Played this hand in my last session. Made a number of decisions without really thinking about them too long or hard, and so in retrospect I'm not sure if they were anywhere near optimal.

1/3. $500 max. 9 handed. Friday, around 5pm.

V1 / UTG - mid-late 50's WG. Been at the table a few hours. Never seen him here before, but my sense is he sort of knows what he's doing. Bit of a TAG-fish - tight agressive, but fairly face-up in most pots. Can't remember him 3B'ing much if at all, and definitely don't remember him 4B'ing. Started around $650.

V2 / CO - late 50's / early 60's WG. Hero and V2 know each other well. V2's been crushing it lately, in tournaments and cash, at 1/3 and 2/5, possibly even 10/10. Former professor of psychology (not kidding), likes to use speech-play and get inside opponents' heads, and SUPER aggro. Capable of 3B'ing very light and jamming with just a draw or total air. Lots of meta-game / leveling with hero. Currently getting obliterated, stuck around $2k on the session, starting the hand around $550.

Hero / BTN - early 50's WG. Currently having an unbelievable session. Crushing the regs. Destroying the fish. I am the poker gods chosen son today, up over $1700 in just a few hours. They are giving me good starting hands, sending me whatever I need, and generously blessing all my reads. Starting around $2200.

OTTH...

V1 opens UTG to $15. Standard open size for the table, though we'd seen some EP opens up to $20.

V2 3B to $55 from the CO. A little large for a LP 3B, but possibly due to V2 wanting hero out of the hand.

Hero on the BTN looks down at KQdd.

Ordinarily, I might fold KQs facing an EP open from a tight player and a 3B from anyone who isn't V2. If V2 or any other reg opened from MP/LP, this would be a mandatory 3B. In this spot, folding felt too nitty, and 4B'ing felt too spewy, so without thinking about it too much, I opted to just flat call, even though cold-calling a 3B isn't really a thing, according to pros.

So...I dunno - flat call here with KQs too fishy, or okay?

Blinds fold, V1 calls, and we're three to the flop...

FLOP ($165 net of rake) - QQ9tt. I'm not 100% sure of the suits. No diamonds, obviously.

Action checks to hero. At this point, I'm not sure if I should bet or check it back, and what size I should take if I do bet. I have no idea what I'd do if I bet and get raised by V1, but I'm not crazy about giving my opponents a free card on such a wet board. So, without thinking too long, I casually toss out $75 using three green chips.

Here again, I dunno - should I just check? Is this 45% pot size stupid? Should I go 1/3 or less, 2/3 or bigger?

V1 rage-mucks. V2 thinks for a few seconds, mutters something that didn't quite register with hero's brain, then jams for roughly $500.

Before everyone says this an obvious insta-call, I hesitated in-game, thinking about previous hands where I'd seen V2 say something weak-sounding before jamming, the meta-game, and the recent table dynamics.

While this sort of weak-statement speech-play is usually an indicator of the nuts within the general population, I've seen V2 do it with both value and bluffs against other opponents. Against me, though, he usually had thick value. The only exception I could remember was an earlier hand from this same session, when I 3B him pre with A5s, and he 4B-jammed with KQ, of all hands.

V2 can obviously show up with 99 or AQ for value, and he's capable of 3B'ing pre and jamming with QJs or a decent draw. But I wasn't sure if my bet sizing might have induced him to jam lighter, or if I was running so well and my bet looked so strong that he'd never jam without AQ or 99. He's already stuck four buy-ins. I figured he'd have to tighten up at some point.

Like, from his perspective, what hands am I cold-calling pre that bet almost 1/2 pot on this flop? Do I somehow have some random low-equity bluff here? The only obvious bluff I could see would be JTs with a FD or BD flush draw, but if he's jamming as a bluff, I'd expect him to have that, not block it. Likewise, JJ and TT block me from having JTs. And I didn't think he'd over-play AA/KK this way, when my 3B-calling range pre could have 99 or QX in it.

