1/2

V1 (1800) is a grinder: headphones, watching videos only in between hands. He has not made an error in five orbits although his bet size here deviated from the standard 10+2 open raise. His bet sizes were otherwise correct, no limping, one 3bet. He has played about 10 percent of his hands but hasn’t shown down. Buyin is 500 max and most people buyin for 300. He earned his stack.

V2 (135) overvalued his hands. He lost his stack because he couldn’t let go of his QQ on a KJ9A2ccc runout. He’s back from the ATM, lost another 70, and now on tilt. He looks like he’s about to cry.

Hero (315) has a tight image to V1. I didn’t play my first 15 hands, then raised three times over limpers who folded.

OTTH

UTG limps. V1 in UTG+1 raises to 20. V2 calls. Folds to hero in the SB with AhQh. Hero? Hero calls and later wonders why he did not raise. BB and limper fold.

Flop (55 after rake): 8hAsTh

Hero checks. V1 bets 20. V2 calls. Hero?

I actually don't mind the flat pre at all. It is a huge raise size over a limper so he should be strong, and we want to see a flop and not get jammed on w a nice multiway hand.

There's two competing things here. 1, we are not super deep and our hand doesnt mind getting it in, but also if we do get it in we are certainly behind V1. I definitely want to keep V2 in the hand with dominated holdings.

I think best thing is to play this passively and just call and call any turn. Depending on turn I might find a turn jam if V1 bets again and V2 calls, or if V1 bets, V2 jams, and then we go over the top, or if V1 checks, V2 bets, and we jam.

flatting vs UTG+1 open is fine, just call the flop, CR only gets called by better.

Pre either way I think is ok.

Flop is a clear call.

Villain sounds like a real grinder and won't be messing around with an EP open, he has a value hand. With more information hero might be able to read something into his big opening size but here hero doesn't have enough information yet. Is he targeting V2 who is likely to call too wide? Does he have a marginal value hand and want to limit callers? Does he have a really strong value hand and is hoping for callers?

Given the situation I prefer the call. Hero can't be confident his hand is ahead and a raise preflop likely limits V1 to just better hands. Plus there is the possibility of V2 making a tilt reraise/shove with a worse hand.

Flop is obvious call and evaluate. Probably check/call turn again. Keeping V2 in the pot runs up variance but also runs up hero's value because V2 will stick around with a lot of worse hands. Also if the turn is dirty and there is action hero can get out cheap.

I'd usually prefer to raise AQhh here (75% raise 25% flat) but given villain description flatting can be fine as AQs can flop well and you're not going to get V2 to fold much here to isolate.

I tend to look at this hand as a situational play - I'm looking to flop good or get out of the way if I'm OOP vs a competent opponent who will make post flop difficult for me especially with tilting opponent in the mix. The unpredictability of the third opponent is a factor in flatting here and V1's iso vs UTG even if slightly wider is in solid shape against AQs.

Flop ez flat. Id check raise with something that flopped a combo draw some % here - ideally you want something with good equity vs 2pair or sets.

Anticipating future streets: complete bricks changes nothing about board texture and we ch/call again.

V1's value range shouldnt be betting huge on this board the only wild card is V2 so you're in a good spot to ch/GII against V2 if they do something wild say. If V1 is as competent as described, its unlikely you'll get them to stack off except with a narrow range of hands youre ahead of or in a situation where they spike a set but it completes the flush say but even there Id expect it to be a situation where they would be driving the action meaning if it is some kind of gin card turn brings them a set but completes the flush you'd have to risk a ch/raise and hope they're willing to push.

If turn gets checked thru by both opponents, is a brick and river bricks as well I dont hate leading river but this is a great hand to strengthen your ch/call range imo as well. Blocking Ax and Qx flush combos narrows V1s range to not have as many flush combos (a handful Kx. I'd say the bottom could be something like JTh, but Th on the board so unlikely Jxhh).

