<Mod Edit: No trolling this thread! I'm iffy about leaving it open, but OP has legit questions, so post constructively or not at all>

$1/2NLHE - late night, 6 handed.

Hero: UTG (~$960) KK (perceived TAG)
V1: BB (~$650) Bad LAG/maniac. Always raising 5xBB with almost every hand, betting 50-80% of the pot every time, likes to play big pots.
V2: UTG+2 (~$560) Medium player, loose passive.

Preflop: Hero opens to $10 (which had become the standard pre-flop raise at the table), fold, V2 min raise 3! to $20, fold, fold, V1 calls $20 from BB, hero eyes V2's stack and decides to flat. Pot: $60.

Flop: T82r
BB checks, hero checks with intent on check raising, V2 bets $100 straight, V1 folds, hero folds.

Dealer pushes pot to V2, V2 shows Aces.

I feel like this is the best fold of my life. While that is true in this particular case because he showed Aces, I wonder if I played it too nitty/conservative/scared, and if it was -EV play long term. Feedback appreciated.

My thought processes were as follows:

Preflop: V2 wants to isolate V1, hence the min-raise. The min-raise is super suspicious at this point because he does not want everyone to fold, especially V1. V2 and V1 are too deep for my comfort in terms of 4! pre (because putting V1 on a range is next to impossible), and so I decided to keep the pot small and see what happens.

Flop: Since the preflop was suspicious and I'm OOP, I wanted to see what V2 will do, and so I checked. He overbet the flop, and now my effective stack to pot ratio is about 9. V1 is capable of calling here, and so it felt like a big value bet. If I continued, I cannot flat call, and I have to check raise, so it was pretty much my stack against his for a $60 pot. I beat QQ, JJ, possibly AT (he's definitely not betting $100 into a $60 pot with AT), but lose to AA, TT, so I folded.

Wow. Props for being right but just wow. I don't like anything about this hand, except I'm probably folding too, but everything else is just wow by you and V2.


Edit: sorry for useless comment but I'm too tired to write a long answer, but I just do not understand that play at all

V2 is a total donk who missed a lot of value in this hand.

Few things: min raise pre doesn't isolate anyone in live games. It just bloats the pot.

Donking $100 into a $60 pot on that flop only ensures you will ever get looked up by sets and 2 pairs and folds out everything else (on a rainbow board).

Just because you got lucky this 1 time doesn't mean you shouldn't 4! pre here. That means the times he has aces (Hint: it's like 2.4% of the time) we can comfortably fold to a 5! pre (or maybe fold to his shove on the flop)

Terrible.

Re-raise pre, bet flop yourself. When you flatted preflop, what sort of flop were you looking for?

What range of hands would V min 3! pre with AND bet $100 otf into a $60 pot on a rainbow board that isn't extremely connected; though the T8 might give one pause?

If you were playing me, I would not be looking to take down the pot otf with a set of 8s or Ts. I also would not bluff with a 166% pot size bet otf with AKs with that board.

I would be looking to charge the max, while getting a call, if I had QQ/JJ. Both pairs has blocking value vs. str8 draws. AA/KK I probably go ahead and bet the same - $45.

If he's making the same size bet with JJ+, 100% of the time, you have ~62% equity & made a bad fold. It would make sense to bet the pot with JJ to most people to avoid the stress of dealing with an overcard turning, but he is IP, so most good players wouldn't bet but 75% pot.

Either the guy is a clown, or, he was pegging one of you on an overpair & hoping that his big bet would be perceived as his attempt at over-protection with JJ & that someone will call with a bigger pair.

However, which one of you has the overpair? Does V1 call $20 cold pre with QQ OOP? Does he believe you're capable of calling with an overpair there & then think he has JJ & call it off with QQ?

It might not be a totally outrageous of a bet, since V1 is in there; if he can count on ANY c/r being a set & be willing to fold his AA. However, that's a BIG 'if'; still it isn't completely moronic. Especially if V1 is calling $20 pre with JT, J9, 97 etc & willing to call a bet that size. However, who believes V2 can fold AA?

IMO, V2 suffered from FPS when he got excited over seeing AA.
It's either that, or V2 has had his AA cracked too often due to his weak/passive play & is tired of it. But that bet is going to cost him so much money in the long run.

So congrats on your fold, however, IMO, I think that weak player does the same thing with QQ & probably JJ. Reason being: both of you checked the flop & he doesn't believe either of you would ever consider checking that flop with a set because it is extremely connected [in his view] & so his JJ must be good & he 'fears' the overcard coming on the turn.

I would have bet the flop [75%] & watch him spazzzzz out with his raise & then fold with confidence.