I'm guessing no one here is ever folding KQ in my spot.

yeah i mean pre is too big to have a cold calling range at this depth (unclear if you really want one in general but can argue for it otb in some contexts) and i dont think your reasons for it are really sound or even exist from reading the thread. yes you should bet the flop most of the time, as played you have trips good kicker in an spr 3 situation. like idk, most of your threads are these long convoluted essays about how you made a bad fundamental play bc of rounders level tells or whatever and you're not really open to people telling you otherwise. not every hand needs to be a soul read and you are really opening yourself up to making colossal ev errors doing this. i wouldn't bother worrying about what v2 has or what he thinks i have, you have a hand you want to get the money in with and the money has gotten in.

66, 77, 88, TT, JJ, JTs, T9s, 98s.

I can maybe see flat calling this on the button. I was in a similar situation i posted about where i was also on the button with same exact hand and an unknown opened, reg 3bet, and i elected to 4bet. Well the UTG raiser flatted and the reg jammed on me w some low pocket pair and I wouldve flopped top pair so i definitely regretted it. And for that reason, that its a strong hand we dont mind calling with and we dont want to get jammed on, i think its fine to flat here.

We have trips and your villain is prone to doing goofy stuff. Even if he wasnt I dont see how we could ever fold vs anyone unless we were crazy deep.

You could bet all kinds of stuff on the button when checked to here. Pocket pairs, any 9, any straight draw, any flush draw, so villain cant really put you on that tight of a range. He can jam with w QTs, QJs, same hand, and also every straight and flush draw, plus total air he decides to spaz with based on your history. You are beating way more than youre losing to. This is a snap call.

I mean...okay, maybe, but if I posted this hand, and I said I had any of those hands, and that I bet when action checked to me, I'm pretty sure everyone here would say betting those hands would just be a spew.

Maybe JT, TT, or 9x makes sense. Don't know that I'm just going to randomly stab at the pot with 66-88.

Fair enough. That was my initial thought as well. I posted the thread to see if anyone thinks otherwise.

Pre you have to fold what good hands cold call here. Snap flop

Preflop flat call isn't as bad as pros make it out to be. Pros talk a lot about not flat calling 3 bets but if you look at actual hand histories they do it more often.
In this situation though when V2 puts in 1/10 of his stack flat calling is weird. Your in the twilight zone where no drawing hands can really get odds to fish for a good flop and no strong hands would flat against an aggressive bluffy villain.
On the flop 45% would usually be bad but here the pot is so bloated that it works. $75 is enough to make villains decided then if they want to play for stacks or not. Board is wet enough that is what matters, your hand is not so strong you want to invite two villains along. The normal problem with bets a bit under 50% is that if your just probing to see if anybody wants to stick around then a 1/3 pot bet works and if you want to apply pressure then you need something 50%+ depending on the situation.
When V2 shoves you need to call. Not only is your hand really good and V2 could be shoving worse QX for value but you played the hand oddly enough that V2 probably isn't putting you on the right range.

⁰ Um, what? Vs this V? This V is betting like he doesn't want to face a setmine, stuck and firing a way too-big 3b. I.e., some uber premium.

Ok. H has a pretty good suited hand, let's go. Call and see what the flop shows.

Trip Qs, lol. Stick it in his face and call the shove. If he popped you with 99---he shouldn't be---NH (and we know the rest).

KQs is an excellent 4 betting hand because it blocks KK QQ AK AQ and unblocks Axs that people love 3 betting with.

As played id bet flop, but i dont hate checking back, to let someone else bet the turn. letting a free card peel isnt as big of a deal when the straight completing K gives you a FH. I also find it a bit fishy the hyper aggro 3 bettor checked, i find that these mega aggro types almost play “reverso” of normal, where the moment they hit something, all of a sudden they are checking.