Turns where I'd re-evaluate my equity estimations would be something that hits the straight potential here. I'd still check call but in the situation where V1 checks V2 bets, you call and V1 raises you definitely have to evaluate V1 range. if the hypothesis up top that V1's iso raise pf is as tight as a standard range they shouldnt have a lot of hands that want to raise on turns that brick/complete that straight and not a lot of 2pair makes sense unless their iso range includes hands like 67, 78, 89s - doubt theirs gappers given frequencies described above - but probably some PP down to 88 or 99. V2 however has way too much in their range so connects well but that set of potential hands is so wide it becomes a call down situation. I'm likely not folding to V2's actions regardless how strong they look. But a tilting villain who is likely to be going to push anything and everything with a 35BB stack is a shrug put the money in situation for me.

I think the flat call pre is fine. Wouldn't want to get 4B by V1 and have to fold, nor do we want to play OOP post-flop if he flats.

I think I might have preferred a donk-lead here, for 2/3 pot.

My reasoning is that V1 doesn't seem likely to pay us off if we make our flush, and flat calling makes it obvious we're on a draw, whereas V2 is tilted and is less likely to fold worse hands, and more likely to chase worse draws, but may rage-fold if our flush comes in and we go for max value. If V2 likes his hand, he might jam over top, which would be awesome.

If V1 has AK, he'll mostly flat call, but may occasionally raise, which we don't mind, because we want to build a pot. He'll probably raise AA, but that's also fine. Otherwise, he might raise with worse, or float wide, to see what we do on the turn. If V1 floats us, V2 will be getting good odds to come along.

I'm surprised everyone is saying we should just flat call. What are we worried about here? We're crushing every worse 1P. We're crushing worse flush draws. We're crushing OESD's. We're a slight favorite over A8/T8. We're only a slight underdog against AK or ATs, which we block, and never worse than a 30% underdog against any set.

I think a check-raise is in order. We need to build the pot, and we don't mind getting stacks in here. I'd make it $100, enough to put V2 all in. If V1 wants to raise all-in, let him. If V1 calls or raises, V2 will be getting an amazing price to call off the rest of his stack.

Im flatting flop because I dont think raising to shove is ideal given the fact that V1 is unlikely to call it off with worse - we're in a spot where we can get more money in the pot and easily get away from dangerous board texture changes that dont favor us.

Our flat out the blinds with AQhh is somewhat sneaky - we _should_ be 3betting out of the SB w/ most of the hands we see a flop with - so broadway and PPs etc Therefore Villain is likely to raise our donk lead a fair % of the time and the range they would do that with is pretty narrow IF our assessment of their PF raise range is as narrow as we might expect from a snug aggressive opponent. Sure they have folds and we win in those spots (i realize other V is in hand but im simply comparing our range/perceived range to villain in this spot).

Depending on V1 perception of hero/hero tendencies we shouldnt have as complex and broad of a range as if we were in BB for example.

Effectively V1 would most liekly put us on FDs, some higher equity combo draws, some flopped two pair & maybe bottom set. 88 unlikely to raise Pre whereas TT might be a raise a majority of the time (its 1/2 so if I am WAAAAAY off here let me know. im still trying to recalibrate myself to low stakes live opponents and tendencies after taking quite a bit of time off and shed the memory of online 50/100/200NL assumptions etc

Unpacking some of this...

Not sure what you mean by "raising to shove." I'd prefer a donk-bet here. But as played, I think we should check-raise to $100. That's not shoving, though we don't mind if either or both opponents shove over top.

Is V1 going to call with worse? He's starting $1800 effective, hero only has $295 going to the flop, and V2 only has $95 after calling V1's c-bet. He can certainly afford to peel one off here, when we consider the odds he'll be getting.

The pot will be $195 after our check-raise, and he'll only have to call off another $80, so he'll be getting around 2.4 to1 pot odds, with a little over 6 to 1 implied odds if V2 stacks off for his last $95, and we're left with $195 behind. If they both call, the pot will be $390, so we'll have exactly 1/2 pot bet left, making for an easy turn shove.

Even if the turn is a brick, I'd shove. If we get called, the pot will be $780. We only need to win 25% of the time to make jamming $195 profitable. Even if we're not already ahead, we'll have at least 9, if not 12 outs to improve. With any fold equity at all, a check-raise to $100 here, and a turn shove for $195 is just printing.

