Hero is unknown to most on this table. Been at table for < 30 minutes and bought in for $500.

Villain literally just sat down - his first hand. He seems very friendly with all the regs, dealers, etc. Prob mid-20s WG. Bought in for $1k+ for what that is worth (table allows to buy in at max stack of table)


Villain straddles UTG to $10

Hero AcJc UTG+1 and raises to $30
Folds to villain who calls (again it's his first hand - literally still taking chips out of his rack)


Flop (~$60): Qc8c4h
V check
Hero bets $40
V calls

Turn (~$140): Qc8c4h 7h
V check
H bets $75
V call

River (~$290): Qc 8c 4h 7h 2s



What is our river decision here if villain checks? just check back?

I am a bit lost on how to play these types of hands. It's good to barrel hands that are drawing to the nuts and that have a lot of equity (i assume my ace is also good on the flop so I believe i have 12 outs at least on the flop if V has a Q).

At the same time, when we get to the river, we are blocking like a ton of club combos. Given this, should we just not really ever 3 barrel bluff a missed FD on the river?

Also is turn barrel ok, or do we prefer to just check back turn? I felt ok barreling given that we are heads up.

Lastly, sizing? How do you approach sizing in these types of hands and what is your reasoning?

Thanks

I'd bet a bit more on the turn, like 90. I mostly have value hands here and want to take manies. Dont particularly want to vary sizing.

I'm firing again on river. This board has a ton of hands a straddle defender could have where he picked up value OTT. 86, 85, 8x hearts, a whole stack more. From a theoretical point of view, when the river bricks I am going to have a metric ton of hands I want to valuetown. AA, KK, QQ, 88, AQ, KQ, what is that like 42 combos? My triple barrel bluffs that I raised UTG are various club hands plus probably T9s, I'm going to want to run all of them.

@ChrisV does that mean you are more likely to give up if there is no BFD? Given that most of the hands you are targeting are hands that picked up equity on the turn? Let's say an offsuit 2 - a total brick?

Good point that our UTG range should be way more value heavy here, and given villain's description it SEEMS like he would consider this.

Turn sizing kinda messes you up for a river barrel.

The problem is 40 -> 75 -> 135 has no fold equity, but 40 -> 75 -> 195 looks like you just really want a fold now that FD bricked out. If you had a made hand, your relative sizing on turn would tend to be bigger or in proportion to relative sizing on river given FD.

If you bet 40, then 90 or 95, then 195 or 215 or more. I think you're telling a believable story with FE.

Also, this is why I dial down my flop sizing. Like I think 30 -> 75 -> 185 is still believable with FE, but you've saved like 35-40$ on your bluff. But if you dial down flop sizing, you have to do it with your whole range or villains will notice, and you'll tend to lose value on your value hands.

I like pre and flop.

I don't usually run triple barrel bluffs against unknowns without a better runout than this. The problem with the turn bet is that the turn was a blank and so isn't likely to scare anything that called the flop. We're getting folds only from very weak hands -- essentially reverse floats on the flop. There might be enough of those to make the turn barrel marginally profitable, but I'm not comfortable that's true.

OTR, once V has called pre, called the flop, and called the turn, I don't like a triple barrel on a completely blank river like this. I think all we're folding out is missed draws, most of which we're probably beating anyway.

If you are going to barrel, I think you're going to need to act like you mean it. LLSNL V's tend to call too much for smaller bets (but often fold too much to large ones). If you're going to barrel, follow up the 40 on the flop with 100 or even 125 on the turn. The turn bet is key. Ideally, you want V to think calling the turn means he's going to have to call a river shove.

After composing the above, I did some work with Flopzilla. I gave V a calling range of any pair, any two broadway, 54s+, 75s+, A8o+, AXs, and K9s -- about 23% of his hands.

If he continues on the flop only with a good draw (OESD, FD, GS+pair) or TP+, he's folding 76% of his hands on the flop. (Thats expected; a wide range pre has to have a lot of folds somewhere unless he's a showdown monkey.) To show how sensitive this is to tendencies, if he'll call with any pair or GS, he's calling 63% of the time.

Against his tight flop calling range, most of his range (88%) is TP+. None of that is likely to fold to a small turn barrel, nor to a river barrel.

So, short answer, I like the flop barrel, I can see arguments for a turn barrel, but I think the river barrel is unlikely to be profitable. I agree with Chris' argument that he wants to include all his draws to balance his value range, but I think that's more applicable to a tougher game where elements of balance actually start to matter.

Flop is fine. Turn is not a good barrel. It's not a scare card, and he's almost never folding any part of his range that called on the flop. Additionally, if you get jammed on or raised, which will happen at a decent frequency, you have to fold.

River is a terrible spot to bluff, esp after both FDs brick. You actually have some SDV, so just x it back. Hearts are a much better candidate to bluff with, since you don't block any club draws that can call/call & fold to a river bet.

pre anf flop fine but im checking back turn a lot.

This is more due to us not knowing him and just not being a good thing to do long term wise to complete unknowns.

but i could just be a nit here.