Hero (covers) - Late 20s/early 30s looking white dude. I look like a maniac and have been playing the part tonight. I've probably won about 20% of pots in the 10 hours since I sat down. Despite this, I haven't been correctly bluff-called all night. Mostly just stealing limps and winning via cbets since the table is letting me get away with it. When I've gotten to showdown in big pots, I've had it. The last decent pot I won (~$750), I showed down T8s on a Q8xx8 board as the PFR.

Villain ($500) - Early 20s, white, likely college student. He's been three to my left since he sat down 5 hours ago with $200 (min buyin). Has been playing very tight preflop in that time. I've been raising the BTN every hand it's unopened to me. With people taking breaks and whatnot, I've probably raised his BB 4 or 5 times thus far. He's folded all but one, which he 3bet huge and I folded. He doubled up maybe an hour ago when a fish went crazy with TPTK in a limped pot vs his top two. His buddy has been standing behind him for a couple of hands now. All of his PFRs have been big pairs (QQ+).

2/5NL - 8handed

UTG limps, HJ limps, Hero raises J4o on BTN to 25, Villain calls from BB, limpers fold.

Flop ($55) : A87
Villain checks, Hero bets 30, Villain calls.

Turn ($115) : 8
Villain bets 35, Hero raises to 110, Villain tank calls.

River ($335): Q
Villain checks, Hero shoves for ~350 effective.

Villain always took a long time before acting when there was a bigish bet for him to call, so the turn tank doesn't mean much.

Have at it.

Just fold turn??

Turn was awful to fire the second bullet, plus when a nit can call one he can call all 3 nearly always.

Has villain seen you pot-shove rivers like this for value? If not, how have you sized your river value bets?

Also river sucks for you as now V can call with an A no kicker since the Q now helps him chop vs most of your Ax range. You put villain in a much tougher spot when the river is <8.

With your image and the information provided, I'd just let go of it on the turn. Or fold preflop. You're allowed to sit out a button every now and then.

Villain's weak donk OTT seems really weird. I'd be a little scared of induction.

AP, if we're seeing this through to the end vs. a tight player (not really recommended) I think the line looks a little strange and I think you're betting too much OTT to really look like you're value popping a monster which you're basically planning on repping OTR.

If V's firing he's got something. The story we have to tell is that our something is much, much better than his something, and that's going to be difficult since we've been opening every button (not really recommended, x2.)

In line with that I repop only to $85-95 OTT. If we've been previously raising big without much, this is going to start sending warning bells off in his head. He's still calling, mind you, but he's going to start feeling a little nervous.

The river bet has to be very precise. AP, I would've bet ~$255-260. Think about what we'd bet there if we had, say, 7-8. We'd want a call from AJ, AK, AQ. So we'd probably bet around $175-$200, and we'd probably get called. The extra $60-70 still places a monster in the realm of believability, but it's way too much to call without the opponent having a serious hand. It folds out one pair, mayyyyyybe folds out AQ. I don't think anyone inclined to call $260 with AQ here would fold to $350. Obv if he's got an 8... you're roasted.

Something to always keep in mind is that we don't always have to blow out our bets when we're bluffing. We just have to be believable. This has a ginormous advantage to just plowing money into the pot and praying they fold - when we DO decide to bluff, we can do it risking less money overall. If you took an $85/$210 line, for example, I feel like you still fold out just as many hands as you do with $110/$350 and ultimately you're risking $165 less to win just $25 less than with the blowout line.

This Villain's range going to the river has to be something like AJ+ given earlier streets, doesn't it? (Maybe T9s/56s if he'll flat those pf, but those are behind your bluff anyway.) If he's paying attention to you, he should never be calling your raise ott with a made hand and then folding to a river shove, especially when every draw missed.

There's also a simplistic saying that I hold as virtually sacrosanct at LLSNL - don't try to bluff anyone off a suspected/realistic ace.

OP, are you giving villain a range of mostly AJ/AT/A9 type hands? Do you think our own line reps AK/AQ/AJ against his range, or did you also feel that he could start to be afraid of 8x and 77? He's getting 2/1 on the river and has already called OTT when he was offered $75 to win $165.

This is such a villain-dependent situation and I'm still trying to figure out the most important variables to pay attention to when trying to make an effective float/2 barrel. Were you strongly weighing the fact that he was up from his buy-in and would not want to go broke with TPWK on a paired board? If so, were you counting on the idea that he would not realize he was playing for stacks when he called the turn and would only start to think about this when you shove the river?

I like it

Bet a bit smaller on river though bc his range is polarized IMO. I think he either has monsters like 78 or drawy hands like JTss 79ss 9T etc

I was done with the hand after he c/c'd the flop. However, when he weak-donked the turn, I figured the strength of the line would be enough to blow him off a good ace.

I mentioned another hand in OP where I stacked a guy with T8s on a Q8xx8 board. I potted the river in that hand and guy shipped for 2x that.

Folding the BTN on this table would seem ill-advised considering how much limp-folding has occurred.

I don't think villain is 3betting AQ (not even sure about AK), so you have to leave that in his range also. I'm repping AA/AK/77/8x OTT.

