First off I know I will get some constructive criticism on how I played this hand(particularly pre flop), but most interested in the River decision as played.

I am $3,600 effective with the villain who covers the table.

Villain has approx. $6K. He had approx. $5K when I was moved to the table(must move to main table) and a player next to me said he drew out on them for a big pot when I asked him how he got that stack. Buy in for this game is $300-$2,000 max.

First time I saw villain was the day before and he said he came in town to specifically to play PLO. Approximately 25 and looks like a full time grinder. Hasn't played too many pots since I've been at the table. Only hand of note is he got it in on a Q high flop with QQ and won another $1K or so to get his stack up to $6k. Had not seen him 3 bet before this hand.

Hero had 3 bet previously a couple times where table saw me show up with AA.

On to the hand. Everyone is straddling so game is 5-5-10 and I am under the gun with AA93 double suited . You can open 5x's the blind in this game so I make it $50. Villain makes it $170 2 to my right and it folds back to me. We are deep, I'm out of position, and I want to disguise my hand so I just flat(thoughts on play?).

Flop is 1055. I check and villain bets $340. I call.

Turn is a Q Villain bets $800. I call. At this point, I feel like he could have AA(possibly with a diamond freeroll), KK (and possibly with Diamonds), some type of 10JQKA combo hand with possible flush draw and/or straight draw with 2 pair or 1010, QQ. Thoughts on call, raise or fold? I called with the intention of evaluating what he did on river and river card.

River is a blank (3) So no flush or straight possible.

I check and after thinking a bit villain throws in 3 $1,000 chips. I have approx. $2,300 behind. Now I really just have a bluff catcher. He has it or is bluffing.

Fold or call? Looked at villain and he was very still staring straight ahead not really giving much away. Will post results after we get a few responses.

i fold river to most villains but i prob fold or jam turn (usually fold). most people shut down turn or triple in these spots. Turn when they double barrel they either have good equity or have you dead usually (have seen like 6789hh type hands but those triple 100% anyways if they double) so don't like c/c with this hand oop. very hard to play rivers correctly and your hand looks like what it is/kk/bad 5x.

(I kinda like the c/c c/c shove river line too in these spots... such a strong line people fold like A5 here but you have like the worst bluff hand w/ AA blocking AA/AA5x which is like 90% of his range that folds and you don't beat.)

i think a river call is good. it seems like villain's line, basically potting it the whole way, is too strong for "just" trips. so he should have a boat or air, and given how disconnected the board is he shouldn't have that many boats.

Fold. Not a spot to hero call. Protecting your stack>>>not surrendering your equity in this spot


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I get your reasons for not 4betting pre, but if you're truly very deep, your 4b range should be wider than just AA. It should also included double-suited rundowns. Plus, double suited aces are a super premium hand. You need to always raise the max pre whenever possible from any position with DS Aces.

Fold flop. Runouts are pretty bad for your hand. Rainbow board is a different story.

this is terrible logic.
all the matter is how often is his hand good here.

This is a pretty dry board.

But are you willing to potentially risk 600 BBs over 3 streets out of position as a bluffcatcher?

How long have you played with V where this is the first 3-bet you have seen?

If it's a long sample then AAxx *would* be a lot of his range if you didn't have AA yourself. Still pretty plausible, but blocking the AA he could have 4 Broadway cards a lot of the time, including TTBB / QQBB and all sorts of wraps on the turn. The problem is almost of those hands are probably betting the river for value or as a bluff because Hero has played the hand extremely passive apart from the initial open. Even AA can bet a blank river if he thinks he can blow you off a chop or get a hero call from worse. Basically V should be betting his whole range on most rivers when checked to, so call turn / evaluate river isn't really a practical line since he is almost always betting river, the question is how much? A Broadway or diamond river is way too scary to call and even on a blank river you can be put to the test (like now). Maybe a blocking bet / fold in the turn or river is a cheaper way to find out where you are at instead of this passive line. You have more 5s in your range on the flop and turn, but once you just call the turn they're way gone and V can continue blasting. If that's what you wanted to induce then that's great but again there are a lot of scary rivers where V can happily bluff or value bet and it doesn't sound like we have much history to help weight that river range.

I agree you should just go ahead an 4! pre being double suited... if you pot it to 530 and he calls, then the SPR on the flip would be about 3 so you can probably commit as long as the flop isn't the wrong monotone or very connected.

Literally never fold the flop as played on this board.

in retrospect I think folding on either the turn or river is best. no way is a guy that is presumably up huge, and just got it in and won with top set, is going to run a massive multi street bluff for most of his chips.

Lol.....”in this spot” I don’t see hero being good and not worth stacking off

“In this spot”= being right 33% to break even

“In this spot” /= in general.