I mean your spr is 3 and you have the 3rd nuts. With the read and everything im definitely not happy about it but that would be a gigantic hero fold. Some advice i have heard is dont over adjust to the V, but idk about over trusting reads.

Its also worth mentioning that if this is a regular V, if he showed up with Aq/99 here its massive intel for the future. You described him as very aggressive, and most guys like that ive seen bet flop at a 90%+ clip after 3 betting, so if thats the case with him, now you know he checks his very strongest hands, meaning that you can bluff raise him off his 3 bet flop bets.

I mean, I understand our thinking preflop so I'm not going to hate (although I just fold). Preflop isn't nearly as WTF as our JTs HH, imo.

Is there a flush draw on the flop? Cuz this would be the difference between betting and checking (to tarp/induce) for me (especially how the OESD gives us a boat some of the time and so we're not as worried about protecting against that).

With an SPR of < 4 against a guy who is capable of making big moves, especially against what could we a wide bet by us when checked to, I think we just have to sigh call this. Having said that, this game plays differently than mine (i.e. the answer to "when was the last time I got in $500 on the flop" is, um... perhaps never?).

GcluelessNLnoobG

I don't like the flat pre w/ this hand, but I understand why you did it. Now that you are here, it's a must call, but I'm sure you know that. If he has AQ or 99, more power to him -- the gods have spoken.

In most 1/3 games, at least where I play, there's not that much 3B'ing, and what little 4B'ing there is, it's usually just a 4B-jam. My 4B'ing range at 1/3 is going to be somewhat dependent on my read of V's, but it's going to vary from pretty strong to extremely strong.

KQs just doesn't fit well in that range, knowing we'll end up facing AA/KK/QQ/AK/AQ a lot, and we'll be dominated more often than not. We'll always fold KQ to a 5B jam, and it'll be rare that an opponent will call with TT/JJ, we'll spike top pair, and they'll want to gets stacks in.

It's really unusual to be in a 3B pot after flat-calling pre, then having action check to us on a high-paired and two-tone board. Like, it happens so rarely that I don't know how I'd range opponents, or what our betting range is supposed to include. Obviously QX, JTs (if we even have JTs as a 3B-cold call), 99, and some PP's that need protection, like TT/JJ, maybe 88, and if we got there with A9s, I guess that too.

No idea how many flush draws would make sense. AKs might be a 4B pre. AQs/AJs/ATs/A5s might be flat-calls or 4B's, I guess. I shouldn't be showing up here with KJs or worse KX, I'd think.

Seems to me like a 3B-cold calling range is going to have a lot of KQs / QJs / JTs type holdings that look attractive pre, and are going to be fairly playable post flop when we're IP. So if I'm either V, and the BTN cold-calls the 3B pre, then bets this flop, I'm going to think he's got some piece that is no worse than A9s or JTs, but could be Qx or 99 a lot of the time.

I wasn't trying to say in my OP that I was seriously considering folding here. But I wasn't entirely sure V would be spaz-raising with air or just a draw very often, given that he knows I know he's capable of that, and he's stuck four buy-ins, this seems like a board that would smack my range, and I shouldn't be stabbing at this pot against two opponents in a 3B pot without a real hand.

if you think his 3b range is so strong that you can't 4bet, i dont see what calling does for you beyond getting you stacked quite often postflop with stacks the way they are. you're dominated by every value hand and spr post is going to be that you cannot fold your hand if you make a pair or draw. also villain definitely does not sound like someone 3bing only qq+, ak. id recomend looking at some sims to see how this spot is generally approached because this is like the 4th time you've posted a hand where you're cold calling a 3b in a spot that generally gets simplified to 4b or fold which makes me think you do it often (and are likely leaking quite a bit of ev as a result)

I appreciate the thoughtful response.

I posted the hand because in my gut, I thought there might be something fundamentally wrong with flatting pre, and I might have thought about it more if I wasn't deep-stacked and running well. I wasn't expecting to get such a favorable flop and have action check to me, so I really had no idea what to do on the flop, and didn't want to tank too long before deciding, because that can look strong. So there again, I wasn't sure about my bet sizing.