As far as your metagame observations, you're exactly correct. Started with a minbuy, gifted a double up semi-recently. I think he calls the smallish turn raise too frequently and then cry-folds to the river bomb.

Good post. Replying a bit out of order here. Villain had a habit of counting down his stack when facing big bets. This made me think he was acutely aware of his profit/loss status during a hand. When playing with a relative unknown, though, I tend to think that threatening someone with losing their whole stack is much more effective than threatening just their profit. I could be entirely wrong here, and it may just look more bluffy.

As for the turn sizing, I don't think it's believable for most of my range if I raise as small as you're suggesting. Given my BTN open frequency, the range I'm repping here is really heavily weighted towards 8x. And on a turn card that seems like it added backdoor draws (even though it pretty much never does for villain due to the A), I'd be raising this much or more given the pot size being what it is after his donk.

I don't think he ever has 8x here given his line, and he definitely doesn't have the type of history with me to justify an induction line like this. He'd almost certainly go for a c/r if that was his goal.

Yeah, AJ+ or ATs is pretty much all he can have here IMO. As for the turn call, this is really common in rec players. They want to get to showdown with their made hands. You can make it seem like they might be able to do so relatively cheaply, and then bomb them off OTR.

It might be possible for him to have the big draws, but they're so few combos compared to the big Ax hands that I don't think he's polarized at all. Don't think he ever weak donks his monsters (does anyone really take that line against relatively unknown aggro player?).

The real question about this hand is UTG and HJ

I mean if villain is capable of thinking about what you are repping it is pretty light/non existant.

Why are we in this spot..... fold pre..?

The whole table besides one player had been limp-folding pre or fit/folding the flop for hours. That includes UTG and HJ. It's hard to think of a hand to not raise the BTN given that dynamic.

Villain is capable of determining what people are repping. But he doesn't seem like the type who's going to draw any connection between that and the likelihood they actually have that hand.

Fold pre, wtf....if you want to take it down pre just make it like $45. Turn needs to be a raise to like $145-150 instead of $110 to get him off a weak ace, and he's probably never folding AQ+. River is one of the worst cards to shove because a crappy Ax has magically turned into a chop with all other Ax hands except A8/Q/K. The only way V folds river is probably if he missed a straight draw in which case you are winning anyway.

I just realized I misread the hand, I thought villain limp called. It doesn't change a ton though as I don't expect him to have big ace very often here. I agree that he can have AT AJ though.

They key is that his turn donk suggests that IN HIS MIND, which is what matters,his hand is weak and he wants to see a cheap showdown. I'd be shocked if he called with a hand like AJ after you continue to show strength on river. I think we rep AA AK AQ A8 87 77 fine.

How fast did he call pre, and how fast did he check river?

I mean not to be mubs but described villain should have exactly AJ/AQ maybe 1 ATs here.

Hand seems fine though. I agree that river is a jam vs. described villain. Calling ranges ARE elastic with scared money and jams. Often times I try to bluff scary 70% bets or w/e and getting tank called. Those type of bets are for thinking players. Not players counting how much they are up for the night (which is 90% of llsnl) Go big or go home.

I generally like the way you think but I just think turn/river is dreadful here. When he bet/calls turn I just don't think he is folding to that Q. I mean if OP wants to present additional reads or w/e I may change my opinion but this hand is just FPS X 10 IMO.

His call PF was immediate, but he checks his cards before action is to him. River check was quick as well, I definitely didn't get any kind of "oh **** I just made two pair should I value bet it" vibe that I expect most rec players to give off if they spike AQ here.

No additional reads besides what's in the OP and what I posted earlier about him counting down his stack when facing big bets.

Lol I agree this is spew in a wholistic sense for 99% of llsnl games, but the way it's played out I think turn and river are warranted.

Like if OP posted this as hero has xx what is the least you are jamming river with? My response would be any two cards.

Huge emphasis on villain description btw for taking this line.

I agree pre was spew but OP had a plan and the right villain got involved to spew against, imo.

But in hindsight i have to admit you are likely right, a donk/call on this turn from this villain probably isn't folding river.

If ur gonna raise ATC on the button, you must read situations better post, plus raise a normal 20+ 5+5= 30 PLUS 10 surcharge = 40 for your hand being virtually zero equity post most likely. You wont have to balance this obv. Your villains will react according to the betsizing, and not the logic.

V range in this spot will be mostly AK AQ with maybe a AJs sprinkled in, thus you are attempting to fold a tight villain off top pair most of the time which is recipe for disaster.

I would fold the turn. And if i raised the turn it would have been larger and more convincing. But i wouldnt raise it really. When you get resistance, its time to fold the trash.

He never has a monster. He is playing scared money.

He is going to fold the river an extremely high percentage of the time. He is never thinking that AT now chops against AJ or anything similar.

Raising $40 with J4o in this spot is crazy. You are risking way too much money to win way too little. Just fold this garbage preflop. If you want to raise as a steal, just make it $30 to go.

I know no one is adjusting, but pre is just spew. not a fan of opening ATC, even otb, unless you are at an incredibly weak table where everyone is 200+bb deep.

ap, I just give up ott and don't even worry about trying to move this opponent off Ax