Look at equity against a range rather than individual equity against hands. It could be a b/c or it could be a b/f. Not sure cuz I don't feel like firing up EquiLab. You omitted a key possibility of KsKx.

Pre is bad, and your 3b range sounds awful.

I didn’t say flushes should raise. I would have virtually no raising range here.

I’m saying if villain DID raise it’d be more likely to be a flush than anything else and to not include them is stupid.

When I bet this flop from hero’s perspective I want to take it down right then and there. If villain raises, great he has Q-hi crushed. Villain flatting is what scares me silly.

Sure, you should put two combos in the raising range, but it's still not the most likely. There are nine combos of sets for example. Three combos of ATs.

If Villain flats, I'd expect him to have AJ/AQ A LOT. He could also have JsJx. I think you can profitably rip it on a brick turn if he flats.

I just ran it on equilab, and it looks like we have about 31% equity against a reasonable raising range. So it'll be close assuming you bet in the 200ish ballpark, but with this hand, I would err on the side of caution and just fold to a raise.

Pre is a little loose against MP opener, and definitely -EV in a straddled pot.

Take one of the aggressive lines on the flop. x/shove is tempting, but I'd expect him to just xb a lot. Half pot flop, shove turn seems good to me.

I'm as big a fan of 3! light as you'll find around here, but this is spew PF.

You don't have any of the conditions present you want to 3! light. There's no dead money to attack/squeeze, your read on Hero is TAG (i.e. doesn't open light), and your position is the nut low.

If you want to balance your 3! range from the SB to a MP open with no callers in between - which is completely unnecessary but whatever - use suited Aces, pocket pairs, or suited connectors.

I gave equity percentages against the hands I think he could raise with. If you want to add up all the combos of those hands and then try to figure out how often the guy would raise with each combo, then go for it.

He could have KsKx and thats the worst case for us, but I dont think hes gonna shove with that very often. I could be wrong though.

The point is that bet/folding isn't a great idea. Id rather check and hope the guy checks back...or crai if he bets. If we crai villain will be the guy thinking bet/fold was a good line for HIM to take and we have tons of equity against the hands I listed that he could easily bet this flop with.

I have a feeling this is gonna be a "I stacked a vegas pro!" thread but in reality it's just a case of FPS.

Fold pre. I would bet the flop since you have a super tight image.

Pre is just awful. If you are 3betting QJo you are wayyyy overbluffing in this spot. Being card does is not a reason to start 3-betting 16 combos of a trash hand.

If you want to 3b bluff at least be suited here; suitedness is a really big thing in 3b pots as pfr aggressor. It lets you win more pots by barreling, flopping good equity, etc. KQo is a fine 3-bet if he opens wide, plus K blocker is very good. We also beat hands like QJs/KJs that flat the 3b. QJo is just awful. KQo is probably a “standard” 3-bet 6-max vs MP open, but that’s mostly for balance/upping 3b range for board coverage and so they dont fold too much vs our nutted 3b range. Live poker you can just skip the variance and just fold; it’s probably breakeven or super marginally +EV

Ap i bet flop and shove turn. His range isnt very strong here, and even if he has a flush we have a lot of equity. He shouldnt have too many flushes with As out there and he should be folding weak SC like 65s/97s vs a 5x 3-bet. Only hand i see him calling off is AxKs, flushes, and sets. Plus with straddle i think a pro 4b AK here at a decent freq

I hear you. I may have been desperately looking for an opportunity to play a hand here, and QJo looked like a good chance to take it down pre given blockers and my super tight image. Obviously, if he 4bets its an easy fold and I save money from calling f,t with a dominated hand.

Again, look at my earlier post on 3betting range. KQo is a 3bet for value, and QJo is a 3bet bluff.

Granted, this 3b range works better vs a LAG then a TAG, and that's where I messed up in this hand.

I appreciate the feedback!

KQo isn't for value. And it's not good to be light vs a LAG since they rarely fold (especially if you're in the blinds. You need to add all these factors together and adjust your range accordingly by being stronger instead of weaker just let it go pre next time).
He probably discounted spades in your hand and thought he had FE against your range.

I still don't see how this isn't a +EV move in the long run in this exact scenario, given my very tight image. I will grant you that this is a spew with a normal image vs a normal player in LLSNL.

If V opens 17-20% of hands in MP, he is folding 75%+ of the time to my 3bet (only continues with TT+and top suited broadways and maybe AQ; he 4bets premiums).

Am I missing something?

Imo KQo isnt exactly really a 3b for value, although it can be vs specific hands like KJs/QJs (tag shouldnt really be flatting ip vs 5x 3b though).. plus you are dominated by AQ/AK Including KQo in your 3b range is 3betting linearly, which is suitable for SB where we are at a positional disadvantage and want to mitigate it

KQo should have less than 50% or 50% equity against a caling range. 3b for value would be like 1010+, AQs+ and obv much lower than that if they never fold e.g 99/88 and A10s+

And ofc! No problem

How do you know he folds 75%+, and that he actually opens 20%?

