I need to start playing my draws more aggressively when I am the pre flop caller.

I know that non nut flush draws, and gutshots +1 over are great candidates to raise as bluffs. I'm less versed on OESD's. I was told by a good pro that we shouldn't raise or cbet OESD +2 overs in a lot of spots, because of the fact that getting raised/3 bet (if we were raising the c bet) just sucks, but he's also a 5/10 player, so I'm not sure if that idea applies to 1/2? Are OESD's as good of raise candidates as gut shots + over?

Also - if we raise the flop and get called and the turn is a complete brick, are we just supposed to check and give up?

A lot of your raises should probably be IP vs. OOP -- we'd rather play big pots in position, plus it gives us the opportunity to take a free card rather than give up when called on the flop.

All of them are fine raise candidates, but I think the real thing is you need to pick your spots carefully -- at 1/2 you may be better off keeping the pot small until you get there and then extracting as much as you can, since your opponents might be calling stations.

How are you all generally playing flops in position as PFR when we whiff against your average 1/2 player who donks small, assuming 100bbs+ stacks. I have been autoraising in these spots with success but have a small sample size and am wondering if you are even somewhat frequently getting called down light across multiple barrels (like with second or third pair).

Thoughts?

For me this depends a ton on my image -- my image is frequently awful, everyone always thinks I'm a LAG. To the extent I think someone will fold their TPNK to me, I'll autoraise same as you, but I'm shutting down if I get called unless I improve to be beating the current top pair. I used to just autoraise everytime because that's what works online for me, but they just always think I'm FOS live, so I mix in some calls and a few folds in this spot these days.

At 1/2, this is almost always a medium strength hand trying to take it down quick to avoid future streets OOP. Depending on our image, V's tendencies and our equity in the hand, I like a mix of raises and floats.

large percentage of donk bets are medium pocket pairs or middle pair. usually 1 pair hands with the occasional draw hoping to set the price. as long as we have a solid image and the villain has a fold button you will be successful applying pressure to donk bets.

villain dependant and board dependant.. some players will never fold TPTK and others will fold a set when the board gets scary. most of the time i don't like to let a pot go after a cbet but if you are up agaisnt a sticky villain on a dry board then I'm never continuing with air on the turn.

Bad reg raises early position to $20, few loose callers, hero calls on button with KQ, one of the blinds calls

Flop is
9T3 (Pot is $105)
reg bets $30, 1 caller, I call, blind calls

Turn is J (Pot is $220)
reg bets $60, caller all in for $260, Hero has $460 in stack, reg covers, blind has less

Go all in here or call and try to keep bad reg overpairs or random straight draws in?

Go all in. He can’t fold his draws now and if he misses we won’t get paid on river

1/3. V is visiting pro. Hero $650 effective. V raises BTN $15 over two limpers, SB old white dude 3! $30, hero flats TT BB, one limper calls, BTN calls.

Flop ($120): 9-T-Kdd. SB checks, hero $60, V/BTN flats, SB flats.

Turn ($300): 5h. SB checks, hero $235, V/BTN calls, SB folds.

River ($770): 3c. Hero jams $350. OK?

Thanks,
DT

Yeah this is fine. Even if V had an AJ/AQ combodraw he should be smart enough to read the writing on the wall that you have a great hand that he's not going to be able to bluff you off. If he has AK/KQ/KT/99 he'll find a call or he won't.

If he has QJ there was no point at which you were getting away from it post for these stack sizes.

Is there a better way to navigate this spot?

1/2, 9 handed, three hours into session.

Villain appears to be playing pretty TAG, and seems OK, but has spent about an hour of the session away from the table. He hasn't been raising super frequently, but definitely a few times an hour. Villain got 3 bet once about 20 minutes in when he opened $11 UTG and HJ 3 bet him to $35, and he folded. Hero has a pretty aggressive image, probably moreso TAG.

OTTH

Two loose passives limp to villain in LJ who opens $16 and it's folded to hero OTB who 3 bets to $50 with AQs, and it's folded to villain who shoves for a total of $146, which hero called.

In hindsight, calling here comes out break even if his range is JJ+, AK; it's a small losing play if his range is QQ+, AK. Either way, we are in a pretty marginal spot getting 4 bet jammed on. Is there anything we should be doing differently?

1/3

Newer table.

V seems to be loose from the hour we have played together

He has about 250 and I cover

1/3 game.

I iso his UTG limp to 16 wit His JdJc

He calls

(36) Flop 7s9h6h he checks we bet 15

He calls

(66) Turn 6s

We bet 45 he raises to 115

Yuck..

