Villain #1 ($450) UTG very aggressive and raises a lot. He has been involved in many mulit-way pots that he took down with aggression. He has not shown a hand, so I do not know if he is running as hot as he is telling people he is.

Villain #2 ($300) UTG+2 just sat down to play his very first hand. I have never seen him before so I have no information.

Hero MP#1 ($220)

Villain #1 from UTG raises to $12
Villain #2 raises to $32
Hero looks down at KK.

Hero??

Reraise, and make it ~80. Right now, you have 2nd nutz, and since V2 is an unknown, he could have a lot of hands he could raise with right off the bat. If he's lucky enough to pick up aces wired his first hand, then so be it.

See if he's willing to play for stacks pre, then soul read, and maybe fold or maybe call. Not much else you can do without more of a line on the new guy's game.

This one i have to go with. Not needing balance I want to punish villain as much pre as i can since i doubt he folds. I make it 90. Maybe 85.

Reraise to $52, fold to shove.

so i actually raised it to $100. Does everyone agree this is too much?

It's really totally fine, I'd have made it 90 but 100 is totally optimal

this is horrible. reraise to 85-95 and iso/take it down. if villain a reships and villain b calls, fold. if villain a folds and villain b calls, ship almost all flops. if villain a folds and villain b reships, call. easy game.

No.. your horrible.

Our 4b size makes no difference. Villain plays his range exactly the same against a 80 raise and a 52 raise. Random isn't shoving QQ and there is more combo's of AA in his range than KK so its terrible to get it in preflop here in LLSNL.

This is why in retrospect I thought I should have made a smaller raise. I should give QQ the chance to make the mistake of calling and potentially making more mistakes after the flop comes. Since both villains folded, I did not get to find out what they both had, but villain #2 could have been 3 betting light to try to set up a certain image.

you lose less versus AA when they reship, this is true. you're also losing significant value for your hand with all the other combos of pp sub KK and random broadway hands/Ax hands that call. dont know about you, but i play poker to maximize value not to minimize loss.

I think you may not be giving much credit to the frequencies involved here.

At this point, villain can have TT+ AK, even 99+ possibly. he wont fold them normally. If you 4 bet to 52 it allows him to take the flop and then fold on so many bad flops that you only make a small amount when ahead, not to mention you do not know how he plays AK.

His range is not narrowed to AA at this point, thus I am going to exploit the fact that i will get him to call a much bigger bet, more of the time with less than KK. Money that you lose due to bad flops coming to QQ JJ TT 99.

4 bet folding small vs an unknown is playing "safe" and would be viable if we knew the villain was a complete nit, but we do not know that. I think the villain will have TT JJ QQ KK far more often at this juncture in the hand than AA, thus i gain more in the long run than being super cautious worried about the one KK vs AA cooler in the deck.

No, you're fine. Unless you completely nuke the pot a cold 3 betting random is never going anywhere.

Just saw that vil folded... rare occurrence IMO

Wtf to 4bet folding.
Meh to 4 betting small.

4bet a normal amount to get value from an Aggro v1 and v2 with a good hand.

i think the most important part is heros image. if the table has seen you cold call 3bets etc i think the ideal line is to balance your weak cold calls with your strongest holdings also. pot will be around 100 if UTG also calls, and we can comfortably stack off on most flops. it also gives us the benefits that the agressive UTG might sense dead money and 4bets. we might get drawn out though or even bluffed.

if hero seen as active, we just have to 4bet/get it in.

as a default: 4bet/call to 80+ imo.

in my opinion there is not too much difference between the two plays. you cant do much wrong with KK preflop in nlh. unless you fold...

Haha, dont worry, he didnt fold QQ.

This is exactly why we dont play villain as if he has AA here.

I hate the plan to 4bet big with KK planning to fold to a 5bet. Yes if you get 5 bet you probably don't have the odds to call. That tells me its a bad plan. Its the lazy I did not get stacked by AA I'm a genius plan..its not the lets get the biggest EV.

Yeh the plan might be OK if I new the 3 better was a complete drewler...Hell if I thought the Lagy player UTG was a total moron drewler, but you did not describe him as calling huge bets...there is a big difference between being aggressive whth the lead, and calling down huge bets light.

The range you are putting these guys in to call a 80 to 100 bet is ridiculous. even if you think they call QQ or AK to this raise....its such a small part of utg range, and may be a small part of utg+1 unknown range.


I much prefer either calling...yes calling...let UTG come along and let him make a stupid move like call AQ and go broke on a Q high boared, or try to bluff on a 9 high board....thats how you beat aggressive players not by announcing you have a fantastic hand.

