Main villain is the whale in the game. I am UTG+1 in this hand. "hero" is the gentleman sitting next to me who is a very very good player. It's very hard to show down against him because of his aggression but he's an excellent hand reader as evidenced by the hands I've seen him play. Earlier in the session he hero called the river with second pair to a 60bb bet against the same villain so these two have plenty of history.

Villain is kinda crazy. Earlier in the session I flat called a raise from the BB with AJs with the sole purpose of trapping him. He raised late pos, I defended, flop was 533, i check called, turn was a deuce, i checked and he shoved 1100, i folded and he showed 94s

UTG (hero, covers) raises to 30 with JT, 2 calls, villain (1700) raises from the BB to 160, hero calls, everyone else folds

flop 479

BB bets 275 and we put him on a high pocket pair (lets say we have a live tell for the purposes of the discussion)

assume villain shoves all turns when we call

what is our play?

Seems like a super easy call. We've got 12 outs, so 3:1 odds to hit turn. When we hit we win the 650 in the pot + the 1250 V has behind. So we're calling 275 for a 3:1 chance to win 1900.

Don't think described V folds an overpair, so I don't like raising. Can't fold given the IOs.

Only 9 outs vs AQhh+ with him still having a redraw but that’s only 2 combos. He also sometimes has 99 here although probably not too often.

Hero is calling $275 into $930 which means he needs 30% equity without IO included. I guess it’s a profitable call but I don’t think it’s a slam dunk by any means since V may fold an OP if you hit the turn, may have a larger flush, or may still redraw to win on the river.

I’d probably call but I’m ok with high variance spots.

Well, given your assumptions, we obviously have no FE on flop, so shoving flop is effectively calling off 1540 into a final pot of 3465 (65 dead from SB & 2 callers, 1700*2), requiring 44.444% equity to be breakeven EV. Giving him 99+, we have 45.45% equity, which is worth just under $1575, versus our $1540 call. So it's +EV, but in a very minor way given the amount of money being bet ($35). Also, the times we get it in against higher FDs are disastrous, so I would avoid shoving for sure!

On turn, if shoved on, we will be faced with $1265 into a final pot of $3465 against 99+, so we require 36.5% equity to profit OTT. On a random heart turn, we are 91.35% (8-9 outs). On a non-heart 8 turn (3 outs), we are 97%. On a J turn, we are 42.3% (2-3 outs). Out estimates are based on removal effects that I don't really feel like delving into, I'll just use the bottom end of each in my EV calculation to give a conservative estimate. On the other turns, we don't have enough equity to call.

45 potential turn cards
Heart turn EV : (8/45)*(.9135 * $3465 - $1265) = $337.8
Offsuit 8 turn EV : (3/45)*(.97 * $3465 - $1265) = $139.7
J turn EV : (2/45)*(.4232 * $3465 - $1265) = $9
Brick turn we fold EV = (32/45) * -$275 = -$195.5

Total EV of call flop = $291

Equities were calculated using PPT simulations, using the bottom # of J/heart outs. Random heart turn done like this : 9h7h4d *h

There are in direct contrast to the assumptions OP has stated are to be made.

This spot is not really interesting at all given those assumptions though.

I’d like to see more history than a guy opening 94s in LP and then overbet shoving over what he perceived as weakness before assuming anything. That hand and this one could be very different as in this one he went over 4x on a 3b pre out of position. OP also didn’t share any history of this V overvaluing his hands to think that him calling an overpair on a bad turn is likely to happen.

I’m not saying the guy can’t actually just be a maniac but I don’t think calling here with is a slam dunk if OP is assuming we have no FE. I admitted it’s profitable but it’s obviously huge variance. If we don’t connect, our hand equals napkins unless we have the balls to make a huge bet on the turn with J high if this guy somehow manages to check.

This is more a point of order question:

If OP says specifically for us to assume something and then answer his question, is it useful at all to challenge that assumption? Or should we just follow that assumption and answer the question?

Nothing in his description of V has any relevance to the action in this hand besides a general point that he thinks the guy may be a maniac. The other hand was an LP single open vs a BB defend on an uninteresting board while this one is a 3b OOP on a slightly more wet board.

More to the point, is that we’re discussing IO when we call the flop, and nothing in the HH provided is relevant to whether V will refuse to fold an overpair if Hero connects to his draw. All we know from the HH is that V overbet shoved a basically zero (although it actually wasn’t) equity bluff after Hero checked twice (the first being a check/call) on a 5532 board.

You’re right though, if we assume V shoves all turns as OP asked us to do, then it becomes an uninteresting spot. I just find it difficult to answer that when we can never, ever make an assumption that V shoves an overpair into a 3 flush board, or any board, for that matter.

As i was watching the hand I felt villain had a big pair, and hero next to me also put him on that as we discussed the hand afterward. We both knew he would shove the turn no matter what card came out because that's his style, and that is exactly what happened.

I felt calling the flop and folding blank turns was the best way to play it and thamel18s math confirms imo. I don't see villain ever folding if we shove the flop so i think calling the flop and folding blank turns was best even tho it's definitely not the funnest way to go

The problem is, if we’re using the HH provided for relevance to this hand that we should be calling almost any turn bet since J-high might be enough to win the pot. With us saying he’s already shown the ability to shove ATC after a check/call, check, then our J probably gives us enough equity on the turn to call.

That’s the problem with the HH provided imo. Did V only show large PPs/big premiums on other hands he 3b oop? That’s the type of info I’d find relevant to also piece together to get a more accurate picture here. Cause if we’re describing him as a maniac then he can have all kinds of smaller flushes and straight draws here that our J-high have even more equity against.

People do not have a linear range Dave. The fact that he showed down so weak twice can mean that he's not going to do it again.

The hero in the hand is a crusher and he's able to decipher this. If it was just you and me we might be best off shoving the flop but hero is probably one of the best players in the room and he was reading villains hand as a big pair. I put that read in there based on the conversation that ensued. I personally thought he was strong this time just based on his raise size. I was UTG+1 and called with AQo and then folded to the 3bet, so i was reading a big hand as well. This is villain's value sizing imo

If it eases your mind, villain shoved the 5 of diamonds on the turn and showed KK

pretty simple math problem imo but i wasn't exactly sure how to break it down and it's a cool math problem that should be easy to solve and a decent enough study guide

When you use a HH and say a V is crazy, which is basically another way of calling him a maniac, you significantly widen his range. If you then say you feel like he 100% has a large PP here, then why is the original HH relevant? That's the part I'm not following. Why even mention the HH at all if this was just a math problem?

just to show that he's always shoving the turn. his predictability makes the math tractable anyway. I really didn't want to get off track with the read that he could have garbage here, or that he might not shove any turn. He's shoving every turn and he has a big pair. I suppose i didn't need the description. I could have just left it out

As played I call and fold turn if we don’t make our hand and villain shoves. That being said, raising JTs UTG+1 at a full table may be a bit loose. I don’t play this high. We are deep enough I guess.