Context: This is my second 2/5 session. I am 21 years old and I decided to take some shots and move up to 2/5 after beating 1/3 at my local casino for about 5 months now with a 19.36bb/hr winrate. Also, quite frankly, I find 1/3 incredibly boring in my casino. It is filled to the brim with passive players who often limp fold ATC.

One thing I have noticed so far in 2/5 is that players are much more willing to bet very large much more frequently and with a variety of holdings than in 1/3.

Anyways, on to the session. I sat down with $500, only 100bbs. There was a fairly young man, 26-30 who had a gigantic stack of over $7k in front of him and, after watching him play for an orbit or two, was very aggressive and was not afraid to put people to the test. I later managed to double through him by slowplaying trips and just c/c when he inevitably jammed on me on the river as you will see in the two relevant hand histories I post below.

We will call this guy MV (main villain)

I am sure I made quite a few mistakes with either one or both of these hands, please roast me accordingly it helps me learn!

Hand #1
H has the effective stack with ~$500

MV opens to $20 in UTG+2
H looks down at Q7 and calls out of the BB
Pot $42
Flop QQ8
Hero checks, MV bets $50, Hero calls
Pot $142
Turn J
Hero checks, V bets $125, Hero calls
Pot $392
River K
Hero checks, V jams for Hero's remaining ~$305 effective
Hero?



Hand #2
H has the effective stack with ~$1000

MV opens to $20 UTG
V2 calls UTG+2
Hero calls OTB with KQ

Pot $62
Flop K62
MV bets $75, V2 folds, Hero calls
Pot $212
Turn 7
MV bets $150, V2 folds, Hero contemplates folding but tank calls expecting a river 3rd barrel
Pot $512
River 6
Hero loves to see MV give up and check. Hero?



Those were the two biggest pots I played against the MV.

Later on during the session, some time after the two hands I posted against him, I continued to play solid sitting with around 200bbs, opening to $20 pre with solid holdings that I believe I could slowplay and get paid off by this guy again as he had shown a willingness to attempt to bluff me in every pot we had played so far. However, this guy would relentlessly 3! to $120 IP almost every time I opened. So, in order to see flops against this guy, I just began open limping hands like KQs, JTs, 88, etc. This seemed to work, as he just raised to $20 over my limp and instead of paying 1/10th of my stack to play a hand vs him, I was now getting in much cheaper and it ended up working in my favor, as I won some more hands against him and booked my largest win ever playing live. It is strange as he didn't adjust his raise sizes to be larger over my limps preflop.

My question is: Were there better adjustments I could have made instead of open limping vs raising preflop with solid hands vs a talented loose/aggressive opponent? Was I Just lucky?

Hand 1: Fold pre. Defending your BB against an EP open is -EV in the long run even if villain is laggy. After that your fine, there are some hands that beat you but they are all unlikely. The real concern is that villain might have a better QX or 88 but against a guy playing super aggressive and bluff shoving you have call this most of the time. You planned to check/call and let the very laggy opponent bluff off his money. If that is your aim you can't get into the habit of calling flop and then giving up later in the hand.

Hand 2: This is pretty standard. With KQo in position you should throw in some raises preflop also against a very laggy villain but not every time. Flop and turn are standard. River check back is generally correct. When a super laggy villain checks he generally has given up but will be trapping occasionally. Either way there isn't money to be made on river.

If villain is bad enough to stick to 3 bet heavy strategy when you start limp/calling good hands then it's OK. You can also use a strategy of 4 betting him with strong hands and some bluffs mixed in based on how often he is 3 betting you and how he reacts to your 4 bets but this is very high variance also.

If you end up playing this guy multiple times there is some metagame strategy you need to take into account eventually. Particularly in hands like hand 2 you should start betting your reasonable value hands on the river to balance your air bluffs. This quickly turns into a complex bluffing game that you don't want to get into with this guy until you have more experience.

I really don’t mind your flat in hand 1, I like the way you played it post.

My only comment for hand 2 is: what do you do if he bombs river? Mostly asking out of curiosity as I think it would be a sick spot.

Good luck in your shot taking!

Both hands look fine. Call Hand 1. I would bet small on the river in Hand 2, like $100, and look to induce a bluff.