You're right. We want them to put more money in while behind, while also keeping the pot from going super multiway while being OOP to the entire field, except for UTG.

But when this UTG player DID call, I got cautious and decided to keep the pot from going parabolic. I stand by that part of the hand.

If you want to flat here with QQ, try it. Im not saying its the worst play ever, but I dont personally like it at all.

Why are you so concerned with the number of players in the hand? Poker is a game of realizing equity edges. Sure you will be OOP vs a large field so realizing your equity is going to be difficult. But even if it goes 3-4 ways you rate to have an equity advantage in the pot preflop.

However if you 3b and UTG calls, now you immediately assume his range is stronger than yours? Thus all the 3b does is fold out all of the potential callers calling with inferior ranges and isolate you against UTG who now suddenly has a stronger range than you.

This is pretty basic logic really. I'm really surprised you struggle to grasp this concept.

If a solid TAG-ish player opened UTG I would think the default play would be to flat QQ from UTG +1

It seems to me you are more concerned with the number of pots you win and less concerned about the number of dollars you win.

You also didn’t put him on KJs, QJs, JTs, 99, 88, 66 or 55 - all hands that are part of his continuing range that have >40% equity versus your QQ+/AQ+.

That’s the entire point. You don’t understand ranges, combos and equity. If you don’t think he is continuing with those hands for a 3x raise 1k deep then you really don’t understand poker math at all.

Given how nitty and bad your thought process is, he should be even more incentivized to continue with most of his RFI range given your unwillingness to put money in the pot postflop, let alone stacking off 200 BB’s with an overpair.

I play a hell of a lot better HU or 3 ways than I do multiway pots. Call it a leak if you like, but I know my weaknesses.

Several people have listed what they think a solid TAG would open UTG. My guess is that this guys range is slightly tighter than what people listed but either way, I dont see how QQ isnt way ahead of his range. I really doubt hes only opening AA/KK UTG, so I dont see how anyone can seriously be arguing against 3 betting QQ here. I really dont.

The point is that you argued that fold pre > call pre, which is absurd. How to rank call vs 3bet is a subject worthy of debate.

ETA: a subject worthy of debate "imo", I should emphasize. I'm open to the possibility that with better understanding I might come to the conclusion that one is clearly better than the other.

It seemed to me that you are checking flop here 100% of the time, a clear mistake given that you are in position as the aggressor with a stronger range especially when you are playing vs a "solid player" that doesn't get out of line. Seems like you are not taking the line that will maximise your EV, so seems like a mistake to me.

Yes I am going to critique your play, that is the point of posting a HH I believe... I am open to alternative lines, just don't understand why you state that you are, when all evidence points towards you not being open to an alternative line. All you do is defend your line and often times have contradicting arguments.

Additionally, I find that taking aggressive lines will generally make you much tougher to read rather than passive ones.

And I don't really care about the river by now. I am more interested on why you think checking flop is not a mistake, and your thoughts on your turn line. Betting $50 into $120? Seems like an awful sizing to use with both value and draws IMO.


The dynamics of this hand are far different to the original post. V is aggro, so he will probably overbluff that spot. V is in the BB, his range will be a lot wider. Your range is probably a bit wider from MP.

I would also take the line you took from time to time vs an aggro.

And you are being resulted oriented, like you have been before. You could have also potentially gained a lot more if you bet the flop and V check-raised you and fired off his entire stack on a stone-cold bluff and you end up calling.

My message is that you state that the majority of people here are stubborn with their standard lines but really it's YOU that is stubborn with your non-conventional lines.

Next time you post a hand be open to new ideas instead of trying to justify your 'creative' line. It's YOUR thread, YOU were asking for advice on this spot, you received a lot of information on it but all YOU have done is defend your viewpoint. But its up to you to take all the value that has been created in this thread and potentially improve your game. Or YOU can be stubborn and just carry on playing your creative passive playstyle which you naively think is superior than the ABC players.

I'd like to know where the games are that UTG standard TAG openers are this loose

LAGS on the button don't play this loose

K10 Q10 ????? you better bring 10 buy-ins with you, you'll need them playing UTG like that

I folded pocket QQ UTG+1 yesterday to an UTG open 5x from an OMC nit . 100% he has AA or KK
far better spots to play then chasing 2 outers

That’s not remotely loose. Shai’s range is perfectly standard for 200+ BB stacks.

Mike blatantly told you the key information:

“Never limps, always comes in for a raise.”

Do you think he’s just constantly getting AA and KK every hand?

In a vacuum, I think 3-betting pre-flop is superior to calling, but to claim that you'd rather fold than call is almost certainly a troll and should be worthy of an infraction.

HOWEVER, if after 3-betting you decide that this is a flop you can't even bet, then there is a problem with your range construction somewhere. If you think that you don't get called by worse enough you are clearly doing it wrong.

Of course not, but this was his first EP raise that I can remember. How about someone look at Shai's list and tell us what they think that persons raise% would be if they are raising that many hands UTG and obviously a lot more as he gets in later positions.