This. You are way too deep to be flatting here. An SPR of about 9:1 is just awful for an overpair making hand. AP to flop, it is way too dry to be check/raising. You'll lose all of the hands you want value from. You should either be betting or check-calling. That said, after a passive player min three-bets pre and then overbets a super dry flop, he's screaming overpair, and most likely either JJ or AA. I don't hate folding given how we got there and the bad SPR for playing for stacks. We should just ever have got there like that.

Also, please don't post results. It biases people's responses. Just get up to your last big decision and instead of saying what you did, say "Hero: ?"

I considered locking this up because it's too late to edit out results, and this is could to turn in to troll bait, but it seems like you're likely to have some questions about the responses, and they've been pretty good so far.

i would probably 4bet pre to $75 and fold to a 5-bet.

As played, I would at least call the flop because villain can have JJ-QQ in his range. Wouldnt be calling off entire stack though, would evaluate later streets based on runout, sizing, and what i thought about villain

I wouldnt want to C/R the flop either. just flat and keep his range as wide as possible.

Sick brag

@setintostraight
Agreed, I should definitely have 4! here. My biggest leak is being unable to fold when drawing the spotlight onto myself, since I fear being run over all the time. I'm probably prone to 6! shoving if he 5!. In any case I should have tested both him and myself with the 4! He could have had aces only 2.4% of the time.

@backdoorflush and @persianpunisher
I actually think it was terrible that I didn't 4! It was weak. As played it ended up being the perfect play only by chance. Also, tiny things matter: if V2 was competent and had standard bet like $45 or $30 into the $60 pot, I'm probably losing about $300 bucks on this hand at a minimum. I didn't know he had Aces, his huge bet just made it a bad spot for me. It's more of a "he played it wrong" than "I played it right" situation.

@ZuneIt
V1 was very much key to this hand. V1 was opening a lot of pots, c-betting, calling with any pair, and was in general running the table over. So V2 was staring at V1 on the pre-flop min raise, and on the flop bet with an almost "call me if you dare" look, and completely ignoring me. So, it's not super outrageous, just a testosterone/ego-fueled play perhaps. I'm sure he would have done it with QQ, JJ as well. Leading on the flop and folding to the raise that was coming was probably the better play overall since I was perceived as super-tight in that spot because I was allowing V1 to run me over. As played, if I check-raised then V2 could have given me credit for a set, but I doubt he could fold AA.

@blackluster777
Yes, this seems to be the optimum play. I doubt if I can fold KK to a 5! though. I'm quite nervous when playing NLHE (I have only 85 hours of live play in NLHE (thousands at limit HE/O8)). With time, I suppose I could fold to a 5! OOP.

@QuantumSurfer and @Garick
Well I was looking for the exact flop I got (non-Ace). I suppose I also wanted to keep my huge overpair somewhat disguised (since it was short handed, and didn't want V1 to fold since I was perceived super-tight and he was putting a lot of money into pots). I also suppose I was suffering a little from FPS myself. V2's flop bet just made it impossible to continue my sneaky play.

Also, yes I won't post results again. Please lock up the thread, I got some great feedback, and thought processes!

You lost the absolute minimum. But you got lucky I️ think. The buffoon might do this with queens or even jacks too.

I️ almost folded a set earlier today because of recent monsters. And I️ felt like a buffoon after I️ scooped the big pot. How would I️ almost fold my like 95 percent equity. (Bottom set)


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I've played with villains that literally only 3b KK+. Loose passives in general tend to fit that description, although OP is the only one that can have a good feel for that.

That said, if the villain is willing to 3b wider than KK+ you need to be willing to put some money in the pot.

How does a c/r disguise our hand? ... when you see someone c/r do you think they're strong or weak? Like Garick said, you should be betting or check-calling, with the latter being more of a guise.

I meant keep it disguised pre-flop without the 4-bet.

When your 4bets get folded to more often than should be, the exploit is to expand your 4betting range, not decrease it. Always 4bet for value. When you notice the players don't give you action, 4bet to bluff/semi bluff more. To restate what's already been written, your stacks are too deep to keep KK disguised preflop. That really only works when stacks are so shallow that you only have one, maybe 2 PSB's left. By 4 betting, we decrease the SPR to make flop stacking easy.

This sounds like one of the worst 1/2 games in history.

This forum loses sight of this too often imo. Especially in the room I frequent, 3 bets pre are AA or KK way too often. OP is essentially committing himself when he's super deep & has $20 invested. Depending on the opponent trying to take this pot has a lot more downside than upside.

This is the type of hand that will make you a worse player when are just starting out - it happened to me so I know . You got lucky in a very weird pot. In the long run, just play your KK more straight up unless you have a very good reason for getting tricky with it. If you let this hand be your benchmark on how to play KK then you will leave a lot of value on the table until you slowly realize you need to just 4!.

4! pre. If he has AA he will probably tell you when he falls out of his chair as he announces all-in.

If he flats the 4!, then cbet the flop and go from there.