Im on a poker road trip so Im at a new poker room and dont know anyone. Playing 1/3 deep stack but nobody is deep yet. Table is very passive with lots of limping.

2 limps to me and I make it $15 with QhJh. My image is probably that of a maniac. Im raising liberally because nobody else is and nobody is fighting back. BB and both limpers call.

No real reads on anyone besides they are all 65+ and all seem to be friends.

Starting stacks
V1 ($210)...first limper
V2 ($225)...second limper
V3 ($150),,,BB
Hero covers the table

Flop ($60) Kd Qs Jc. First limper checks, second one leads out for $45. Thoughts?

Ur position?

Sorry, Im in position. Cutoff or button, I forget. Limpers are both in MP

So older tight regulars are stereotypical tight weak, meaning they limp a bit to often, and are passive unless they hit monsters post flop. It is perfectly reasonable for a player like that to limp AK, A10, JJ, KJ, 109, and KQ. you beat exactly 1 of those hands. Now there are plenty of people at 1/3 who just randomly click buttons. V2 had 75 BB to start the hand, I'd probably call flop, and call down unimproved but I wouldn't feel great about it.

Cant he also have AQ, KT, QT and JT?

If our image is a maniac, I might just overlimp this (although I realize we're not going to get a maniac image by overlimping much). My reasoning for this is because we're not going to thin the field with this raise so best hand is going to win postflop, and I'm not convinced we're going to have that more than our fair share of the time at this table (i.e. I expect to be dominated here a lot by bigger hands limping in). Building a bloated multiway pot setting up a small SPR with a hand that is most likely going to make TP with a worse kicker is meh, imo.

I probably just lie in the bed I made and shove on the flop. There's a good chance we were dominated going in and this guy made a bigger two pair, but I'm also thinking that perhaps they might be checking their hand to maniac us. So I'm just kinda hoping we're looking at pair + draw here enough and we can use our maniac image to our advantage by perhaps getting looked up lightly.

GcluelessNLnoobG

I think we can use position and call here. I think it's optimistic to expect an OMC to lead JT here. Not sure about the rest of the range.

ProPokerTools Hold'em Simulation

75,240 trials (Exhaustive)

board: KQJ

Hand	Pot equity	Wins	Ties
QhJh	33.88%	24,348	2,285
AT, 9T, KQ, KJ, QT, KT, AK	66.12%	48,607	2,285

Now you can run ProPokerTools on your desktop!
Download the Odds Oracle 2.30 Now

If we just call, what's our turn plan? We'll only have a PSB left.

This is part of the reason I really don't like preflop with these stacks. We get ourselves into pretty much the exact same situation on Qxx / Jxx boards too.

Gwe'rejusthopingheshutsdown?G

I call flop and fold to a large turn bet if I don't boat up

OMC's rarely will take the lead in a pot without 2 pair or better but he does have like two hands in his range that he might "think" are the best hand....AA, AK but that's it really

We are really reaching to find hands he does this for value with that we beat, but can't really fold the flop

Course, if we call we have a big advantage of being able to get away from the hand if one of the other 2 guys left to react goes nuts, so there is that.

GmehG

I'm not sure I like the raise pre unless when you say lots of limping, QJ is better than most of their limping range.

But as played, I really find a fold here. This flop hits their range so hard, even if you are ahead here, you are dodging a gazillion outs and you have two passives acting behind you. The one checker on the flop could be trapping (loose passives love to do that against overly aggressive). Hollywood for 10 seconds if you must, but this is a fold.

If you call here, what's the plan for a blank turn and another $50 bet (loose passives only sort of in relation to pot size).

How have we been playing postflop? Are we checking back a lot? Or bulldozing thru hands trying to run over the table?

I think this makes a difference.

Gshoveifbulldozing,foldifcheckingback?G

Grunch.

V has 165 behind and pot will be 150 if we call. We can commit. We could call this and fold to a turn bet but commit if turn is checked through.

I think in game I call here and evaluate turn. I don't think an old man donks with one pair on this board, but it is possible. If he bets again, I'm very comfortable folding even though we're getting good pot odds.

I think this may be a fold since they're old guys. Sounds like the poker room I play at in Oklahoma. All the old guys are friends and nitty. The poker room is like their country club. They only play monster hands. In this situation it sounds like he has either flopped a straight or a set. I would be very suprised if you were ahead.

It's sad to fold such a good hand, but I think you've got the read.

I wasnt just blatantly running the table over, but I was taking advantage of position and any weakness and semi bluffing more than normal. I find that most times when someone donks into the raiser, they have a weakish hand, but this time it felt different because theres 4 people in the pot and his $45 flop bet into a $60 pot doesnt seem weak.

Ya, conflicting spot. The donk into the world should be taken as strong. But the donk into betty you (who is most likely expected to bet this) should be taken as weak.

I really seem to be alternating between shove versus fold depending on what we think (and I'm thinking I'm now leaning towards fold cuz I'm just not sure people are donking the weaker hands here multiway which eliminates a lot of combos we're ahead of). Calling seems to be an inbetween cop out that I'm not convinced is good either, but maybe it's not as bad as I think.

GwishywashyG

Fold. You should not have a calling range in this spot.

If you knew his gii range was exactly JT-KT, TT, (AK doesn't change much if you include it) then you'd shove your 60%. If you knew it included T9s, AT, KQ, KJ, QJ, then you'd fold.

So, irl, when a so-far passive and likely straightforward V donks into PFR/4 handed on a scary board, you aren't making too big of a mistake assuming his range is weighted toward the meatier side of range 2 above. Your image, even if he is aware, has no bearing on things either here.

Worst hand I'm shoving here is KQ w bdfd.

At first glance that's certainly possible, but it's also possible that he expects Hero to raise as often as bet. It's also possible that V doesn't care what hero does becasue he has the nuts on a scary board and is betting his hand strength period. Point is, were just leveling ourselves without history which is dangerous in any marginal spot, and likely useless at shallow 1/3.