Flop bet seems way too small. Board is wet, your hand is solid, and V is loose. Bet more.

Turn x/r sucks, but I think we need to stack off vs loose V's on this board. Plenty of these guys semibluff and some of them can intuit that the board favors their range and most of your raising combos don't like this board. I probably just GII.

Very hard to get a handle on how wide he's doing this without more history and better reads. Pretty much a flip between call and fold. I probably call just because some of these guys spaz and spew when playing shortish stacked. I think the initial 3bet is just fine.

1/3

V is definitely an OMC MAYBEEEE slightly less tight than a normal one he covers me in this game
I have 300 to start

I open in LJ to 12 he 3! To 35 I call with 9c9d

(74) Flop 6h9h3c

I check raise his 50 bet to 135 and he fold QQ

THOUGHTS?

should we just call OOP

I didn’t want him to be scared of another heart or something

I would use this information to start raise bluffing him

Overall, we got check/raised on the turn and it kinda looks like we have exactly what we have (an overpair), so I fold. If we're not comfortable folding to his player, then perhaps check behind somewhere and make sure we get to showdown.

GcluelessNLnoobG

Preflop we're only getting 13:1 IO to call the 3bet OOP, which is really meh (especially if he's capable of laying down overpairs).

The SPR is just 3. There is no reason to check/raise and possibly get him to hero fold. With this small SPR we can easily get in stacks with 3 weak looking donks (noting he could easily raise a donk to commit himself). Or we can even just check/call the flop where he'll no doubt protect against the draws with a big bet on the turn (where he'll commit himself); yes, it risks a scare card, but against bet/foldy types its worth the risk.

GnotafanofanydecisioninthishandG

Sklansky said it pretty well in NLHTAP: "don't raise an amount that will leave you unsure how to respond to a reraise."

[Re-]Raises to around 1/3 of the effective stacks fall into this bucket a lot at LLSNL, because a jam in response offers us ~2/1 odds vs. ranges where our equity is often ~33%. The simple answer is to shade the 3! up or down out of that dead zone if we can.

If your image is a little loose and prone to 3!ing, his shove range could well be a little wider than you listed, in which case a call would already be fairly +EV (although making it $55 or whatever might be better still).

If you think your image is more tight than LAG, maybe his jamming range is only QQ+/AK - in which case it makes more sense to shade down the reraise, maybe to $40-45, where you could more comfortably fold to a shove. (As a bonus, AQs is a great holding if it instead winds up 4 ways to the flop for $40, always a possibility at these stakes.)

The only reason I don't like 3 betting smaller is because, yes, while that allows me to get away from it, it's also smaller than I normally go so I could get exploited if he's thinking

At any given full ring 1/2 game, you'd have to be unlucky to run into more than one opponent who even pays attention to your standard bet sizes, much less has the ability or willingness to exploit it.

If you're really concerned about it or your opponents are two steps above total droolers, make the same undersized 3! the first time you pick up, say, AA of the same color pre (1/3 of the time). If it goes to S/D, anyone paying attention will think, "wow, he sized his 3! small with a monster", and that'll be stuck in their heads the rest of the session.

1/3. V is 30 y/o Indian guy who claimed he folded top two on JT3r in limped pot out of BB when he led $12, I raised $55 with QQ UTG, and CO (also limper) jammed $700 with AA. (Yes, this table was amazing.) V seems like a weak player, has been stuck at 1/3 for a long time. In an earlier hand he limp/called hero's $23 raise from BB in SB with T9s and lost some on K-5-4-T-K runout. He led river small and hero just called, not sure if he knows what a blocker bet is or whether he thought he was good.

Anyway, hero raises KK $20 over two limpers and only V calls. $375 eff. Flop ($40): Q-8-7r. V checks, hero $20, V c/r $40. Hero calls. Turn ($120): 5. V $55, hero raises to $115. V calls. River ($350): 6. V bets $150, hero calls. OK?

Thanks,
DT

Hate the turn minraise. Either bet a real number and plan to GII on pretty much any river, or just call. Could even probably just shove, it's only a slight overbet (would be $315, a PSB would've been 285, so only 30 over pot-sized).

As played I think you have to call the river, obviously a gross card but he shouldn't really have many 9s/4s. If you're beat it's likely to a hand like Q9 or a set.

turn re-raise is the very definition of clicking buttons. what is the purpose of it?

call turn, call river

as played, meh, just call because we only need to be good just over 20% of the time but we really only have a bluff catcher unless we have strong evidence that he's a total spew master with top pair