2/5 NLHE 8 handed.

Table is unusually short stacked and a lot of 1/3 players are trying their luck.

V1 - Loose passive player playing up from 1/3. 500$. BB.

V2 - TAG/LAG winning player. Plays as high as 10/20 live. I've seen his graph and he's crushing 1/3. Not sure about 2/5 but at this table he's probably the best player. He knows all the usual strategy and can bluff, read the board, x/r light etc etc. That said, he levels himself. He comes down from 10/20 and talks about how "I unblock the 2nd nuts so I have to raise/fold!" as some guy does something he deems stupid when no one is really thinking on that level. CO. Covers.

H - V2 has called me somewhat tight but not overly so. We don't have a lot of hours together. 830$. HJ.

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Folds to H who opens A Q to 15, V2 to 50, V1 cold calls, H calls. 3-ways 2nd to act.

Flop 150 - A K 2

V1 checks, H checks, V2 bets 75, V1 folds, H calls

Turn 300 - 8

H checks, V2 bets 175, H tank calls (?)

River (530 back) 650 - K

Hero? What are you doing if he jams here? What are you doing if river were a brick like a 4 and V2 jammed?

4bet pre

Pre is fine , you can 4b too.


It's really a range question

It depends how you play your heart combos. If you have lots of hearts that hit, aq and AJ a8s 22 (AT probably folds on turn) , then you are on the middle of your range so it's a tough decision on basically a full pot bet where you need to call half the time. Maybe you call with aq with Qh otherwise fold. If you have some missed spades perhaps it becomes a call. But maybe some of the draws you raise on the turn, along with your two pair A8 and 22. so if you haven't many hearts flushes left here it's more a call. Not having a spade is good. It's basically close. I'd definitely fold aq with a spade and definitely call with Qh. So few you have no heart which is bad and no spade which is good. Toss a coin? Remember he has way more missed spades in his range than you as he can bluff the flop then again on the turn but you can't call the flop except with JT spades QT QJ .


4d isn't a total brick as you can have A4 spades and hearts, as can he. Again it's a range question. Now you unblock all missed flushes so I think it's a clearer call.

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Against the population, I fold to a jam. Against this guy, it's close. I'd probably block bet the river for $200 and fold to a raise.

If the river is just a brick, we have to bet or check-call. He's going to have a lot of busted draws and worse AX here. Our hand is too high up in our range and too under-repped to over-fold when we get to the river the way we do.

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I agree with Bill's excellent analysis post flop.

But I'm definitely in the 4b pre camp here. Playing this hand mw oop against the best player at the table isn't a spot I'm relishing.

AP: I feel like the Kh is a better card for us, as we have more small flushes given preflop action. It also reduces his KK combos to one. I think we have to call getting 2-1, although it's close. V has plenty of worse Axs here along with a few AK that beat us.

Edit: didn't see Docvail's comments while I was drafting. I would rather jam myself than blockbet. I think we have more flushes. I would be targeting his AQ to fold if I have no plans to fold myself. But I agree with Docvail on brick rivers.

V’s bet sizing on the Turn is bizarre—he should either be betting pot (or over-betting) or checking. I have no idea what range bets 60% pot here. If he’s on a draw, why would he risk getting blown off it with a check raise…while if he has value, why isn’t he charging you the max on this wet board, deep?

I’m inclined to check-call a shove. It would be nicer to have the Qh, but our not having a spade makes it a wash. Perhaps to avoid over-calling here we could fold this when we have the Qs and call all the others.

I’m fine with every decision you made so far and also think the River is so close that there’s not really an EV difference between calling and folding.

I don't think you should bet the river. You need to give him room to bluff. If you bet, you fold out hands you beat and get called or raised by the rest. Okay maybe you get AQ off a chop but that's it. Also if make a blocking bet then what are your bluffs that you make with that bet? Generally I don't like betting to see where you are at. It's just too exploitable and face up. Ppl make these sorts of bets because they are scared to make a big call or a big lay down when it's marginal. Better to toss a coin or spin a chip or shuffle your cards, than make a blocker bet tbh



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My reasoning for block betting is that our range on the river looks most like AX or a flush, assuming we would have raised flop or turn with AA/KK or AK.

If V has the nut flush or a boat, he can pretty liberally raise. There's only a slight chance he might be concerned we slow-played AK if he just has a flush. We can also have the nut flush here, so it's hard for V to raise as a bluff, or even with a better value hand like trip K's.

If we bet big, we can only get called by better. If we check, V can bet huge as a bluff, and with a lot of value hands, like trip K's. We don't block flushes or trip K's, only boats, so it's kind of dicey to check-call or check-fold.

But V could have a lot of worse AX that will call a small river bet, but otherwise check back. The pot odds will be too huge for V to raise as a bluff, and expect us to fold trip K's or better.

River X/c.

what position did you raise from? this matters a lot vs good players. if you opened from HJ or CO you should be 4 betting pre to 2.5-2.75x or so. if you 4 bet pre small your SPR is about 3ish assuming both players call, which is what you want for this hand vs a wide 3 betting range and a loose calling range.

also if you 4 bet pre and you get 5 bet shoved its a very very easy fold.

anyways, as played, start by checking.

how long did you tank the turn? if you tanked a really long time you look really weak. if you tanked a medium amount of time less so. fwiw.

once you check, if he shoves river its a gross spot. he has boats and probably lots of flushes.

again what position you raised from matters a lot vs good players because if you opened in late position he has more flushes than if you opened in early position. that said he also is smart enough to know that probably can get you off of Ax as this board is good for a pf 3 bettor. id make an assessment of weather or not there is easier money to be hand on the table and also prepare myself to be shown a bluff, so as to not tilt.

