This hand occurred last night between me and a buddy and I'm having trouble nailing down an accurate range and EV.

Hero is a late 20's reg with a bad image. I had just got caught limp/rr Axs in a juicy spot by villain in question and rebought for $300.

Villain is a mid 20's reg that bounces between 1/2, 1/3 and 2/5, puts in good volume and is more than capable of semi-bluffing.

Effective stacks: $300

Hero opens JJ to $12 UTG+1
MAWG rec calls $12 in UTG+2
Villain calls $12 in MP
Bad rec calls $12 OTB
Unknown rec calls $12 from SB

Flop ($55): 7 8 9

BB checks
Hero bets $40
MAWG rec calls $40
Villain raises to $140
Bad rec & unknown rec fold
Hero ... ?

There is no question the combination of being OOP with a small overpair on a super wet coordinated flop sucks. Villain would have raised AA-QQ and AKs for value preflop. I came up with a rough range in my head of value hands vs. semi-bluffs but couldn't figure out the blended equity in real time. Here is the range I think he could raise. Whether he raises the semi-bluffs in multiway pots with recs involved is probably the million dollar question here.



Against that flop raising range this looks like a shove or fold spot. My intuition tells me because of the dead $ involved this could be a possible +EV shove even though we have <50% equity but I'm not quite sure. But that would require him semi-bluffing all the combos in the above range (which I think are great semi-bluffs personally).

Easy fold. Raising range you assigned him 5-way is wayyyy too wide. Players will bluff way less with this many people (especially recs) in the pot, especially vs PFR c-bet and overcaller. C-bet is alright. Would definitely check with Jd tho.

Check flop.

Seems terrible 4 way, where 80% of cards are potentially bad. Also like the poster above said, we arent too likely to get bluffed given that its 4 way

You're gonna get semi-bluffed all day vs good players. Our equity really isn't that great on this board.

If theyre semi bluffing that much (not saying they are) then its a super easy shove

Bet the flop. Not loving it. With four calls to the EP raise, there is a decent chance you are facing 2pair+ from a mid pair or sc. However, you are probably best, and there are plenty of worse draws and made hands that can call. This is for value and protection.

As played, fold. Yeah. He'll be semi-bluffing sometimes, but there are too many made hands that crush you. You aren't much ahead of a good number of the semi-bluffing hands anyway. V raised after a caller and with two left yet to act behind. Shows a lot of strength. Just let it go.

So I think villain and myself are both interested in how he should be playing the range that I listed above.

If he were to raise all 35 combos listed above, we could shove with 45% equity vs. that range and have an +EV of $54 based on the following:

Preflop pot: $55
Flop pot: $40 bet + $40 call + $140 raise [+ $150 when villain calls shove] = $370
Hero's remaining stack: $250

EV = (0.55*-250) + (0.45*(55+40+40+140+150)) = [-137.5 + 191.25] = +$53.75

JJ has the highest equity vs. any of the premium pairs. The only way we could be doing better is to have the J which ups our equity to 47%. AA-QQ is nearly a 10% equity dog to JJ at 36%, so we are effectively near the top of our range with JJ (TT performs similarly at 45%).

The question is two-fold:

1) What should villain be doing with the range I provided?

Based on the answers thus far, semi-bluffing seems like the obvious choice since we have no calling range beside sets and AK/AQ/AJ which is too few combos since we are folding 30/42 (71%) of our c-bet combos (assuming I open all combos of 77-99)

2) How many semi-bluffs do we need to remove before shoving is -EV?

The worst performing combos vs. a range of JJ+ are the following:

TT (6 combos): 35%
T9s (3 combos): 41.6%
KQ: 43.5%
- - - - -
A2-A4 (3 combos): 44%
QJ: 47%
KJ: 49%

If we remove TT (6 combos) our equity drops to 39.2% and our EV drops to:

EV = (0.608*-250) + (0.392*(55+40+40+140+150)) = [-137.5 + 191.25] = +$15

If we remove TT and T9s (9 combos) our equity drops to 36.1% and our EV drops to:

EV = (0.639*-250) + (0.361*(55+40+40+140+150)) = [-159.75 + 153.4] = -$6.3

If we remove TT, T9s and KQ (10 combos) our equity drops to 35.7% and our EV drops to:

EV = (0.643*-250) + (0.357*(55+40+40+140+150)) = [-160.75 + 151.75] = -$9

So it looks like the cut-off point is the bottom 6/35 combos I had come up with before our shove is -EV.

My brain is a little fried after working this out but I think the takeaway is villain should call with TT, T9s and KQ and can raise the rest of the range giving him 15 value combos and 13 semi-bluffs.

I've always wanted to be the villain of a 2p2 thread

I vote fold, but mostly because I know what the luckbox had...and also because I'm not semi-bluffing nearly as much as you need me to be with all those stations at the table.

What's your felting range on this flop villain? T2p. Sets and 15 out draws?

Fold. Bet's okay depending on villain tendencies. Probably checking if they're likely to bluff raise. btw, just because villain semi bluffs a lot doesn't mean it's easy jam. They can have a raise range that has semi bluffs that still crushes us quite easily.