As you said, we should be playing 3B or fold from the SB, so V1 might think a donk bet or check-raise is fishy here, and either call or raise on that basis. Most 1/2 players who check-raise here will have 2P or a set, allowing V1 to rep hearts or a better 2P, depending on the run-out, so he might float with devious intentions to steal the pot later.

If V wants to rep a set and raise, or even if he has a set and raises, that's fine. We're only a 30% dog to sets here. I'd rather jam flop as a 30% dog and see all five cards than A) hit our obvious flush draw and not get paid, or B) miss our obvious flush draw, and have to fold to aggression on later streets.

If V jams AK, any worse AX, and all his 2P here, we're actually doing much better than 30% against that range.

The only thing we need to worry about is flat calling the flop, and V1 betting huge with AK or better on the turn. I think flatting here is negative EV against these two V's, at these stack depths.

Our hand is too in-between to play as a bluff-catcher. It's strong enough to raise now, but not strong enough to continue calling if V1 takes geometric bet sizing leading up to a river jam on a brick run-out.

Its not so much a bluff catcher as it is an opportunity for V1 to value own themselves - we're making the most by keeping them in the hand - our hand fares better against the range of hands V1 has that bet and we call across all streets vs the range that calls a shove from us or shoves themselves over our donk bet say.

The addition of tilting villain does make this simple solution above less applicable but in the situation they find themselves trigger happy we now have a good overlay re: pot size/odds as well as the fact that V1 NOW may have a wider range in stack off scenarios.

After the V2 call on the flop, how would you range the opponents?

(Equity, Win, Tie)
Player 1: 46.7% 41.4% 11.5% [AhQh]
Player 2: 37.9% 31.7% 13.2% {AA, TT, ATs+, AQo+}
Player 3: 15.3% 12.4% 6.55% {A2s+, ATo+}

Board: [Th 8h Ac ? ?]

Once again, I wasn't advocating for a shove on the flop. I was advocating for a check-raise to $100, to set up a turn shove of 1/2 pot, creating 4:1 implied odds if our turn jam gets called.

His shoving range here is sets, 2P, and TPTK. Maybe some combo draws, if he's opening UTG1 as wide as KJs or J9s, which seems unlikely, if he's VPIP'ing 10%. If he shoves KK or worse PP's, all the better. We're doing fine against his shoving range, no matter what it is, especially since we block AA, AK, AT, and A8.

Seriously, what worse hands is V1 going to continue to bet after V2 and hero calls his flop bet, on this board? We're behind AA, TT, 88, AK, AT, A8, and T8. We're basically ahead of AJ and A5, and not much else that V1 would actually barrel, unless you think he's barreling JJ-KK. How is our hand ever a favorite against his barreling range?

Hero hasn't seen V1 make a single mistake in the last 5 orbits. He's only VPIP'ing around 10%, and he opened from UTG1 here, meaning he's probably got a VERY strong hand. He's got 6x the typical buy-in for the game, and doesn't even bother to watch the action when he's not in the hand. Despite hero's perception of his own table image, V1 might think hero is just another rec-fish spaz-raising in the face of V's aggression.

On what planet is this guy going to value own himself if we flat call? In what galaxy is he going to pay us off if we improve? This guy isn't blindly going bet-bet-bet in a multi-way pot against a tilted V2 and hero who slid into the hand by flatting from the SB, probably with a range that smashes this flop. Once he gets two callers to his flop c-bet, he's shutting down with every hand we beat.

If we spike a Q or a heart, and check, V1 is just checking back. We'll be lucky if V2 decides to bet, but even if that happens, V1 is just going to fold when we call. If V1 already has us beat, or has AJ or A5, and the turn is a J or 5, we're torching money if we just continue to flat call.

I think the only way to play this is to fast play it, in the hopes V1 thinks we're over-playing a draw or some weak 1P + a draw. V1 has us covered, by heaps, and isn't going to over-fold to a $100 bet, getting 6 to 1 implied odds to call, even if he knows we're planning to jam turn. He only has to be best about 17% of the time to make calling profitable.