I agree that I played the hand oddly, which is why I was wondering if I somehow accidentally played it right, or if I just got extremely lucky despite playing it all kinds of wrong.

Interesting take that seems at odds with what others are saying. Do you think KQs is good to 4B regardless of stakes, or would you downgrade it at 1/3, where there's almost no 4B'ing with any hand, unless it's a 4B jam?

I never thought about the fact that it unblocks all the AXs hands people love to play, and some people will over-play by 3B'ing those combos, assuming we're not talking about AKs/AQs/A5s, but all the other AX from A2 up to A9.

KQ seems like a tricky hand to 4B, because we'll likely have to fold to a 5B, and our opponents' continue range should be pretty strong.

You're touching on something that I was sort of struggling with in-game, the way some aggro players will reverse things and do the opposite of what we'd expect.

Like, it wouldn't make sense for him to check-jam AA/KK here. And whereas most players will feel compelled to bet AQ for value and protection on this two-tone board, I could see this V check-jamming AQ, or especially 99. And while I thought he was capable of jamming JT, I wasn't sure he'd 3B a hand like that over a UTG/EP open from a TAG-fish.

So it seemed like his jam was extremely polarized to AQ, 99, maybe a worse QX that I wasn't sure he'd 3B pre, or something completely insane. And I wasn't sure how much I should discount insane, if it should be discounted at all.

Yep, I didn't think you'd call here, but I respect your consistency. Actually admire your discipline, as far as adhering to your core logic goes. I plan to read that mega-thread you started, eventually, and possibly learn your ways.

There was a flush draw on the flop. Sorry if that wasn't clear. I don't remember the suits, so I just put "tt" for "two-tone" on the flop.

I'll admit that in-game, I didn't pause long enough to think about either V having JT and what a K does in that scenario. It honestly didn't even occur to me that either V would show up with JT. I didn't think a TAG-fish would open JT from EP. I couldn't be sure my aggro friend wouldn't 3B that hand pre, but I guess I was giving him credit for not 3B'ing it over an EP open from a TAG-fish.

If I had thought about it, I'm not sure I'd have looked at boating up as a good thing, in that if either V thought I might have QX, a K could very likely make me a boat, and lead JT to shut down, whereas I'd want JT to call another bet on turn, then be ecstatic to hit their draw on the river.

As far as my hand needing some protection, I was mostly just thinking about the potential flush draws from either V having AKs or other AXs. Also just hoping that V1 in EP actually opened with a real hand like AA/KK and was hoping to check-raise, or that V2 might have gotten out of line with QX or A9s, and neither would give me credit for having QX and not slow-playing it.

That kind of goes back to the point @Tomark made, about aggro V's sometimes reversing things. I could see myself slow-playing KQ there, sometimes, maybe even most of the time, if I'm running well and splashing around, hoping not to scare my opponents away.

So instead, I thought it might look bluffy if I bet, and I was trying to figure out a bet size that would look like I was stabbing at the pot without wanting to commit too much to a weak bluff.

Respectfully, I think you've misunderstood something I've said here.

I wasn't worried that V2's 3B range was super strong. I wasn't sure how strong V1 was here. So when action is on me, facing V2's 3B, I was thinking that if I 4B, it puts V1 in a jam or fold spot, and I would absolutely have to fold if V1 jammed.

I know you don't like how much thought I put into the meta-game and reads, based on how often you've advised me to play more according to charts or sims or GTO whatever. I get that. But that's not how I play.

I pay attention to the table dynamics. In this hand, I felt that flat-calling the $55 3B with a plan to fold if V1 4B was an acceptable risk to take, preferable to risking a >$175 4B and having to fold to a jam.

