Playing an absolutely insane 1/2 home game, max is $600 and people have busted multiple $600 bullets and the spew has not stopped and the alcohol is flowing. Just watched a 4-bet all-in river bluff with K-high get through. Avg. pot size is ~$120. One guy is sitting on +$4k. Most of the money is going in post-flop, haven't too much craziness pre-flop except for a 5-bet bluff to $290 earlier. I have a lot of history with these players.

Reads:

Main V: I am roommates with this player, we talk all the time. He is super aggressive and not afraid to play big pots. Plays very exploitatively. Seen him have bluffs in all sort of spots.

V2: Down ~$1900, likes to spew post-flop but rarely is super-aggressive pre.

Hero: Viewed as pretty tight by V, maybe a little too much (also somewhat passive). Loves showing me bluffs that he gets through on me.

OTTH

Hero is $950 effective with V, ~$400 with V2.

V2 raises to $10 in MP, V1 raises to $35 from the CO, Hero cold calls JT on the BTN, V2 calls. Everyone else fold.

Flop: Q86 Pot = $105

V2 check, V1 bets $40, Hero call, V2 fold.

Turn: 9 Pot = $185

V check, Hero bets $110, V raises to $370

Hero???

My Thinking:

Pre-flop: Seems standard enough to me being this deep. V2 was the spot and rarely 4-bet pre, but bluffs way too much post. If he comes over the top we can fold. I'm in position with a playable hand and almost 500BB's deep with V.

Flop: Seems close to me, this is one of the worst hands I'm peeling with 3-ways, especially with V2 left to act. Might just be a fold, but my outs are to the nuts. Another reason I don't like it is that V1 is aggressive and doesn't shut down a lot, which means we don't realize often. However, we have a lot of turns we can bluff/continue on, such as an A,K, diamond, etc.

Turn: Obviously fantastic, kind of confused by the check-raise. It seems bluffy, maybe something like Axhh? At the time I was thinking of what my cold calling range looks like, and almost all of it (that continued flop), bluffs included, want to pile this turn before seeing a river. Also if he has a hand like QJhh, 88, worse straights, etc. he will get it in now, but fold some rivers. He will have to fold hands like AKhh or random pair/air bluffs though.

What do you guys think, jam or call? I'll post results later.

preflop:

i could go either way preflop. you are probably behind V2, but possibly ahead of V. if you have the god-read that V2 won't 4-bet, i'm fine with it. given our position and depth vs. V, i probably call as well as long as we're reasonably sure V2 doesn't repop

flop:

this is a solid flop for our hand. even if you don't spike a 9 on the turn, any diamond ups your equity and gives you a combo draw. it sounds like V may give you respect if he thinks you are tight, so we may be able to push him off without a made hand if needed.

again, our action depends somewhat on what we think V2 will do, but when he checks 3-way i'm not giving him any credit. we're getting 3.5 : 1 or something, so need ~22%. with 4 outs to the nuts, i can see 8% for the next card. can we make up the other 14% with implied odds? we're surely deep enough, and our hand sounds like it will be semi-disguised to V. my first thought was a fold, but i think it's actually a good call at this stack size vs. this opponent.

turn:

jamming here. he's not gonna pay you off with busted hearts on the river. he's also never folding AKhh here. however, if you just call, and a heart comes, are you really gonna fold getting 3:1 on the river vs. a guy who is "super aggressive" and has "bluffs in all sort of spots"

I'm all in trying to stack a worse straight.

I almost want to flat the turn to let him try to bluff you off the river. If he sees you as that tight, what's he calling a turn shove with? You have to pray he has a big hand here.

I can see shoving, too, hoping he will call with worse or a draw, but I think he needs to be really strong to call us. Also stops us from having to think about a heart or paired river, etc., but that's not a good reason for jamming

I think it's probably right to just jam turn. This is one of those spots where it's hard to know which outs on the river are scary for you or villain. Any board pair, J, T, or heart could either scare you are your opponent into not getting stacks in on the river.

Also, it seems really unlikely that villain is doing this we no outs against our hand. His most probable bluff is some type of combo draw that may feel compelled to call river and we're not that upset if he folds rather than seeing river for free.