I would rather XR some other high equity draw like KJhh, or J9ss, or T9ss, or QJhh than AQhh here because those hands benefit from folding out V1s Ax type hands. I just think if we get in a situation where V1 is willing to call us off it will only be with hands we are behind currently and we are going to need to hit our flush and thats it. Thr only better hand we can make fold is AK. So when we XR we are only folding out worse hands mostly. We're going to fold out dominated aces, but also he might start folding his weaker flush draws and thats just a disaster.

V1 c-bet just over 1/3 pot. We don't have enough information to define either opponent's hand well enough. But if your reads are right, V1 had a very strong hand to start, and V2 could have almost anything, if not literally ATC.

All I know is that we have at least 30% equity against everything either opponent could possibly have here, and 45%-80% against the bulk of V1's range, so I want to get more money into the pot on the flop, before the turn changes everything for the better or worse.

1) Top pair second kicker with the nut flush draw is a high equity draw, inasmuch as we're behind V's better AX holdings.

2) V1 is very unlikely to fold out any AX hand here to a donk bet on the flop. He'll want to see a turn. It's doubtful he'll fold any AX to a check-raise, since hero could have worse AXhh than AQ, and he's blocking AX. If V has AX, he'll think (correctly) that hero's x/r range is going to be draw heavy, or 2P/set heavy. He's never folding AA, and probably not folding AK, AQ, or AJ against that range, when he can improve to better 2P, and AQ and AJ can actually make some BD straights here.

3) I'm fine with V1 calling with hands that we're behind. We're only a slight under-dog to AK/AT, and we're a favorite over A8/T8. And we block AK, AT, and A8. We're only a 30% dog to AA, which, again, we block, and it's literally just 1 combo. He only has 6 combos of TT/88. We're crushing every other 1P and every other draw. V1 might think we're FOS and flat call, or come over the top with worse. If he only continues with better, that's fine, because we're trying to build the SPR to the point that he CAN'T fold TPTK or better when we jam turn.

4) I'm find with V1 folding out worse hands that have equity to improve. We WANT to deny equity from some worse hands. Obviously we don't want to fold out his worse flush draws, but what worse flush draws does he have when he's VPIP'ing 10% and opens UTG1? KJhh? J9hh? He's NEVER folding J9hh - that's an OESFD. He's probably not folding KJhh, if that's even in his range. We don't really mind if he folds worse PP's that might spike a set on the turn, when he's not going to continue betting worse PP's on an ace-high board after his flop c-bet gets two callers.

5) All of the other combos you'd rather x/r are not good, because if V1 jams, they have to fold, or if they continue, they have to make a hand, and it's unlikely any 1P hand they make will be good at showdown. Conversely, AQ is already top pair second kicker, which can also improve to 2P by hitting its kicker, giving us additional outs if we're behind.

V1 is pretty on spot. He may or may not open ATs, may not bet JJ with the ace on the board, there are probably a few other hands he opens but doesn't bet on this board.
V2 really depends on player and how tilted he is. He will have some TX that he won't give up to a single bet, possibly some 8X, could show up with J9, T8, A8s. He probably doesn't have AK/AQ/JJ+ when he flat calls preflop. What he does with low suited aces depends on the player, A8s and lower he may or may not have. Likely has JJ-88 in his range but gives up an underpair to a bet. No this range is not balanced or particularly sensible, it reflects the tilted players desire to get into hands and his refusal to give up.

sorry i forgot a few words - i meant ch/raising with intention of calling a shove or GII on the flop.

There's a later post you made with some good points but I wanted to go back n forth on the argument of it with ya which i'll do in a separate post as i dont feel like figuring out how to multi quote different posts right now and I dont have all the time to respond to everything properly just yet either heh.

appreciate the discussion - personally i think its important folks kidna go back n forth on their arguments - it both elucidates thought process to other players trying to learn as well as offering each of us a bit of time having other people stress test our logic/arguments too *thumbs up emoji*

apologies for being verbose, brevity is not my strong suit.

