8 or 9 handed 3/5

Villain 1: older 60s swedish/middle eastern mixed. Came to the table a few hours ago. Plays pretty snug. One hand he folded pocket Jacks preflop when he opened early I 3b in sb, and bb came over top. I had ak, bb had aa. I called it off and lost obv. Right before this hand, I thought to myself, wow, this guy just sits around and waits for the nuts. Rarely raises pre.

Villain 2: older white gentleman. Likes to see lots of flops, will call raises with lots of garbage, will stab at pots with small pieces of flop. However will fold to aggression post especially on turn.

Their perception of me is probably that I'm dangerous. They've seen me stack several people. They probably think I bluff a lot, but I've only shown down strong hands, so they may be confused.

V1 has about 1600 or 1700, V2 has about 1000. I cover.

Straddle is on.

V1 raises to 40 utg. I think 1 caller on button, looser asian gentleman. I call in sb with 88. V2 calls in Straddle.

Flop (160) AT8 rainbow

I should have led, but I checked, v2 bets 40, v1 smooths, I check raise to 200 thinking my line is really strong and they would fold 1 pair hands to any bigger raise. V2 folds. And v1 raises another 200 on top. He has about 1200-1300 left.

So I'm thinking he has TT, aa, or at.

What do I Do?

I just put him all-in now.

Another line that works if they fold 2p is call raise and open ship turn.

i'm confused. So V1 opens UTG not v2?

x/c flop

Yeah pretty much the perfect x/c spot on flop. Raising does practically nothing.

Fixed it sorry

Raising flop vs V1 is just going to own you. Will this nut peddler continue with AQ/AK, and does he even have that in his range, you said you worried he was nit peddling?

He probably has TT+. V2 has the wide range and you want to keep his gutshots in there. If V1 would double barrel, you're in a tough spot.

If v1 checks turn, I expect v2 to bet a lot, from the reads right? Then you can c/r your buddy v2.

Why would you check call here, I like the check raise as the villains perception of us is tricky/dangerous. I think $200 is probably on the large side, but ok. What could V1 be smoothing $40 and min raising on the flop with? Many draws, 2p, Ax.

As played shove


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Don't think

"Their perception of me is probably that I'm dangerous. They've seen me stack several people. They probably think I bluff a lot, but I've only shown down strong hands, so they may be confused."


his was in the OP, seems like it got edited in, am I wrong? Or did I skip. I don't know how you come off as bluffy when you show down the goods. So the read is wrong and you're probably putting your own thoughts into your head.

Also you should re-read V1 & V2's description.

You're right I'm probably projecting my own thoughts because I know how many times I don't have it and take down decent pots with aggression. But they rarely see the bluffs. I think they know I don't always have it but they tighten up and just wait for monsters against me, which is the worst possible strategy of course.

I hear comments about "stealing" pots often but they let me take it most of the time fortunately.

Most over adjust to one side of the spectrum, too tight or too loose. These are probably the too tight guys.

So, you've got a good hand, but is it actually strong enough to c/r a dry board vs tighter opponents post-flop in which V1 is on TT+ in your eyes, maybe AK (I think you may doubt this), along with V2 who has some Ax here on flop, but strong enough to call a c/r when he has shown the ability to fold to aggression? Some gutshots (these don't have much equity vs us). His flop call is rarely a Tx hand. It's, gutshots, straightdraws like J9, Ax and 2p+.

So vs that range, we're flatting to keep V2's range wide and on the turn we can really start to think more about V1's range. What happens if he double barrels?

And I realize I'm thinking too much. These guys are basically playing their own cards.

I guess it comes down to whether you think V1 will do this with AK. AT could do it, but that seems like an odd open by a nit UTG.

I think I'm calling the raise, but if you are confident that this is rarely AK from this villian, you probably should let it go.

I'm pretty sure I never actually find that fold in the moment though.

Dochrohan, in an effort to continue learning, can you help me understand why we want to keep his range wide here, I have a hard time with that concept.

Do we want to keep his range wide in order to not fold his hands that we beat, and keep in the hands that beat us (if we raise)?

Or point me to literature to read...

Thanks in advance!




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I would bet the flop. I believe you have 3 opponents? Make it $125. You can't miss a street of value, especially if V1 plays passively.

"never fold a set" applies to 100BB strategy. However, at 300BB, you need to worry about getting coolered. People typically don't lose a massive stack unless you get cold decked. You can definitely dump bottom set here against a nit's call/backraise. These situations are so read dependent that it's hard for us to give quality advice. If V1 never raises with TPTK or worse, then fold.