I did the combo work in my second post.

I think his felting range = his raising range. He's never raise/folding $140.

I think the hand is complicated by the fact that Dizzy can raise stuff like TT for value vs. MAWG (was actually MABG) and as a bluff vs. me because he knows I have a fold button (which we've discussed). With the dead money involved I'm sure he's taking TT to the felt if anyone behind wants to shove a flush draw (though rec fish had deeper effective stacks vs. Dizzy).

Knowing I have a fold button he can also take any of his combo draws to the felt vs. MABG as he'll easily have ~60% equity with most of the semi-bluff range plus dead money overlay. The weakest hands vs. a combined hero/MABG range are now the 9Ts and A2-A4 hands which have about 43% equity vs. stuff like A9-J9 and my range.

Why would you give him the range you gave him? Care to explain why he'd raise every flush draw, or TT? Like why would you ever consider TT and T9 to be standard raise hands in that spot at all? Or even nfds. Those hands perform very well when flatted.

For that matter, why do you think he'd have all those suited combos preflop to begin with? You are aware of course A2-A5s are preferred 3bet hands, and the rest are folds (assume you're trying to find a balanced strategy, in which case you must assume a good preflop strategy). There are just plenty of assumptions that are untrue both in a balanced PoV and a practical one.

Anyway what's your point. You did the combo work, and what? We are still crushed.

Yes I know he's not raise folding.

I had you right at 37% with an optimistic range which is break even. But I had all two pairs and possibly too many NFDs.

Yeah obviously never raise/folding. Taking all 2p+ and draws that are flipping or better vs his obvious overpair to the felt here.

+1 - not raising these hands here.

Fold.

Also, this spot is complicated by the OTHER PLAYER who still has cards. You aren't heads up and that reduces your defending burden. You should have plenty of combos in your betting range on this flop that feel comfortable getting it in. JJ prob isn't a prime candidate.

And what are those combos?

Your bad image at the table makes opponents think that you are either titling or just in a general spew mode. I don't think anyone expects you to lay down an overpair here so it makes their semi-bluff pointless since they have no fold equity.

I would like betting this hand if we were heads up but I like checking multiway and calling a bet if we are given the right pot odds. The advantage to betting multiway is when facing a raise you are basically reduced to drawing to 6 outs at best and can comfortably fold.

I don't see any semi-bluffs in V's range except for monsters like q10dd and A10dd. Even with these kinds of hands, I would need to have seen a V make this kind of play before I can put this in their range since it is so rare at 1-2. But even if I knew a V could shove a big draw, your basically flipping versus a big draw and crushed against sets/straights and two pairs, with two pairs even being unlikely. V needs to have trash like 23dd in his range or A9o to make pondering a call a possibility.

Hero's equity is quite low in this spot.

JTs(4), 56s(4), 99-77(9), 98s(2), 87s(2), AJdd-ATdd(2), QJdd(1)

That's 24 combos that are pretty cool to stack off with on this kind of crumby flop for your range and position. I mean, ffs, you're OOP, multiway, in a raised pot, with a tough player IP against you, and you have a pretty weak over pair with gutshot outs to the 2nd nuts. Turning a set isn't a fist pump, and you're very likely going to face turn action. You're slightly ahead/way behind when the money goes in on the flop.

It's also okay to have check/calls, check/raises, check/folds, bet/folds, bet/3b on this board texture. Just try to avoid having too many of each and you'll prob be okay. This flop sucks for your range, so it's totally fine to check some extra hands that you may bet heads up/in position.

I fold and I dont feel too bad about it. nh

He should not be opening a significant portion of this range UTG+1 at the table we were at.

It's just a spot where my range has him crushed and I'm just not bluffing without massive equity with multiple stations at the table. I'm not going to exploit him/even be able to exploit him when there are villains behind me who I'm deep with that will cold-call my 3b with 2-pair, flush draws, pair+straight draw, ect. plus a shorter-stacked station who already called his c-bet.

That may be so, but given I wasn't privy to that information, I had to think in a vacuum. So, fair enough if he doesn't have all of those. I'd find it very hard to believe that a significant portion are open folds though, even at an aggressive table.

As for your second point, I agree very much that you have the range advantage/aren't spewing here, and that your action indicates a lot of strength, given there are a few other players involved at the point of your decision, which further drives home my inclination to just fold JJ here and not dwell on it.

Yeah I don't think Johnny really gave enough information on the other villains at the table to get a good grasp of how the table was playing. It was basically me, him, and 7 known fish/stations. There was no need to be aggressive because people just weren't going to fold. I wasn't necessarily saying that a significant portion of that range should be an open fold, but a lot of it he would be limping since every pot is going to go multiway regardless, initiative wasn't very important at this table, and building pots when you wanted to was not difficult.

I was once. Someone posted a HH that I recognized and realized I was at the table during the hand.

This flop is so horrible with this many people seeing the flop, I just check and get ready to give up to any action. I dont know why people feel the need to win every hand that they raised preflop. An overpair sucks on this board.

Check/fold without a second thought.