Ive played with this guy one more time now and Id say he plays about 16ish% of all hands and I still havent seen him limp. No way that guy is raising all those hands UTG that Shai listed.

I didnt say its a flop I cant bet. I just didnt bet it this time.

Ever think maybe it you that is being stubborn?

How often does somebody post a thread on here that describes a Villain... "Pretty ABC player, overvalues TPTK and Overpairs. Will take them to the felt."

Yet here, all I am hearing is "OMG, we haz QQ which is at the top of our range, and no run-out or betting line from V is going to get me to fold it."

I would actually love to play this hand 4-5 way from this exact position, but once we get it heads up with a 3! which I don't hate either (table/player dependent) I am not just going to blindly put 200 bigs in the middle.

Seems like a the logic goes like this, 3! pre, bet flop and call when V X/raises, Oh on the turn we have an SPR of???, regardless of what he has, range or reads be damned, we have the odds to call.

Doesn't really seem like there is any real thinking going on, just making standard plays on auto-pilot. QQ is a great hand pre-flop but how often are you winning when the big money goes in on later streets when you don't improve?

I play a mix of passive-aggressive style, because I have a passive-aggressive personality. But one thing I do know is my sanity in the game is maintained even if getting in 200 bigs in the middle every time we have QQ is slightly +EV. How many times do we have to lose a grand before some goofball gets it in with a worse hand? That I do not know, but I think the EV of doing it is way overblown.

I'm actually more curious as to whether this V should have a 4-betting range from his perspective.

Let's say I'm V. What image of Mike would I need to have to want to 4 bet here instead of flatting with KK?

.

Whole post is a giant strawman. Not going to bother.

What is a strawman? Anything like a scarecrow?

If you get 5 callers after flatting pre, you dominate all those callers. If there's an ace high flop and the tight original raiser cbets into 6 players, I can easily fold my hand. What's so scary about that? I actually think it's a lot more scary to 3bet a tight UTG raiser from UTG+2 with QQ than to flat and let other people call behind. QQ isn't an automatic 3bet.

QQ has show down value. It's not like we have pocket deuces. insert head slap emoji here

yeah I don't think not having a 4-bet range here is optimal, even if you wanted a very tight 4-bet range, say AA,KK for value and Ax5x as a bluff is prob better than not having one (super deep its a little different IMO but like up to 300bb I think you can be pretty tight here reg v reg UTG v UTG1) , just because you get to push equity against someone who might 3-bet you with AA-TT,AK,AQ,Ax$Wx, and still call with AA-TT,AK...now in cash over 200BB deep I wouldn't really have a 5-bet range except against fish...

yeah I agree just bet like 33% with your whole range here, I don't think your going to get exploited

I would probably 4bet 2-3 combos of AA, 4-8 AK, 1-2 KK and 4b/fold a bunch of AQ.

Jesus you guys are nitty. The open range I used is from slightly tweaked hand charts from CLP and Jandas recent book. It could not be more standard.

You must be joking about LAGs OTB not playing this loose. That or you're the most unobservant person ever. LAGs OTB have far more hands than JJ-55, ATs+, A5s-A4s, KTs+, QTs+, JTs, T9s, 98s, AQo+ which btw is just 9.2% of hands.

Or is the idea we should be raise/folding? We are 200BB effective and it's 8BB to call. We have enough IO to call with the entire range, particularly considering how easy it is to bluff MS.

It's hilarious to me MS thinks he's a LAG but that solid ABC Euro guys aren't opening AJs.

Now you're arguing the guy is a nit.

This is what people are talking about Mike. You start off saying he's a solid ABC TAG but instead of assigning him a solid ABC TAG range you give him a nit range. Then when confronted that solid ABC TAGs are opening wider than this (whether or not you accept my range, it is certainly *much* wider than your implied range of TT+ AK), you backpedal and imply the guy is a nit.

None of us have observed this guy so your ranging should be more accurate, but you have a serious problem with player classification if you think this dude is a solid ABC TAG yet his UTG open range is 3.47%.

You also said he never limps, and now he limps.

Perhaps you have more accurate info now but that doesn't matter one bit as far as range construction during this hand. You go with what you know at the time, which as you've stated was young solid ABC TAG Euro guy.

If I see some guy opening 60% and barreling and raising like crazy over two hours I'm going to assume he's very likely a maniac and range him accordingly. If later it turns out he was just a TAG on a sun run does that make my ranging during the sun run incorrect? No it doesn't, because this is a game of imperfect information and lacking prescience, giving any answer but "no" here is results oriented nonsense.

..

Mike you are backpedaling. Your OP says nothing about 16/16. You said young Euro who never limps. That player profile fits the range that Shai provided given the effective stacks.

You always change up your reads well after the fact which is why people say you argue circular logic - because you do. Saying you’d defend JTs but not AJs is just nonsensical and has no bearing on the fact that he’d flop top pair with both hands and you’re still checking back. Also doesn’t change the fact that he has two dozen combos of PP’s that will call a c-bet that you are missing value on.