I just saw that preflop was raised and 3-bet. Good god, fold preflop. If you're gonna continue, then make it $85, so that your range isn't capped pre.

It's a more difficult decision than it seems.

Problem is that you're viewed as tight and he knows you know he bluffs yet you fold more than you should anyway. This dynamic means he's going to know (strongly suspect) you're strong whatever you do following his turn X/R.

You need to think what he thinks you're betting here before making your decision. Obviously you'll have a much better take on this since he's your friend!

Preflop he's 3bet and you've cold called IP. Even though he's isoing a fish from his CO, cold calling a 3bet is a strong move. From a tight player it looks like big/mid pairs, AQ suited Broadway, maybe some good SC - maybe weighted towards AQ AJs KQs JJ-99 if he really views you as very conservative.

So in this spot I think V puts you on mostly good top pair and pockets just below top pair. Perfect spot to put you to the test with a range containing bluffs and 2-pair+ I doubt he thinks you flat flop with gutshot very often (and you don't, so he's not that wrong).

What strong hands might he think you can have here? Sets probably more than straights - 88 on flop can call, it's not to wet, turned set of 9s? Point is V is never folding the smaller straight here and believes his straight draws have outs against your most likely strong hands.

Big question is what line makes you look weakest? This will depend on what he thinks your preferred strategy to counter his aggression is. If you normally make a hand and let him barrel off at you then turn shove makes you look weaker. If you usually raise when you hit big against the V then just flatting will look weaker.

Without knowing how you normally tackle this guy I think on this board flatting looks like you have top pair with some extra equity, like QXhh. If you reraise I think it looks like you have 2-pair+ a lot.

So if you usually raise with strong hands against this V and he frequently double and triple barrels you when you try to call him down I'd be tempted to flat.

If you usually call him down when he's bluffing and are known to shove top pairs or pair+draws or spaz-rebluff out of frustration I would shove here.

Also I concur that cold-calling the 3bet is bad. You can't target the fish in this hand - your competent and aggressive friend is targeting the fish. When you just flat the 3bet you give your friend far too much information and even OOP he's going to be able to punish you for it.

Not only does the cold-call-3bet cap your range (you 3bet QQ+ AK here right?) it also precludes a lot of speculative hands: small AXs, medium/small SC and S1Gappers, KXs, maybe you smaller pairs.

You're telling a good aggro player you have a bunch of mud-strength hands that mostly flop strong-medium strength 1-pair. That's inviting 3-barrels and frequent X/Raises.

It's worked out great for you here but it's very frequently going to go against you (as you seem to imply is the case from OP).

In general fold or 4-bet to avoid giving away valuable information to this kind of villain. Alternatively you could start flatting your premium hands too so he's mistaken when he thinks you're capped.

Same goes when facing his raises: don't flat him unless you're going to occasionally flat your premiums too. 3bet a merged range instead.

(Warning: Against very aggressive villains it can play well to flat premiums but you have to be careful of stack-depth. You don't really help yourself by flatting premiums 200bb+ deep because all you're doing is giving yourself more good 1-pair hands - exactly the stuff he's trying to force you to fold! You want to put him in tough spots by going to the flop with a strong uncapped range and a modest SPR or you want to go to the flop with a wide speculative range and a very high SPR.)

Pre is a little loose but whatever, you obviously have some history with him, so perhaps it's not as bad as we think.

AP, it's a gravy jam. He's not folding sets or AKhh after putting half of his stack in and his equity is fairly close to boat up anyway (if he's thinking you have more than just made straights, he's probably thinking he has more than 25% needed to call off a jam here)

The preflop call feels a bit loose to me, but stacks are deep enough for this to be OK. The flop is fine.

Following the turn checkraise, you'll have less than a pot-size stack after calling the raise. Just jam--he's not folding any hand as strong as pair + draw.

Thanks for the advice, pre-flop might have been a little too loose. At the time I was thinking that my range here is capped and kind of small, but I can really rep some boards that smash that range.

To answer the question on how I handle his aggression, I usually just call him down, however I try not to follow a static strategy, I mix it up quite a bit.

Results: I tanked for a little while and jammed, he snap-folded and later told me he had A8s (no hearts) for a bluff.