I mean, you can level yourself into calling because villain is potting every street...but from villains’s perspective this runout and hero’s line isn’t ideal conditions to bluff shove river after hero calls turn


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Thanks for all the responses! When he bet my stack on the river I thought several things in the moment(On the side of calling why would he bet so much if he wanted a call?) (On the side of folding he must have 1010 or QQ and I got coolered or he has AA5). I was pretty torn and lost in the hand once he bet, although on the turn when I called the plan was to call any safe river.

I ultimately ended up folding as in the moment I thought it would be insane for him to bluff after I called both streets. He racked up shortly after and I asked him to tell me if he had it or not since it would be unlikely for me to play with him again anytime soon since he isn't local. He said he had 1010. The peanut gallery(other players at the table) said it was obvious he had it after he walked away.

About 10 minutes later another player said he had to tell us(the table) he had folded 1010 preflop (guy is credible) and that the guy must have been bluffing if he lied. An Asian guy who I didn't know who hadn't commented at all in the discussion then said he knew the guy (he is from out of town as well and the same city) and his friend had just texted him after he left the table and said he had 910JQ and had the blockers so he turned his hand into a bluff.

It was a tough one and I'm pretty sure I made the wrong decision on the river although I didn't actually see his hand so you never 100% know.

Playing tricky and not reraising preflop ultimately cost me as the hand would have played out a lot differently if I had done that.

ultimately seems like a good fold in vacuum

for every time someone loses their mind for 700bb in that spot there are 10 times they just have it no matter how unlikely that is

I really don't know enough about villain to comment too specifically but calling the turn and then folding this river does not seem like a good plan.

I'm not convinced this is true. I've been moving towards the idea of playing more tight-passive preflop when OOP, especially when likely to be against a smart player capable of making big bluffs. I would be likely to limp this hand instead of opening for a raise because I prefer the pot be multi-way. I will add the caveat that I prefer to cultivate an image as much tighter than I actually am and I think you should raise with a wider range from EP when you have a loose image vs a tight image.

This is probably the most basic PLO advice ever, I'm honestly surprised at the disagreement here lol. If you're not raising the max with DS Aces preflop, you're sacrificing a CONSIDERABLE amount of equity. Repeat that over thousands of hands, and it would be tough to crush in your PLO career.

I'm happy to get 500BBs in preflop with DS aces, because I'm willing to increase equity even if it means increasing variance. If your BR is a huge factor for you, that's the only rational reason to not shovel in as much money possible pre with this type of hand (reduce variance, also reduce equity).

I'm not happy to get 50BB in preflop with 500BB behind OOP against a good player with DS AA when my opponent will put me on AA. Position is important in PLO. You won't realize as much of your equity OOP, so you shouldn't be as willing to build a pot when at a positional disadvantage.

I disagree somewhat with what you say. Sure it’s great to push the max $ in preflight with DS aces. What I don’t agree with is not also including other hands in your 4betting range, especially out of position. Position and playing a disguised range are keys to plo success.
If you only 4bet 5bet aces preflop, then even average villains can play perfectly against you.


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4bet pre, bet the flop, take down the pot. Any other way of playing the hand is just getting too cute. As you see you let villain outplay you. So what if he knows you have aces?

5510 is such a good flop for your hand. Even if you bet like 1/2 pot on flop you can just get it in on the turn unless its a diamond.

this is highly debatable... against some villains i just flat my entire range in this situation. Why? They play really bad in 3b pots even with position and have unbalanced 3b ranges so very easy to play profitably with all my range. As the stacks get deeper and deeper 4b ranges should get narrower and narrower OOP as well until they shouldnt exist. I think most 4b ranges for people OOP this deep are incredibly unbalanced and very exploitable to play against as well. Also I think people play poorly post flop in these situations because they are somewhat rare and they are unfamiliar with them whereas very high SPRs they are familiar with. There are lots of reasons why your advice is very narrow sighted.

Sure, who isn't, but getting in 50/500 bbs with DS aces is not anywhere near the same thing.

Rule #1 about ultra deep stack poker is you never play face up.

I'm not too big on going bonkers with any kind of aces pre, used to be more so maybe it's just creeping conservatism, but it's really only "face up" if you will only fire bukoos of bbs pre with aces. That's not the majority of players out there now at all.

I'd 4-bet a lot, but it's definitely not mandatory to 4-bet OOP this deep if villain's going to put you on AA (rightly or wrongly). Folding the flop would be terrible. As played, I think you need to fold either the turn or river. "Young grinder that's been playing a little snug" is not the type you wanna hero-call your stack off against for 3 streets with a bluff catcher.

There are just so few hands that are betting all three streets for value, especially with an all-in on the river. Triple barrels from young and aggressive players are very likely to be bluffs.

If he had three fives I would expect smaller turn and river sizings to target your face up overpair for value. Same with a full house on the river. Something like 1000 to achieve a call.

Another area to think about, how did Villian throw in the chips on the river? Did it look tough/intimidating in any way? To me the 3 large chips also seem bluffy.