$1/$3, 6-handed, 4am on a Wednesday morning. All players involved in this hand have a ~$300 stack.

V1 (SB) - 20s Asian girl with headphones. Seems like a mediocre reg.

V2 (BB) - 40s Asian man. Loose-passive fish.

Hero (MP) - 20s WG. LAG image. Have shown the propensity to overbet bluff and 3bet light.

H raises $12 MP with AJo
V1 calls $12
V2 calls $12

Flop ($33, 3ways) is J63r

Both check
H bets $11
Both call $11

Turn ($63, 3ways) is 8s
Board is J638ss now

Both check
H bets $55
V1 calls $55
V2 folds

River ($164, HU) is 3
Board is J6383 no flush

V1 bets $45
H ???
(We have $222 behind)

Fold, call or raise?

Any postflop reads on V1?
Looks like a blocking bet that wants to see a cheap river. I feel like she would have played much more aggressively at some point with a hand that beats you, given your image.
Also, anyone wearing headphones, especially at 1/3.. I probably wouldn't give too much credit. Just my experience.
And what's with the small flop bet? Am I missing something? Is this the new bet sizing that's being taught in poker training sites nowadays? (Actually curious)

I guess MP in a 6handed game is like the CO? If so, I'm fine with preflop.

I'm actually cool with our small bet sizing on the flop. Board is bone dry, we're just looking to eke out value against hands that are almost drawing dead, while at the same time not looking to build a huge pot when we're behind (a danger in an SPR pot of 9 if we start betting too big too early).

No sure why our betsizing jumped so much on the turn; are we that afraid of needing to charge the backdoor flush draw? I probably just do another ~1/2 PSB here.

River does look like a blocking bet with a hand that is trying to set a cheap showdown. I mean, I guess it's possible she slowplayed the flop with JJ/66/33 (although JJ/33 only 1 combo each) to entice the fish to come along. But I also think we see QQ+ perhaps more than we realize. Plus I think if shes on the plus side of mediocre that she might manage a fold with KJ- anyways. Although we do have the image to go for big value against KJ-. Me and my image would just call; probably a lot more reason for you and your image to jam.

GcluelessNLnoobG

if we raise does villain call? is she passive?

our stack is in an awkward spot

problem is if she's not passive i feel like only better calls us

also if we raise and she jams what's our plan?

if we aren't folding then i guess we just jam now

i also agree this looks like a lot like a blocker bet KJ QJ maybe J10 suited

kind of need more a player description

Call and lose to QQ

We're getting a great price to look V up. There's a chance it's some weird bluff or some other misplayed line. We're probably beat, but we can't be certain enough of that to make a fold getting more than 4:1 on a call.

Raising just turns our hand into a bluff. We're very unlikely to fold out better than top/top and pretty unlikely to get called by worse.

Just call. And probably lose.

I agree bet the flop small, though I wouldn't make it quite that small. 15 is fine, or check it back. We're expecting two streets of value, they can just as easily be turn and river as flop and turn|river. I also wouldn't ramp up the turn bet. Half pot is fine.

A long time ago, players would Cbet pot on a dry board. But people slowly learnt that, if they're Cbetting so large, then they can't bet as frequently. On the other hand, if you Cbet small, then you can bet at a much higher frequency, which is exactly what we want to be doing on dry boards. For example, hands like TT or AK would probably be forced to check back the flop if the only options were to Cbet pot or check back, but these hands can be added in to our betting range if we bet smaller.

Also, from our opponent's perspective, they're forced to defend at a much higher rate if we bet small. They can't just call with pairs and draws, fold everything else, or else they'll be overfolding and we'll auto-profit on all dry boards like J63r. But since our opponents tend to be inelastic and call with a similar range of hands regardless of the bet size, then we benefit from betting small here and taking down the pot at a high frequency with very little at risk.

All very proper and GTO. But GTO is (by definition) designed to ensure one isn't exploited. In this case, the need to call wider against smaller bets is a simple consequence of the need to ensure that you don't have any profitable bluffs with ATC at any bet size.

These opponents are extremely unlikely to understand or correctly apply this reasoning.

What these opponents do is call too loosely preflop and likely on the flop. Betting too small with TPTK isn't outwitting them, it's forcing them to give you less money when they make the sort of mistakes they always make.

The reason to bet smaller OTF here isn't GTO based, it's based on the fact that there are fewer draws available. That means there are fewer hands they can make the mistake of calling too wide and there are fewer hands that you need to charge to prevent profitable draws (when they make their standard calls).

Against more-savvy opponents, you therefore need to bet smaller with bluffs so that they don't detect a bet-sizing tell. However, if your opponents aren't that savvy (or observant), bet larger as a bluff and smaller for value (when you're in a hand with such an opponent).

Seems like a blocking bet from KJ, QJ, JT, J9. From the previous actions, I have no reason to believe that she has a strong hand that beat your AJ. So, I will go for a raise to 125$ here. I prefer a $125 sizing here because when people make a blocking bet, their hands are marginal.. so if you shove or make it bigger, they might be able to find a fold. However, if you make it just an extra $75 when they have already put in $45... It is a lot more difficult for them to fold.

I either just call or Min raise river and Fold to a shove.

Results:

Grunch:
better bigger flop, ap just call

you did... on the flop. Bet 20-25, likley get it HU, and bet 60-80% pot on that river, have her check again and go for thin value on the river.

Based on the line you took, we're forced to just call river most of the time.

And side note, have you been playing with for a while or did either of you just recently walked in and started playing for the first time around 4am?

I find it hard to believe that the only read you've picked up is "She seems like a mediocre reg" if both of y'all have been there a while.

I bet small because I didn't know that she had top pair on the flop and I wanted to get called by weak pairs, Ace highs and backdoor draws. I started slamming in more value on the turn and I had intended to bet around $80 on the river if it checked to me.

So my read on her was:
She is neither loose nor tight. She's kind of in between.
She is neither aggressive nor passive. She's kind of in between.
Honestly, there wasn't much that stood out about the way she played. If she had any obvious leaks, then I would have posted them. I guess if we compared her to an online reg, then she's probably loose-passive, but by 1/3 live standards, she was just an average reg that is probably breakeven or a slight winner at the game.

Seems like a trivial call.

easy call. Villain may have a 3 since your flop bet was so small, but he is likely using a blocker bet to get to showdown.

That's exactly why you should raise/fold at least some of the time. You cant raise much and then fold which is why I said min raise/fold to a shove.

I would also raise/fold to ~110, this is not a trivial call at all, you should at least seriously consider raising.