20% in MP is LAG, not TAG. And LAGs tend to overdefend 3bets, especially IP. If you are 3-betting a tag, he is not opening 20% and is definitely not folding 75% since his opening range is decently strong.

It is actually very rare to see people fold 75% to 3-bets. If they do, they’re more like TAGfish and weak nits. If you do see this them, you should pound away at 3-bets

I do think QJo in this specific spot is a -EV play. QJs id say breakeven. Also, the whole point of bluffs, for the most part, isnt to generate EV. It’s to get more action on your big hands and to not let people steal your blinds liberally, morsl the first point

All I can say is....dont do this again. The 3 bet is terrible. The sizing is terrible. Bet/folding the flop is terrible.

This. This. This.

The preflop line makes no logical sense. Think about it from an investment standpoint. You are risking $155 to win less than $50 and are doing so against the best player at the table who has position on you the entire hand. Out of all the investment options you have in a game of poker you somehow came to the conclusion that this is the spot you want to invest $155? Wowza!

The advice is all over the place ITT. If you're 3bing a polarized range, offsuit broadways are a poor choice to put in the bluffing pole for a variety of reasons. A hand like J9o is very bad. Just to put that in perspective, even when shooting above a 20% 3b frequency in a HU game, J9o falls below the bottom of my bluffing range.

You should tend to have a more linear range in the SB, esp with the straddle on, because it is so difficult to profitably flat a lot of hands here. This means you shouldn't have bluffs at all as the bottom of our 3bing range is filled out by moderately strong hands. QJo is in that neighborhood, but not against any sensible MP opening range (in fact, QJo should be below the bottom of his own range), and least of all in a straddled pot with two uncapped ranges left to act.

Hope that helps.

That is a very bad 3 bet unless you had some sort of live read. Theres just no reason you need to ever 3! bluff that wide. Also, if youre 3/F with your whole range, this is way too wide of a range vs a MP TAG raise.

Bet/ship flop, if he calls ship any turn.

lol who is bet foidng 2nd nut FD+ gutshot + bd draw to anither gutter + overcards to part of the board.

Surprisingly enough, it is a fold when we bet $175 and are shoved on. It's a pot-sized shove and we only have 30% equity against a mixed range of flushes, sets, and AKxs. So betting $150-300 is really the no-no range for this hand where we're forced into an indifferent call or fold scenario.

Since that covers the sensible sizes for our value betting range, that makes me even more inclined to x/shove here. Not sure why I thought the fact that villain would check vulnerable hands a lot is a bad thing. It's not even like checking precludes us from repping top pair on later streets.

So if we see villain OR hands like T9s and A9o from EP-MP, we would still prefer a merged 3bet range (no bluff 3bets) and fold hands like QJo?

Obviously, it would be nice to know how V reacts to 3bets but we have small sample sizes with LLSNL.

This may have plugged a huge leak for me as well. Maybe there is not enough hand history with live poker or LAG opponents to table my bluff 3bets and get them to call me down lighter in the future.

Those reads should go in OP as people were a little confused by what a TAG who attacks fish means.

In any case, the linearity of our 3b range is determined by the circumstances and how villain responds to a 3b, not how wide their opening range is. So yes, I'd still go with a mostly linear range here. And to repeat, if we're going polar here, QJo is even less of a 3b because it's a very poor choice of a hand for the bottom pole of a polar range.

How wide he opens determines how low we can dip into our respective ranges. While opening A9o in EP is obviously terrible, we can't put him on any looser than a standard CO range, which isn't loose enough to dip all the way down to QJo as part of a linear range. Even if we were 3-handed, 3bing QJo is marginally +EV, so 3bing it against a CO open range with two blinds yet to act is definitely too loose.

if he is indeed a "vegas pro TAG":

1. i don't even want to be in pots with this guy, let alone OOP. in position you could make an argument for QJo being near the bottom of your light 3b range against this player. out of position it's a fold pre. good players will brutalize you over the long run when they have position. (i also don't want him to my left so, at least you were in a decent seat. i would seat change if given opportunity to get as close to god seat on him as possible, allowing me to focus on the other players.)

2. i'm checking this flop. because:

a) betting is standard and i don't like to do standard things against what i'm assuming is a very good player.

b) because it neutralizes some of his toolbox (i.e. raising on a very wet flop) in a situation where we do not yet have a made hand. an instinct that leans towards aggression may be one of his only weaknesses, so let's set it up so we can exploit that. we're ahead of his flop betting range when checked to. i expect him to lead most of his range and i check/call this flop.

c) obviously allows us to see the turn either for free or more cheaply.

the one place you have permission to get creative at low stakes is against more sophisticated opponents.

this was my line before seeing results, for whatever that's worth.