Playing 1-2 NL in a $60 - $300 structured game. The game has been incredibly loose and the action is outstanding. It's an early friday morning around 1AM.

Villain - this guy is tight. Super tight. He's a nit. He's played 1 hand past the flop and that was where he check raised middle set in a raised pot. He jammed turn and won a $600+ pot. Otherwise, he's called a few PF raises and has folded to cbets.

Hero. My image has got to be pretty crazy. I've had a few drinks, nothing crazy and I'm not tipsy, just relaxing. I've made 2 hero calls tonight with A high and was good both times. Another time I got it in with a combo draw and ended up winning with K high. Hero recently took a 'bad beat' where my 78 on a 6910A10 board lost a $650 pot after getting it in on the turn. My reaction was mostly a big (friendly) laugh at the nice lady who took the pots reaction to hitting her set on the turn. Aside from this, the best hand I've shown down at river is TPGK, although I've been very active.

Hero currently has $450 and villain covers

Hand:

Preflop: Hero open raises to $15 from utg+2 with AQo, Villain calls to my direct left and it folds around.

Flop: ($33) AJ6, Hero cbets $20 and villain calls.

Turn: ($73) 8, Hero bets $40 and villain calls.

River: ($153) 8, Hero checks and villain bets $80. Hero folds...

I'd like to hear some of your opinions before I post my own.

If he has been super tight and has consistently folded flops to c-bets, I wouldn't even bother betting turn. What could he have that calls flop that hero beats? My goal here would be to get to showdown cheaply after nit calls flop, calling one small bet on turn or river. AQ is a bit too good to give up to one small bet, but after the flop it is more of a crying call against this villain.

If villain has any aggression at all hero will be giving up to a bluff occasionally after giving up initiative, but against a passive nit it is better to give up to his one bluff of the night and go back to stealing flops next hand.

Pre, Flop, and Turn all seem fine, might go a bit bigger on the turn, but that's just being nit picky. I assumed when you checked you expected him to check back anything we beat? There's not too many hands he can have --AK & AJ -- that have us beat seeing as u mentioned he played sets much more aggressively. x/c is fine on the river with me getting close to 2:1

I think we should be bet/folding rather than check/folding. I won't yell at you for folding river in this spot... just think leading river is the best option

I agree. Not to mention I see a total of 0 hands in villains range that would be bluffing this river.

I think my mistake was betting the turn. I think I can profitably c/c the turn and c/f the river. I think betting the turn hardly gets called by worse, I am not sure if villain is even calling me with A10 on this turn.

I also highly highly doubt that he is ever randomly turning A10 into a bluff on this river. There really aren't any hands in villain's range that we beat at this point. I think you played the hand fine, I fold this river as well.

This guy doesn't even call AT pre.

If we know he's only continuing on this board with AK+, why cbet?

Check flop, force him to open his range by delay cbetting. Ace high dry boards are good to cbet for a reason, people fold. So the opposite of that must be, if they are good to cbet, they're bad to value bet.

At the time I cbet because I think he's capable of calling a cbet light agai st me because I was playing rather loose. On the turn I think I'm good when called 0% of the time.

Then why bet if he's not calling with worse, and definitely not folding better?

Bet fold $50 on river. I think you got owned.

I think this is a badly sized raise preflop given the stack sizes. If you get a single caller, as happened, you will be out of position with an SPR of 13 - the worst possible SPR for a hand like AK/AQ, since it gives any villain in position a lot of room to play his position in many, many situations to his extreme advantage post flop. In fact, this whole hand resulting in you c/f'ing a blank river after firing 2-barrels with TPGK is primarily due to this terrible SPR - all started by arbitrarily raising to some standard amount of $15.

I would prefer to raise less, even as little as $6, and then playing cautionly multi-way for TPGK firing 1/3 pot-sized value bets and maintaining good pot control than raising to $15. Alternatively, you could open big, expecting one or two set miners or hopeful wanna bees to come along, so you can fire a single big cb whether you hit or not - but then your cards don't really matter, do they, if you don't plan to show down anyway. You might even limp/reraise as a bluff. But if limp/reraising, or making a much smaller opening raise, or making a much bigger raise is distasteful, then it is OK to fold AQo in EP at a full ring table for low stakes live play. Personally, I like making the small raise to build a pot and play cautiously for value post flop when I hit. I'd raise to something like $6 - making an SPR of well over 20 if it is heads up, and likely about 20, even if its multi-way. If I'm reraised by anything other than a short stack, then I would plan to fold.

I suppose you might argue that sizing your bets on the strength of your hand is too easy for people to figure out, but if you mix up bet sizing a lot, and with a wide range of hands, including small openings in EP with some very big hands hoping that someone actually does reraise you, then the few that notice anything will notice that you mix up your bet sizing too much to spot a pattern. At least half low stakes live players probably won't notice at all no matter what you do.

Also, given your read and how you ended up c/f'ing the river, I think the turn 8d is a blank, and you should have just checked the turn, planning to c/f there if you really and truly think he never has AT or Axs. I think it is not good planning to fire at the turn for value only to decide that another blank river pairing the 8 has changed anything.

Finally, as played to the river, since the river really didn't change anything, I think you are better off bet/folding than check/folding. Bet a bit more than 1/4 the pot (~$60), and fold to a raise.

grunch

as played i like the fold but i probably b/f like 70

rest of the hand is perfect

this is unbalanced and bad/wrong for many reasons.... come on man

If he is super tight wouldnt we expect to see aggression either otr or ott? If your image is LAG why would he play a monster so passive? As played I would call. I would prefer a x/c ott and reeval river.

As listed above in the thread, I feel like my mistake was betting the turn.

No because he's not "tight aggressive". He's just tight. Maybe he plays a monster passively because he's seen me bet fold earlier, maybe he doesn't raise without a nutted hand (no AK and AJ here is not nutted).

HOWEVER, I fully agree w c/c turn reevaluate river.

What do we expect to get called by that we beat?

No offense, but I'm not some poster saying villain is tight then saying he's limp calling oop with AXs. He's tight as in he's never calling preflop with worse than A10 (not even sure he's calling with that PF). Villain is calling 3 streets with A10 some amount under 1% of the time.

easy check fold on river. hard to say what to do on flop. its close between check call flop check fold turn.....and bet fold flop check call turn check fold river i'd say

i normally hate pot control, but when against a super nitty villain who doesn't really bluff either, you can often check call flop and check fold turn safely. betting flop doesnt accomplish much as you'll likely get one street from worse only unless you will check fold turn. of course, this means you should be bluffing a ton against these villains

Given you read of your opponent imho the hand is played fine (including the turn bet).

you said he's called some PFRs and folded to cbets, I think you're narrowing his range too much, he has weaker AX sometimes, and our hand is strong plus our image will make him want to not fold, it's hard to say that he's not calling our open with any weaker Ax just because in a couple hours of a live poker session the only time he showed aggression he stacked 2 people with a set, I'm simply saying he still has worse here enough to make a bet/fold better than check/fold here

haha no offense taken dude, just trying to contribute.

Go ahead and tell me why. I'd love to hear why it is wrong. Especially for many reasons.

M hood, I'm not sure his exact reasoning however its unbalanced because we should be bluffing this type of villain a large % of the time. If he sees us checking TPGK but betting air we are unbalanced.

I'd love to hear his reason, he's usually atrocious with any kind of theory.

If you're concerned about being unbalanced and being exploited by a nit at 1/2, you're doing it wrong.