With V1 starting $650 effective, and given the fact that I'd never seen him 4B, and couldn't even remember him 3B'ing much, I didn't think he'd 4B here with worse than AA/KK or AKs, and if he wanted to 4B with a wider range, because he perceived V2 as being too aggro, he'd be less likely to do it if I was also in the hand, so my flat call seemed to be a risk worth taking.

i think a pretty good exercise for you might be to think about how often %age wise you think v1 is opening and then look at what % of hands hes 4bing and figure out how often thats happening here. you can use openpokertools or propokertools or something but you're going to see that this isn't a huge driver of our action (its going to be something like 2.6% 4b range and probably 18-20% opening range, also if you cold 4b he may fold the bottom portion of that bc he dunno what to do - the qq / ak portion) . also the 4b size here is not going to be anywhere near 175, its going to be like 110-120.

this isn't like a stylistic thing, you keep posting threads where you're making > 50bb deviations from equilibrium with minimal evidence. pretty much you only see that quality of mistake at this depth in literal whales. i get the math is scary but its the fundamental driver of the game you're playing / trying to improve at, you can't just decide i don't play like that and ignore it lol (if you're trying to win).

Well I think different styles' players can flat/fold/raise with KQdd PF with solid reasons and they know what they are doing.

But if you call with KQs, in position, flopped trip Qs and unsure about what to do you should just fold pre.

Given the above, the post would have been more readable if you use less descriptions such as 'crushing the regs, destroying the fish' and irrelevant things like 'professor of psychology' (I had a degree in psychology so I am sure there is no significant correlation between psychology scholars and good poker players). Otherwise I just thought you "crush the games" by getting lucky flops like this.

If I'm understanding you, then the reason we should 4b vs call, even if we have to fold to a 5 from V1 or 2, is to fold out the bottom of V1 and 2's range that has superior equity to our hand?

That range reduction and equity gain outweighs shrinking the SPR while we've the button with a broadway SC, and potentially forfeiting the difference between a call and the amount of our 4b? OOP, I totally agree. But I had thought the button outweighed that? I don't have PPT (obv.).

Thanks.

I don't really want to debate the logic of a play based on running sims when I'm playing low-stakes against fishy players doing things the sims don't do.

My motivation for starting the thread was primarily to see if others thought the cold-call pre and flop bet were good or bad and the reasoning why people viewed them one way or the other, at least partly because of V1's post-hand grumbling (more on that in the spoiler).

Once V2 jams, I think most would agree I have to call, regardless of any reads. Obviously I'm not folding.

However, if I did run into AQ or 99, I wondered if people wouldn't view that result as support for why the cold-call pre or flop bet was bad, effectively saying, "that's why you shouldn't cold-call a 3B pre with KQs."

Reveal:

well. solver doesn't have a text output for why it does things but my guess is it's similar to why alot of ranges can get simplified into 3b / fold pre. we don't gain much if any ev from having a flatting range, and it becomes extremely difficult to try and balance this cold calling range both pre and postflop (to actually realize that tiny amount of ev). i've seen some monker solves that have coldcalling otb as a thing with like very fractional amounts of some combos but in practice how are you going to randomize 15% of the time and is it actually worth doing that? would we be better off not learning how to play in that extremely nuanced spot and just play our whole range here as a 4b or a fold from an effort to gain standpoint? open poker tools is free and can do % of hands. i think propokertools is or was but cant remember. but the point was just to look at how often v1 actually has a hand to cold 5b with since that was the reasoning presented for not cold 4betting. i actually think preflop here will look similar to solves except v1 will be opening too loose pre and v2 will be 3betting too much (which makes cold 4betting more appealing)

re this hand. its not about playing like a solver, but you don't seem to have a base line strategy or even a way to figure out if you made a good play or not. is why all of these threads are u writing essays about extraneous details and defending your plays

I actually do have a baseline strategy, which I've discussed occasionally. I'll also sometimes make deviations from that strategy when I think an in-game adjustment is warranted, as is often the case in live low-stakes.