I'll try to keep these short and to the point:

1) i keep leaving out that our ch/raise is unlikely to get flat called by too much that wont just GII aside from the possible weaker flush draw. Of which i dont THINK there's a lot of combos in our villains range but I am VERY open to a discussion around what we perceive their range to raise the limp from up front - more about where that range bottoms out as this is critical to understanding what our future plays will be - which brings me to point 2

2) ch/raising flop potentially folds out a ton of stuff we are way ahead of if its there (again, see point 1 for bottom of V1s range) - for example if we say theres KJhh - what other lower card FDs does villain have that also avoid interacting with the potential straight draw thus reducing their equity loss vs our specific hand.

3) I'm advocating a line against their entire range which again - if we do agree its conservative, its not going to spaz and stack off w/ KK ever - our hand has potential to usurp some of their stronger holdings (sets, etc) but performs best simply sucking up money villain sticks into the pot in smaller increments vs the situations where its no longer a single bet on a street but the range that doesnt fold to a check raise on the flop or the range that raises the turn say.

The point I'm really focusing on can be addressed with the following questions: what hands will villain bet 3 streets with vs what hands will villain call the check raise with and also what hands would villain shove over a ch/raise on the flop with?

yes right now before any action place on the flop the equities make sense but clearly those equities change as the ranges will change depending upon what actions villain takes as its highly unlikely they play a mixed strat with their entire range (eg. betting/checking/folding whatever with a mixed frequency for every hand in that range). Which means once we ch/raise - villain would fold out the bottom and call or shove with a range that certainly has MORE equity than the one elucidated above.

Given a conservative villain, this range is narrow and wont have a lot of natural bluffs or other wild **** - its likely most of their hands that aren't ahead of us will still bet as our perceived range is wider/weaker in this spot and we can easily catch up vs the ones we're behind. perhaps this is too minimizing losses vs maximizing gains and thats the issue here?

Results:

Hero raises to 80. V1 tank folds. V2 folds, looking even more dejected.

First, if I 3bet preflop, and anyone called, Vs ranges and their perceived ranges of the Hero are completely different than with a preflop call.

As played, I hoped the raise would fold out the grinder V1's AK and get the tilt V2 to spew-call and go home. Isn't this just a standard squeeze play: get the good player to fold and isolate the bad player.

The flop is a great one for a semi-bluff. Because hero's capped his range preflop with the call, hero's hand is now well concealed. As played, because hero's ranged was capped, V knows hero has all the TT, 88, AT, and A8s. V knows hero doesn't have QQ+ or AKs. V's knows there's just a single combo of AhQh and AhJh, and though maybe he thinks hero could have AhQx or AhJx, he could very well think a tight player like the hero always folds AJx in the SB.

For those who think the hand is a value call, consider that because V1 opens to 20 UTG+1 only with AA, TT, ATs+, AQo+, on the flop he has 1 combo of AA, 3 combos of TT, 3 combos of ATs, 4 of AQo, and 6 of AKo. Heads up against V1 with AK, which he folds to a raise, hero is a 47/53 dog. Against AT, which V1 mostly calls but sometimes folds, hero is a 46/54 dog. Hero is a 32/68 dog against the sets, which V1 calls or re-raises, and the inverse against AQo, which he folds. Someone else can to the calculation but my guess the odds and implied odds with stack sizes make it a wash.

I think this is a good result. No guarantee we would have the best hand at showdown if we didn't improve, and no guarantee we'd get paid if we did improve.

Sent from my SM-G781U using Tapatalk

AK folds to a raise? you must play with some huge nits.

im a nit and i would never fold to a raise after downbetting the flop. the whole point of downbetting tptk is to get people to overvalue top pair and raise the bet with dominated hands. not to b/f.

I always respect your analysis. V1 was a nitty grinder. What other hand would he tank-fold against two players following a reraise except AK?

I imagine the grinder would fold AK there. If im imagining this hand played in my room vs most of the good regs or grinders I'm familiar with, i think they 100% fold AK if I make this XR here, and I would fold it here against most of them most likely as well and I dont think its too crazy.

Axs with the kicker worse than yours. maybe AJ. he probably had 2 outs vs your hand. id rather have kept him in the hand.

and always remember you play vs a range not vs one hand. so you are CRing vs a range that has a lot of hands that have 2 outs against you. dont fall into the trap that live players often do of playing vs. one hand.