UTG+2 is harder since we don't really have a range or style. I have to fall back to may default ranges...40% 3 bets AA and KK....40% 3bets QQ+ AK, and maybe 20% JJ+ AQ+ and some silly nonsense bluffs.... As its his first hand I think some silly noncsense bluffs may make up a larger part. At any rate against a big cold 4 bet most 1-2 player can fold QQ and AK. sure if he has AA we are going to loose some money, maybe are stack if he plays it well. But against the rest of his range he is going to loose some money to us.

The other strategy I don't mind is a shove. If you think they can think a little, your cold call of a 3 bet looks super strong. So does your cold 4 bet of any size....so with no real way to hide your strength shove it in, Now QQ JJ might just decide your getting tricky with AK type hand and call you.

I hate the plan to 4bet big with KK planning to fold to a 5bet. Yes if you get 5 bet you probably don't have the odds to call. That tells me its a bad plan. Its the lazy I did not get stacked by AA I'm a genius plan..its not the lets get the biggest EV.

Yeh the plan might be OK if I new the 3 better was a complete drewler...Hell if I thought the Lagy player UTG was a total moron drewler, but you did not describe him as calling huge bets...there is a big difference between being aggressive whth the lead, and calling down huge bets light.

The range you are putting these guys in to call a 80 to 100 bet is ridiculous. even if you think they call QQ or AK to this raise....its such a small part of utg range, and may be a small part of utg+1 unknown range.


I much prefer either calling...yes calling...let UTG come along and let him make a stupid move like call AQ and go broke on a Q high boared, or try to bluff on a 9 high board....thats how you beat aggressive players not by announcing you have a fantastic hand.

UTG+2 is harder since we don't really have a range or style. I have to fall back to may default ranges...40% 3 bets AA and KK....40% 3bets QQ+ AK, and maybe 20% JJ+ AQ+ and some silly nonsense bluffs.... As its his first hand I think some silly noncsense bluffs may make up a larger part. At any rate against a big cold 4 bet most 1-2 player can fold QQ and AK. sure if he has AA we are going to loose some money, maybe are stack if he plays it well. But against the rest of his range he is going to loose some money to us.

The other strategy I don't mind is a shove. If you think they can think a little, your cold call of a 3 bet looks super strong. So does your cold 4 bet of any size....so with no real way to hide your strength shove it in, Now QQ JJ might just decide your getting tricky with AK type hand and call you.


If you have KK against AA perflop and are not loosing 100bb stacks most of the time, you are making a big mistake. There may be some exceptions, with nitty type reads of your opponents. the good news is they will loose there KK against your AA just as often, so all you need to do is figure out how to make the most with your KK against there AQ AK kq, tt ect hands.

He could have any two cards. Literally. Look at your description. Now, you don't recognize V2, but maybe he has a history with V1. He looks down at something like KQs and figures it's good enough to 3-bet V1 with.

Seriously, if you're playing $1/$2 you have to realize a raise isn't AA, KK or AK. ... It could be 83o. I've raised 58o on the button on my laggy days.

Obviously, UTG might tighten his range. But it's a standard $12 $1/$2 preflop open.

My take here is that you should 4 bet to 85...lets go through the possible choices. If we flat call, then we have absolutely no information. UTG will have pot odds to call, and we are now playing a 3 way pot with 2 players who we have practically no range for. UTG is aggressive and made a fairly standard opening raise, so he could have a pretty wide range of small-medium pocket pairs, maybe AJ,AQ. UTG+1 is new to the table, so we really dont have a clue. He could be strong, or just getting frisky in his first hand at the table to establish an image. If we flat call, we have no clue come the flop where we are at. Now, 4 betting small is slightly better, since we will get a read on UTG. UTG has now been 3 and 4 bet after raising UTG, so if he continues with the hand, he will be certainly strong. However, UTG+1 is commited to call the rest no matter what he has, therefore we get no information on UTG+1 by flat calling, but we do on UTG.

However, if we 4 bet bigger, to around 85, we can get information on both players ranges. If UTG calls or raises, we know he is for real. If UTG+1 calls, we now know he very likely has a hand. Maybe JJ, maybe QQ. Either way, we have a smaller range now, plus position on either of them. We are in a far better position to play post-flop poker by 4 betting bigger. A 5 bet shove by either player would be a very difficult situation, granted. However, we haveto take the chance here that we will not be 5 bet shoved, in order to gain information essential to playing this hand after the flop. If we are 5 bet shoved, then it wud be a difficult call, but one that you would pretty much haveto make at that point.