Hero is HJ/MP ($300)
Young guy is CO ($200)
Older guy is BTN ($65)
Blind is BB ($700)

Reads:

• Young guy is early/mid 30's with glasses. No reads as he had just sat down a few hands ago. Bought in for $200.
• Older guy is in his 50's. Calls bets preflop more than you'd expect a good shortstacker to.

Everyone folds to hero who raises to $10 (3.3bb) with QT. Young guy calls, Older guy calls, big blind calls. Flop comes

QT3
Pot: ~$37

BB checks,
Hero bets $25,
Young guy raises to $55,
Older guy calls all in for $55
BB folds
Hero ???

Call. Check/Jam (call) ~all turns.

Does not matter if you call or jam now since you're OOP.

If I was IP, I'd flat 100% and just jam turn.

First off, what in sam hill is a "good shortstacker" at a 1/3 NL game? IMO, 95%+ of shortstackers at 1/3 play horribly -EV poker.

Anyways. We are certainly not scared of older guy here. He's wide. To the younger guy. You made a standard raise preflop and standard looking c-bet. It is a 4-way flop, but a rainbow so could we could be somewhat wide here. A10+, 1010+. You obviously block 1010, and QQ and given no 3bet pre, these hands are very unlikely. So it really comes down to only 33 beating you. He could be an aggro, with hands like KJ and J9 and such. Probably doesn't pop with one pair hands here often, so I see that as unlikely. So if we put him on either 33 or KJ ONLY (no J9, AJ additions), and assume old guy has a variety of Qx hands and 33, your equity is 50%. HU on side pot vs. young guy is 60%. So we are clearly going no where.

So considering we are either coolered or he has decent equity against us, I think we need to charge a price. Given young guy only has $135 left and pot is now $172, we gotta shove here.

Not a fist pumping move because short stack isn't trying to push anybody out of this pot and old guy wants to play. But for 66BB you can't fold top two without some rock solid read.

I prefer shoving flop but call flop and shove turn is fine also.

Reasons you like a call better than jam? What are you doing on an Ace turn (or are there any turns you're folding)?

I agree with this

Only difference is you see a turn card I guess.

I was thinking about shortstackers online when I wrote that. Guys who play tight preflop, but raise/jam flops/turns and are not easy to play against. Agreed though, no one live plays like that.

Nice analysis. Similar to the things I was thinking at the table. If the older guy has a Q or possibly a good draw he's probably just going with it and I'm not really scared of his hand tbh.

Here's where the hand gets tricky, though. What range do we put the younger guy on? His line looks really strong given he cold raised the preflop raiser with 2 other opponents still in the hand on the flop. And, he did this on a QT board that hits a raisers range pretty well, as well as a rainbow board so less draws. Since I have no reads on him, do we assume he's an average live low stakes player? If so, does that mean we assume he's going to flat our flop bet with KJ and J9 since the average live player is passive? Especially considering he'd probably want a multiway pot with those hands so he'd be more likely to flat to keep BTN/BB in the hand? If he flats those hands then can he ever have a draw here?

What does his value range look like? Certainly all sets although like you said we block QQ and TT so only 1 combo of both (meaning they're incredibly unlikely). 3 combos of 33. He could also have QT but only 4 combos of that. Would he raise with a good Q? Maybe but probably not if we assume he's passive.

Keeps his 5-10% (maybe smaller idk, but non-zero) bluffs in range and he might fold like KQ to a shove here. Minimal downside.

Sorry you lost to 33, but there's no way we can get away here. He can easily be doing this with AQ or might have the same hand as you.

We certainty have little to go off in terms of reads, but judging a book by its cover, this could potentially be somewhat aggro type player. He's on the upper end, but within range of potential online player (I'm assuming $200 max?, if not maybe he's not). But even if not, I just don't think we make a lot of money in long run putting pp on what is essentially the case set in a 1/3 NL game. It's not like first to act player bet, you raised, and he throws in 4bet. That would be super strong. Your making what looks like a fairly standard cbet. Yes its 4 way, but AJ, AK, JJ maybe bets here? Maybe you wouldn't do that, but remember, he doesn't know you either.

I guess in a nut shell. You would have to have a stone cold read on this dude to muck this. Just can't envision folding given such few realistic combos that beat us. If he has 33, you say nh and move on, IMO.

Good point. He could easily be a donk over valuing TPTK. It's probably never bad to just go with top 2 pair vs an unknown.

Results:

I shipped over his raise because I thought with the other caller, he's probably not folding if he has a straight draw or TPTK.

Young guy had TT and took pot
Old guy had AQ (sucks because he had one of my outs)

I might just fold preflop. We still have 4 people to act (2 of whom have position). At my loose table a $10 open this early is often going 5ways, and yet I don't want to open bigger due to risking too much too early with a weakish hand. I also don't want to build a big pot against shortish stacks where TP might suck. There's no other dead money in the pot. If everyone else sucks and table is passive, I could actually get behind an open limp here. Our result sucks, imo, and yet it is one I would totally expect.

I would feel committed against both shorter stacks, and would probably need a pretty good read not to feel committed against the deeper stack. I want to get in as much money ASAP, so I'd pot the flop; there is no need to bet less, if they have something worth calling with they are calling $40 every bit as much as they are calling $25.

I'm still feeling pretty good about being committed to the flop action. A lot of guys won't raise monsters here because board isn't that drawy and they don't necessarily want to blow out those behind; sets will often just flat here knowing they can easily get stacks in on later streets easily in position. The shortstack could easily be committing with anything, and the deep stack is out, so I'm still pretty confident I'm best, so I'm never folding. If we flat we'll have less than a PSB left for the turn. I'd probably just flat cuz I don't want to encourage KQ/etc. to make a hero fold. I'd check/jam turn and jam river if it checks thru.

GcluelessNLnoobG