i wouldn't have done it myself but my question was more related to any hand that is air on the river - would you continue bluffing here without a read that i might fold top pair?

i still think my range should look strong to him, of course he can get me to fold T9 but i wouldn't have thought most people would be trying to get most hands which call that turn to fold on a blank river, which is why i was considering doing so.

this is ridiculous. if he has a few combos of worse made hands and lots of combos of better made hands then whether we call depends entirely on how much he is bluffing, its not enough to know that he will value bet QK here.

It's not actually ridiculous if you do the math.

Hand 0: 74.419% { QQ+, 99, AQs, KQs, Q9s-Q8s, JTs, 98s, AQo, KQo, 98o }
Hand 1: 25.581% { AcQd }

This is vs a "no bluff" range, where I gave him 100% of 98 and just the suited combos of (Q9/Q8/JT). Obv we don't know exactly what he's 3betting but this seems reasonable. You need ~ 27% eq to breakeven on a call, so even including 1 single bluff combo would give you enough equity.

OP what do you think your range is to him for calling flop and turn? And was his river shove timing anything unusual?

wow, my apologies so, looks like i need to do some work on counting combos!

i can't believe we have 26% vs a no bluffs range, this makes it a very easy call on the river so.

he didn't actually shove the river, i just posted because i was wondering if i could consider a fold if he did.

as for my range, i reckon he will expect me to get to the river with something like AQs,AQ,KQs,KQ,QJs,QTs,JTs,TT,99,88,T9s,98s.

of these, only TT and T9s (about 25% of my combos) are worse than top pair, which seems to confirm my suspicion that he shouldn't be bluffing unless he has a read that i will fold top pair, i'm curious if people think my perceived range is correct though.

Putting aside that saying 'putting aside the entire crux of any argument' does in fact nullify it, the only draw represented by shoving would be ambitious floats like 76 or AT, both with outs that are dirty and/or zero implied odds. 76 really only wants to see a 5 on the turn and AT is going to be behind a lot if it turns an A or obvious if you turn a four-card straight. Both draws are also frequently dominated. Dominated, dirty, and obvious means that most decent players will fold them and that your turn shoving range is either a huge move from a hand turned into a bluff or a better than hand AQ.

There might be a few players who shrug call weaker hands facing a turn shove, maybe even to the point that it makes a turn shove better than a turn and river call. However, as far as forming an overall game plan, I do think the reasoning behind a turn shove is quite ambitious against tougher and more disciplined competition. As an occasional huge move goes, this wouldn't be too bad of a bluff spot since you stand to fold out quite a few combos that are value betting, but even then I'd rather use a weaker pair plus gutter hand to avoid some of the aforementioned flop drawing problems those "draws" have.

I'm sure you know this but it's important to remember that ranges do not equal frequencies, villian will expect you to almost always play Qx this way, but much less frequently play some of the stronger made hands this way, especially 98s, and I think he will discount some sets/straits of course.

cool, thanks for the response, although i'm a little confused.

when you say the only draws i could be shoving are 76 or AT, what about AsJs,KsJs,KsTs, as well as pair+fd's?

obviously these don't make up very many combos but they're still a factor and i would have thought that they would be among the first hands a lot of people would put in my range if i shoved turn.

is the reason you would rule them out because they would be better hands to call with since you think our ev is greater when we give villain the chance to shove the river drawing dead when we hit or check/fold sometimes when we miss than it is when we shove the turn?

or is it just that a turn shove is too tough to balance here, and if so do you not like shoving turn ever in this spot?

yeah ok i see what you mean, but i think on this board he shouldn't discount too many of the strong hands except something vulnerable like 98s. i suppose that if i am calling there hoping to be bluffed i can hardly fold top pair top kicker though!

I said draws or floats like AT and 76, the hands you listed being other similarly strong candidates with the same problems of being obvious, being dominated, and having dirty outs (if you have KJ, he can have AK - for example).

I'm saying that getting to the turn with these hands is almost always going to be a mistake and so you shouldn't have these hands to shove on the turn. To other players who realize the same about your flop calling range, this idea a large part of why your turn shove would look so strong, combined with the fact that many reraisers won't take 45s and just barrel off on this board because it hits your calling range so hard.

Sounds like you're trying to argue that a flop call can justify a turn shove. Think about calling this flop with 44 to shove a non-four turn because that's about the same strength of the floats we are discussing, probably better because if you hit you likely have the best hand, aren't dominated, and your hand isn't obvious. That said, drawing to a two-outter on this board texture is pretty ridiculous (still not as ridiculous as floating with AT/KJ/76).

well i'm not floating 76 or AT but i think i would quite often call flop with gutshot/pair + backdoor flush draw type hands.

is your entire range for calling this flop value hands that you will be trying to at least get to showdown with and usually hoping to stack off with so?

That would depend on the preflop reraiser and how often he continuation bets this board texture. Because this board hits a calling range so hard, it's a decent one for the preflop reraiser to check-fold since he won't be getting many folds by continuation betting.

The up shot to this factoid about board texture and 'default' calling ranges against active reraisers is a stronger and more polarized continuation betting range. It's stronger because there is no reason to light money on fire with 54s on a flop you never fold, turn/rivers you rarely get anything going on, and a board where random turns and rivers hit your opponent's range much harder than your own. It's likely polarized because a good player will want to balance all those times he's check-folding to you and you slyly muck your pocket fours. There are a lot of hands on this board a preflop reraiser may have, say T9, that has decent equity against your range but doesn't do that well doing the betting for itself as not much worse calls, especially if the caller isn't floating all the hands we've been discussing. This means you're likely looking at KJ type hands on the flop as a bluff and some pretty strong hands for value, KQ+, maybe stronger.

I'm definitely not getting to showdown with my entire (wide) flop calling range. The would be horrible given the way I've been describing his likely continuation betting range. I gave the example of calling the flop with 44 to show that calling the flop and turn so wide is going to lead to problems for you around showdown time and facing a strong flop/turn/possibly river betting range.

Floating flop to shove turns seems kinda silly since it's so unlikely villain will fire <3 after betting flop.