terribly unbalanced and it's not a huge concern against these players anyway.

I'm glad you said this all DosXX, because I did decide to 4 bet for exactly this train of thought. And I also agree with your turn plan; on a lot of turns, I had my 9 flush cards that could come, and the last 3 kings in the deck would likely give me the best hand (and I would value bet most turn-river combos if a King came out).

I also considered the possibility of having a dominating draw. If either villain is on a flush draw, it's (likely) to be dominated by mine, meaning I can win 3 bets from them a non-zero amount of time. Of minor consideration, too, is that both villains have folded to me in massive pots in the past (V4 folded once to me getting 17:1 on the river in a HU pot), but that's a minor consideration.

Essentially, I (think) I've the plurality of equity in this 3 way spot, and I decided that I didn't mind jamming against capped ranges. I could do either way, though, and think that plays like this may be better reserved for pure nut draws (AX), pair plus flush draw (5X), or a combo draw like Q9, so that I'm not spewing off w/ flush draws whenever I flop one OOP multiway.