If you say it was 500bb, that makes this a $2-$5 game. Not a big deal.
Why are you playing with 500bb ($2500) in front of you if afraid to play properly the second best hand preflop?

I suspect you are making strategical mistakes when worrying being against AA. Yes, you may be facing AA but why keeping 500bb in front if you don't want to play with. A deep stack can be a liability sometimes. Actually you should have at least $50,000 bankroll if you keep $2500 in front of you. Correct me if I'm wrong. I don't think I am!

If you want to make money for sure 100% in NL then bet small many times over and over when you have the edge. Else, even with AA you need luck when the outcome of the hand is determined for one time shot of 500bb all at once.

You may have to fold the best hand and never be sure what went wrong.

Preflop: 4bet to $250. Your sizing of $340 is far too big, even despite being 500bbs deep.
Flop: This is a really close one between bet/folding and checking back. I'd probably be more inclined to check back after your massive preflop sizing.
Turn: Easy call as played.
River: Bet/fold $500. Get some value off AJ and QQ type hands. He probably bets himself if he has 2pairs or a set. It's very hard for either player to have a straight here.

EDIT: Looking back on it, I think it's unlikely that villain would 3bet AJ, so you're really only getting value off exactly QQ, but I think it's still worth a thin value bet OTR.

I like going thin/small otr as played if v cant show up with AA here. I do think its weird that we are 4! pre and then checking this board texture. Makes me think it may just be better to flat the 3!, keep our V's range wider so we can be underepped and not deal with such WA/WB spot that makes value betting difficult for us on JTx type boards. Thats only if we really think we should be checking here though. If V is capable of calling your 4! wide even sometimes, I don't get why we cant just b/f otf and ott. In a 4! pot deep will this guy ever raise with worse? I just do not like a flop check vs this guy. May be better to b/f and get value sometimes and fold if raised than it is to check this flop and call potentially multiple streets in a 4! pot. A bet from this guy in this spot is much more likely to be nutted than a call. Are we calling all 1/2-2/3+ psb on non A,K,Q,8 rivers as played?

As I see it is this:
Your advice is probably correct if we are going to play KK scared. No question about it. The 500bb stack behind is a big liability that makes a deep stack useless. Worse then useless because even a 72o can take the money away from us. If I suspect my opponent with 500bb behind play cautiously I will beat his KK with my T4o. Not that I critique your advice but why carry that load of money unnecessary if we cannot use it? - Why even raise pre or worse, why even try to play KK if we are afraid and super cautious at the flop and beyond?

I'm so confuse about the monstrosity of the 500bb effective stacks that my little autistic brain spins. I have no idea how to play AA or KK in this situation because there is no flop that looks good to me bare on flopping a set. If I know for sure I will get an Ace or a King on the flop I will probably fold pre if anticipating action on the effective stacks.

You’d probably rather have QQ than have KK/AA, putting it better, because if that flop gets a big bet I have no idea how to play those big pairs. The most difficult situation in no-limit hold ’em, without doubt, is AA/KK with 500bb behind.

I'm a professional in something other than poker, so I may not have the same bankroll views as other people. I think your bankroll calculations are based more on buy ins than on the stack you have in front of you. If you want 20 buy ins, you need a $10k bankroll. You wouldn't ever say that is 4 random big stacks.

That said, I was into this session for $500. Much of the profit had come from Villian but in smaller chunks than this. I was planning to get up soon, but why not learn to play on a big stack for a few hours. All other Villian had less than $1200, several less than $300..

I'm really surprised villain didn't bet river. Seems like a fist pump bomb unless he has exactly AA.

Most low-stakes players don't bet for value on scary boards. They do call too often with medium-strong hands. Villain would need one hell of a read to know hero would bet the river. More often than not, he's missing value by checking, if he can beat one pair.

I agree, however I also don't expect my villians to act 100% rationally on every decision. There is a psychological aspect to having a 4-straight on board, even if logically, Hero can't have a straight. I think a vast majority of Villains will default to check/evaluate in game, even if they stopped to think about it for long enough, they would realize that betting is better.

I agree what you're saying but no matter from where the money comes is still real money or rather real big-blinds chips, so to speak. Our hero got 500bb in his 2/5 game and now honestly the way I see him don't want to risk it on KK vs. AA or some two-pair. So, he's going to play it scare and probably lose it.

Tell you what: If I have 500bb effective stacks I don't want to have any starting hand that potentially becomes an over-pair or top-top on the flop. I don't need: AA,KK,QQ, AK, AQ or any two cards combo that has an Ace in it. I want two cards that either flops some weak hand, miss the flop or flops big. This includes: 22 to 77 or 88, suited connectors or one gaper like 64+ to T9. I will try to limp and call a reasonable raise to see the flop. I don't want over-pair or top-top type hands. The 500bb is a big liability.

If hero had flatted the 3 bet preflop and flop, turn and river action were the same would we still be comfortable betting the river?