Man, I'm really confusing this whole hand. I thought V1 bets, V2 calls, we raise flop and V1 folds and V2 re-raises.

Did I read this wrong the entire time or was this edited again?

I must of read this wrong, OP was originally messed up, but don't think it was that messed up.

Either way.


Vs v1 it's a fold.

Ok I'm super embarrassed. I think I need to take a couple days off after this.

So I folded. He showed ace ten.

I went on tilt after that and left w about 3600 after being up to 4500 at the peak. Still a very good day overall. But the biggest mistake I've made in a couple months. I still can't believe I laid down a set on the flop. I've never done it before.

I was so sure he was super strong And trapping me. And he was. He thought it was the nuts on that board and totally felt like he missed value. He was tilting too.

Ugh. I had been playing so well too....anyway there are bigger things in life and hopefully I can forget about this one soon.

Thanks for all your thoughts and comments.

Ya sorry I edited shortly after I posted bc I had switched the vs in a couple places.

The original raised flatted the looser straddle caller and then backraised my check raise. As soon as he did that I thought, wow I just got trapped. Didn't think it through enough obv. Was really had on myself for this one but I'm feeling ok about it now. If this happened when I was 17 I would have been down for like a week. But now I just appreciate the cash in my hands and realize I'm bound to make mistakes.

I think it's a snap-call (and check-jam any non-ace turn). Back-raise after flatting the donk bet smells FOS. Like a "Sh*t I wasn't expecting SB to really have a hand and maybe he's semi-bluffing a broadway draw so I don't know what to do."

I think V2 donking into V1 on the flop may reduce the chance of V1 having AA, since an A is probably a large part of V2's range.

Yes should have thought about it longer. V2 is most likely a big ace there because he knows v1 plays tight so he's not betting lightly. It was about 10 hours into the session and my mind was not in it fully. I was sort of on autopilot. Not putting much thought into things. I would never have laid this down in the early part of the session

Another factor was v1 and I didn't play a pot for like 3 or 4 hours. He just wasn't active at all and I was playing semi lockdown poker too so it was just a shock when he raised and I thought this guy is telling me he can beat two pair.

Ugh, I'm probably going to go on a long vacation soon. I started cashing out my big chips yesterday.

Poker makes my mind narrow in the sense that I'm always looking in the past and analyzing decisions and being hard on myself. Being good at poker feels like a curse sometimes.

Thanks for all your thoughts. Its good to have people to talk with even on the internet in this lonely game of ours.

Call the first time, call now.

This sucks, but I'd probably fold there too. A fish's line is congruent with AA/TT there because your c/r looks so strong and he's still CIB. If he has AT, whatever, overplay.

Retrospectively, this looks like the perfect board to donk big with 88 as Ax is a huge part of their ranges and they're never folding it to a flop donk, and most likely calling even two streets with AJ+.

A c/r OTOH may get help you get more money in if they're stationy but it looks strong enough that I'd rather c/c than c/r as it may easily get even AK to fold.

Thank you for your comments.

The thing is v1 is actually relatively solid. He doesn't give money away and plays super snug. And I was on a heater too so I knew he had a good hand. I absolutely knew AT was bottom of his range.

Looking back, I checked so fast. I should have thought about it. I've been having great success donking sets and building huge pots. Not sure why I didn't this time. I would have bet nearly pot, got called by v2 and raised by v1 and then I probably would have called otf and c/r ai ott so happily.

Earlier this month I was having really good shorter sessions. My focus was great for the entirety. Last 3 or 4 sessions ive been playing longer again and I've won at like 27 or 30bb/ hr but I find my focus slipping sometimes.

Gotta get back to basic good mental game.

I highly doubt villain is opening ATo UTG, and highly doubt he's overplaying AK this way.
If his range is {ATs, TT, AA}, you are crushed and made a good fold. You're not even sure he would open ATs UTG.

Back-raises on dry boards are not typically FOS, they are super nutted. This is probably one of the rare times you can get away from a set.

If you think he has AT/TT/AA, you have 52.79% and have a clear flat/shove.

However, if you range him on ATs/TT/AA, you have 24.26% and a clear fold.


I wouldn't be too results oriented here. I think ultimately you should reconsider your player evaluation or realize this was a fluke hand. ATo is quite bizarre here given your description.

Stop kicking yourself. You have to fold bottom set sometimes deep, especially on dry boards. It sucks but as the two above responses are saying your actually crushed here by the most likely value range.