1/2 NL. Villain is the only good player at the table and he is two seats to my left with stack of $140.

We have AKS UTG and raise to 11. Villain 3-bets to 30 and all fold back to us.

This is about as awkward as it gets for stack sizes, right? Is there any way to play this hand now that doesn't allow villain to play his hand perfectly?

What's his 3-bet frequency?

If he's a decent player and you're not perceived as a LAGtard, I might consider easier spots.

I am definitely not calling if that's what you're asking.

Pretty easy shove for me (given stack sizes I think it is the only reasonable 4bet). It's only for 70 BBs. Unless we run into the worse case scenario (which against this guy seems a little unlikely as his 3betting range is probably a lot wider than most), we're in coinflip territory (unlucky there is no dead money in the pot to make up for that). Plus we do have FE against many coinflip hands (i.e. 88 is going to have a tough decision). Picking up 15+ BBs with A high is never a bad thing.

GcluelessNLnoobG

This is a super soft game with lots of loose passive, straightforward players. His 3-betting frequency is very low. In fact, there may only be 4-5 3-bets all night long.

call and analyse on the flop .

If that's the case, then his 3-bet range is probably QQ+ and AK+.

With bunch of passive donks at the table, I don't see any reason why he would try to isolate you. Unless he's on tilt or have some other personal reasons, I think he's playing this hand straight up and his 3-bet range is probably something similar to what I wrote above.

We're 42% dog to such range, and because we're OOP, I really don't think there's much value for implied odds.

Margin is too thin, I would personally go after other donks at the table.

People offer this "call and re-evaluate" advice a lot, and it often seems to be a way of avoiding actually making any real decisions.

What are we planning to analyze? What will our plan be on different kind of flops? Just shrugging and saying "too strong to fold, too weak to shove" is no good.

FWIW my instinct is that I hate calling here. If you call, you are in a ~$60 pot out of position with effective stacks of only $110. When you hit the flop, you probably don't get paid.

OP, try to come up with some ranges for what he'll 3-bet with and what he'll do if you shove. Sounds like given the general lack of 3-bets, this is {QQ+, AK}. Let's say that if we shove, he folds AK but calls with the rest. I'm rounding some stuff here and assuming all the other players fold.

Pot is currently $40. If he calls with AA, we have a 6% chance of winning the pot, profiting 40 plus his other 110. When we lose, we lose 130. So our EV when he has AA is (.06)(40+110)+(.94)(-130) = -113. Here is our EV for his other possible hands.

KK: (.30)(40+110)+(.70)(-130) = -46
QQ: (.43)(40+110)+(.57)(-130) = -10
AK: 40 since he folds and we just win the pot right there.

There are 3 ways for him to have AA, 3 to have KK, 6 to have QQ, 9 to have AK. So total EV is

(3/21)(-113) + (3/21)(-46) + (6/21)(-10) + (9/21)(40) = -8.

So under these assumptions, shoving is worse than folding since folding has an EV of 0.

I don't think this is the right way to look at it though. It's not a tournament. If we are bankrolled, won't go on tilt, and jamming is +EV, we should do it. We don't need to "look for better spots" in cash games.

Youre giving us too much equity. This guy is not 3-betting AK to 15BB to fold for 70BB. He's calling with AK, so much of our profit in your equity calculation is now gone, and we're either flipping, or more likely, crushed. In these very weak, low limit games, people 3-bet with such a narrow range that I don't mind a fold here. I assume you are perceived as a tight player and I assume that he's never 3-betting to fold to a 4-bet, so I'd let this go and value-town the fish at the table. For what it's worth, buy in for the max and you won't have as many of these tough decisions.

Sure, you can change the ranges to whatever you think makes sense. If he will call with AK, then shoving goes from "bad" to "very bad." On the other hand, if he would 3bet with JJ then that moves us back the other direction. I just made my best estimates.

As noted in my last post, I don't think it matters who else is at the table unless you're on a super-short bankroll or something.

Villain is sitting with $140. I assumed hero covered since he didn't say.

Villain is described as the "only good player at the table" and he has position on us. Which in my mind means (a) he could 3bet a lot lighter than the normal AA/KK and (b) he could understand we might open a lot lighter than most and (c) we could fold to a 3bet a lot more than most raisers.

This is a pretty easy ship for me, he only has 110 left, he might fold, push it easily.

Thanks for the responses. MCS - I did the same as you on Pokerstove and I agree based on villain's range I think this is a fold.

I suppose I should have been more clear in my description of the villain. I am viewed as tight aggressive, but villain knows my range is very narrow opening in the one-hole in this type of poker game. (77+,AQs+)

Also villain is in EP, so when I stated he is a good player I implied that he is not 3-betting light putting in 20 % of his stack in EP without a hand in this spot. (Most likely JJ+, AK+ , maybe AQs and TT) If I shove, I'm pretty sure he folds AQs and TT.

I've been really working on my tournament game with respect to being aware of stack sizes and how it affects decisions and I thought that even though this was a cash game thought it was an interesting spot.

I can see a decent player opening wide in late position, or even MP, but why would anyone decent open wide in UTG?

No matter what range we put him on, we're coin-flipping at best. I can see us shoving or folding here, depending on which range you actually choose. I personally like picking better spots at these extremely weak games because there are so many low-variance, high-reward plays that come up in low NLHE games. But at the same time, i can't blame a shove here, especially vs a person who will 3-bet a wider range than most at these games.

I agree that your bankroll does play a part in this and with a short roll, this is a clear fold. However, with a sufficient roll, this doesn't have to be a clear shove either, especially if you know there are a lot of better spots in the future. I personally don't like flipping if I know I have a huge edge on the game. In the end, I feel like the lack of dead money in this pot leaned me toward a fold.

You're right, I misread the OP and thought hero had $140

I'm just saying that I'm not rushing to a AA/KK range when someone described as "the only good player at the table" 3bets. If there was dead money in the pot, this would be fistpump territory for me.

We're only flipping if he calls. We have decent FE against a lot of pairs, could even be dominating others, which pushes this quite in our favour IMO, unless we're really unlucky and have run into AA/KK (and I'm not going to beat myself up for 70 BBs).

Agree.

Another point is why do we want to give the only other decent player at the table a chance to double up?

Sure we do, but of course this could simply be difference in opinions.

For example if we are sitting on $300 and the max BI to the game is $200, risking $140 or so on a flip is wasting money that could be used to stack a donk at the table with $500.

Another point is that this isn't online where edge is small and value is low. In LLSNL, we really don't need to go after thin value when there are plenty of dead money high value hands that we could easily pick up.

Third point is losing pots. I don't know about you, but losing a big pot puts a lot of people on tilt, even decent ones.

Overall, I just don't see value in this spot in the long run.

People say this a lot. In capped buyin games if you are deep with a bunch of fish it makes no sense to take a flip. If you lose you can't just rebuy to cover the fish again.

Fold unless you have seen him 3bet light before a bunch of times (which I haven't seen you mention, people just assume.)

How often do you winning 1/2 2/5 regs really 3bet light vs unknowns? I assume he is relatively unknown, except we can assume hes good.

We opened in EP. Calling is clearly terrible as we get blown off our equity way too often. Why would this guy 3bet 10s or jacks against us when we opened in EP?

The thing is that 95% of people don't 3bet enough for this to be profitable.

How do we exploit that?

By folding hands like this.


In game is obviously much tougher cause we've been looking at 93o for the past hr and the smelly degen next to us wants to talk about the Giants, but this is a clear fold.

I didn't consider this. I agree with you. How much EV should we be willing to sacrifice?