Played an interesting hand tonight that I thought would be a good choice for my first hand history posting here.

Saturday Night, Maryland Live, ~midnight. Table dynamic is loose passive; preflop raises typically get 2-4 callers who play fit or fold on the flop. Very few 3-bets. Very profitable if you can navigate your way to Valuetown.

V1 (8 seat, ~$200): early 30's WG, TAGish style. Plays aggressively (for 1/2) when enters a hand. Flop aggressive play includes raising with TPTK and min-c/r. Likes to play broadway cards. Seems position aware.

V2 (9 seat,~$200): 50's WG, TPish style, some raises preflop, fit or fold after, not as aggressive as V1.

V3 (2 seat, ~$400): 20's Asian. Plays tight pre-flop. Constantly playing games on phone even when in hand. Does not enter many hands and H doesn't specifically recall raises pre. On flop has made unconventional plays such as donk bets and overbets. Most notably, 3-way hand with H as PFR, flop is Axx all diamonds, ~$50 pot, V3 first to act donk bets $100. (H and V2 fold).

Hero (3 seat, ~$1100): late 30's WG, not a LAG but probably the most aggressive player at table. Was card dead early on, then tripled up from ~$250 stack with set of sixes. After that has won several medium size multi-way pots with a mix of C-bets, thin value, and big value bets (including 2 or 3 broadway straights that didn't make it to showdown ). Covers entire table with ~$1100 stack. H believes his image is strong.

H initially thought V3 was inexperienced but has since reassessed. V3's stack was previously up to ~$500 in a relatively short time without winning any notable massive pots. H has recently changed to seat 3 (from 10) so that V3 and seat 1 (also $500 stack) are on H's right.

OTTH...

V1 from UTG+1 or +2 raises to 10. H ranges him at 88+, A10+, but more weighted towards higher end due to EP.
V2 calls 10. Range is typical 1/2 calling range (PPs, connectors, broadways, suited aces).
V3 min-raises to 20. H is almost 100% certain this is V3's first 3-bet.
H (CO or HJ) wakes up with AK . Was planning big raise until V3's raise.

So two questions:

What range do you put V3 on? This will be critical later on.
H's action?

V's min 3-bet is weird and sets off alarm bells for me. If the other Vs in the hand were deep, it could be a pot juicer, but since they're not and he obv wants calls, I put him on a very strong range. I can't see folding, since we're deep with him and have position, but I'm treading carefully and not getting excited about TP. I call to nut mine and to be able to take it away if V seems to give up post.

I agree with Garick in this situation. Preflop min raises are even more likely then other min raises to be big hands trying to suck somebody in. There are other things it could be, he could just be building a pot, even more rarely it is some weird bluff or a middle strength seeing where they are at. Given your description of him liking to over bet the flop he could just be inflating the pot a bit so he can make a bigger flop bet. Those are all rare though.

Normally I would be inclined to just give this up without any read on his min raise range but you have a good hand, position in what is likely to be a big pot with deep effective stacks and it isn't expensive yet. Call and hope for a good flop or weak action post flop.

With reasoning along the same lines of Garick and QuadJ's, plus the betting is now re-opened for V1 to potentially re-pop, Hero elected to call $20.

V1 calls, capping his range. V2 calls.

The Flop ($83): KQ4 rainbow

V1 checks, V2 checks, V3 checks almost immediately (???)

Action to hero. We're not at the second interesting spot yet, but let's pause and get opinions on hero's next move.

Hero?

The board is fairly dry but 4 to the flop it's a bad idea to give opponents a free card and betting will start defining their ranges more. No need to go big, $35/$40 is enough to find out if they like their hands or not on this board. Bet flop, plan on checking most turns and then evaluate on river. If you think V3 checked trying to lay a trap then checking behind isn't a bad alternative.

Unless you get some weird run out your not trying to build a big pot in this situation. Your hand is short of ways to improve and many villains in V3's position will show up with QQ+ a decent percent of the time.

Hero, thinking 3 checks including two from PFRs indicates lack of enthusiasm for the board, bets $65.

V1 and V2 fold. As soon as action is on V3, he immediately goes all in (!) for ~$300 on top of the $65.

Hero now faces a ~$300 call for a ~$515 pot. Hero?

Snap fold. He has QQ-AA here almost always. His FPS cost him a ton against you, assuming you folded, imo.

Fold. This is usually QQ-AA with a small chance of AK or JT, it would be a very unusual opponent who had a significant chance of anything worse. You would have to see a lot of total air bluffs from this guy before trying to call this off is worthwhile.

Against these guys who will over bet their moderate strength hands do a lot of set mining and try to see cheap flops with hands that can make the nuts. Your implied odds are going to be better then normal with drawing hands. Just don't get carried away because your going to be folding more on the flop then usual.

So my interpretation throughout the hand was in line with QuadJ and Garick's. I was curious to see if I would gather any dissenting opinions...because my read was dead wrong.

Results:

Wow. I did mention above that he might be inflating the pot just to bluff at it later but I wouldn't expect it on that board. Even the rare maniac whales who are all in on a regular basis would be likely to give it up on that flop.

You can add spazz bluff shove to his range of moves, as his play is simply terrible. His over shove is going to limit your range to the best hands and you are going to have a set in this situation more often then usual. If you had known his range included garbage and was willing to call with AA/AK then it would almost never work for him on that board.

Don't beat yourself up. The $100 into $50 was a clue, but V's play was an outlier.

I'm not at all. I posted it here because I thought it was an interesting hand and to see if anyone else would have found a call in that situation. The responses confirmed I made the right play given the information at the time.

I hope I run into him again.