Difficult to say given initiative and perceived ranges would likely have dictated a far different action, but if it happened to get to river the same way, I'd likely prefer to make a small bet more often than check.

Grunch

Well played until river. Bet $400-500.

We have to have greater than 50% equity against his river calling range to b/f this for value, right?

How many combos of AA does he have? I do think he could play some of them this way PF so as not to turn his hand face-up. He could have been going for a c/r expecting you to bet with KK/QQ/AK. Turn action would make sense for him with AA, and he could've just gotten scared by the river.

How many combos of QQ/AJ do we expect him to call a large river bet with? I posit he is not calling with those hands at 100% frequency.

Is there some chance, even a small one, that he can figure out that you are capped at one pair and c/r bomb you on the river? Even if we can decipher that at the table, I think many players can't pull the trigger on snapping a river c/r with one pair in a 1000bb pot. This cuts against us betting.

All in all, I'm not sure I agree this is a value bet spot. If you bet, I think you have to go much much lower than $400.

The long answer...

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/15...er+equilibrium

I disagree with the thought process behind the 4b, but not with the action. If this V has an unbalanced (albeit narrow) 3b range and we think he'll have trouble folding the bottom of it, a large 4b/f with KK is exactly the right way to exploit that. When both Hero & Villain have wider ranges and he's aggro postflop & has a fold button, then sure, flat away with KK IP deep and print money. This is not that spot.

Flop is a pretty easy check back if we think V's range is something like TT+/AK. We're not getting value from much, and might induce a bluff on the turn.

Turn is a pretty easy flat. Way too small of a bet to ever consider folding, given that he has many QQ combos and maybe a few AK.

River seems Villain dependent. Our range is face up as primarily AA/KK. If we think he can't fold QQ and he rarely has AA, then sure, bet whatever amount he's likely to call. 400ish? Is this Villain ever taking this line with JJ/TT or even 99? I kind of doubt it, but including a few of those combos would push it toward a check.

4betting just seems so awkward to me.

a) I don't ever want to fold kings preflop. 4betting with the intention of folding to a 5bet sounds awful to me.

b) I don't want to stack off 500 BB's pre with KK (aside from certain player exceptions)

C) I don't want my opponent to be able to accurately narrow my hand range

Considering A, B and C, playing the hand in position against an opponents full 3bet range while having concealed the strength of my own hand seems like the obvious choice. My 4bets here would probably be AA and bluffs, the percentage of each depending on my read on my opponent. But even 4betting AA here isn't always appealing. Many thinking opponents will get away from JJ or AK, and even sometimes QQ. And some opponents might even back off from KK. Whereas when we flat the 3bet and conceal our strength, we can often get nice value postflop from hands like AQ, AK, QQ, JJ, TT and sometimes even weaker stuff.

This is a leak, and you should fix it. Lots of players will 3b/c with a bunch of hands weaker than KK, and will 5b pretty much exclusively AA. 4b/folding KK against them is generally the nut best line, ainec.

I think the only hands we are getting value from on the river are AJ and QQ. I think this looks a lot like those two hands (aside from the preflop action for AJ calling a 4 bet). Another consideration is if villain has a huge hand, this would be a strange line for villain to take va hero's perceived range of Kings and Aces

Ultimately I do think that betting would be too thin but I don't think it's bad. If he can put us on an overpair, he knows it would be very difficult to call a big check raise.

Yep. Doesn't matter if it's exploitable if no one is exploiting it. For 100BB I wouldn't fold kings but once you're deeper vs certain players I could find a fold.

How many times in live low stakes games are 5 betting with worse than kings.

Totally serious question here...Why does everyone start their posts with "Grunch" ???

=haven't read responses.

A while ago, there was a poster named Grunch who encouraged people to do that (reply w/o having read responses). It helps get a more honest diverse set of opinions, avoid groupthink, etc.

Makes really good sense. Thanks!

I agree about the leak, also I disagree about all the actually correct math analysis of some expert math players. The thing about it is the need of a huge number of trials to show profit while in the meantime we lose or win in big chunks or whole stacks of 500bb up and down and could be out of business by the time our theoretical advantage materialize. I am convinced that betting in small chunks many times over and over again with advantage is the best way to make a consistent profit. This way we beat the huge variances by the sheer big number of trials in small chunks of bets over and over.

That's why I like to avoid over-pair type hands QQ+ and the top-top AQ+ if the stacks are like we see in this example hand. Or even the AXs are not performing because by the time of the turn we are deep into the stack and still drawing. Not good!
64+ or 22-88 cannot get us in trouble because it is impossible to get in a bind with those type of hands. We either connect hard or miss. Nothing in between! We cannot hit a small hand and be in a bind but with QQ+ or AQ+ most of the time have over-pair or top-top that are hell with 500bb behind. Who needs that?

Any sort of thinking where you'd rather have a smaller pair than a bigger pair makes no sense.