I see what you are trying to do targeting ax hands. My concern is that he has more flushes than us. Our only flushes are two Broadway hearts, as the non combo draw on hearts we raise turn as we don't have odds to call. Also we don't really have spades here. So what bluffs do we have? He has Broadway spades as bluffs albeit not great bluffs. And the kh is better for his range... He has small number of kx. He does lose two ak combos and two kk combos. But he has more than 4 flush combos to compensate.

So it's weird to bet when the card is better for him and where we have no bluffs to combine with our value bets. If we bet he should fold at least some of his ax as it's far down his range. So it's definitely an exploitative line for us to take to bet small here. The more GTO approach is probably to check and probably call

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I don't agree that he has more flushes than us. We both could have the nut flush in our range, but when we open HJ and V 3B's from the CO, his range is probably more weighted towards pocket pairs, and is going to have fewer SC's that can make flushes.

We're probably more likely to open QJhh than he is to 3B that same hand. If we're opening wide, we might have opened QTs, Q9s, or Q8s, but it's pretty unlikely those are hands he'd 3B.

The main concern here is whether or not he has the nut flush, not how many flushes he might have. Because if he has it, we can't, and if he doesn't have it, we can. If he has it, he knows we don't, and he can raise pretty liberally, confident that it's not very likely we'd slow-play AA/KK/AK this way.

The problem with giving V credit for QJhh is that it's just one combo, and he may not have 3B it pre, or barreled turn with it, rather than checking back and taking his equity. So, our small block bet is basically a gamble that he doesn't have QJhh, and he doesn't have AK, which we partially block.

If we check, V could jam better for value, worse for value, or as a bluff, not believing that we'd check river with a boat or the nut flush. If we block bet small, he'll raise with his boats, and he might raise with the nut flush, but he's probably not raising anything else for value or as a bluff.

We don't need to think about what our bluffs would be when we block bet. It's just a defensive bet, hoping to get called by worse. Maybe V will fold a chop, which would be awesome. We'll be ecstatic if V folds better, though that's unlikely. We just want to avoid V polarizing with a huge bet when we check.

But the combos we can block bet would have similar properties to bluffs, in that they block our opponent's thickest value. We wouldn't block bet QQ no heart, because it doesn't block any of V's value hands.

As non-intuitive and weird as it seems, our hypothetical "bluffs" would be all the AQ/KQ combos, because they block AK. The best of those combos would also have the Qh, to block the nut flush. These are the hands we can can block bet for value here - TPTK, and trip K's.

Our hand has good properties in that it blocks a good chunk of his AK combos, and unblocks his combos of AXss that might have raised pre, c-bet flop, and barreled turn, and might call a small bet, not believing that we have AK or the flush.

He could conceivably fold AQ here. If he folds AQ or a small flush 10%-15% of the time, and calls with worse AX 10%-15% of the time, we're printing. Otherwise, we're just preventing him from betting huge for value or as a bluff and putting us in the blender when we check.

Sorry I'm not understanding why we WANT to have the Q? Wouldnt that be a good card for V to bluff with? Hence he has more bluffs? Or is it:

We have no Qh ergo he has more flushes ergo his range has more value?

...

We have no Qs ergo he has more missed spades ergo his range has more air?

also...

Afterwards V told me he has waaaay more heart combos than me. I disagreed at the time but now I'm not sure. He said he would have 3bet me with all the 45hh 56hh 67hh 78hh T9hh etc etc

Another thought I had in the moment: "If he bets huge and I fold AQ OOP on a AK28... what hands AM I calling with? 22 only?"

If the River had NOT been a third Heart—if the flush HADN’T come in—then we would NOT want our Q to be a heart, because we’d be blocking his missed flush draws. (His QJ/QThh hands).

But when the flush DOES come in, then we DO want our Q to be a Heart, because we want to BLOCK VALUE—we DON’T want Villain to have QJ/QThh.

I think he had more flush combos because we can only call with 3 on the turn qt qj JT. All the rest, which we can have on the turn we should raise as bluffs as we don't have odds to call with them. But he can barrel all these hands so he has them on the river. If you block bet with weak value hands and have no bluffs or stronger hands it's exploitable as he can raise all the time and win. So it's an explosive play, taking a risk. Yeah it might work though. I prefer xc.

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Results?

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Re - the Qh - what Davo said. When the flush draw comes in, we want to block it (or at least, block the nut flush). When the flush draw misses, we want to unblock it (preferably the missed NFD).

Here, we'd ideally want to have the Qh, and NOT have the As, so that we're blocking the nut flush in hearts, and unblocking the NFD in spades.

V's FOS, or an idiot. He 3B you next to act. He should have more big PP's, and fewer middling SC's. You opened the HJ, and just flat called his 3B. You should have fewer big PP's, and more SC's that can make flushes.

The answer depends on the run-out, and the action. On a brick run-out, AQ is a decent bluff-catcher. On a draw-completing run-out, it's going to be even more dependent on our read of V and the action.

The way this was played, both of you are repping pretty thin. V could conceivably have some flushes here, but not very many, unless he's VERY aggro with his pre-flop 3B range. He shouldn't be 3B'ing you with any hand that makes a flush here, but MAYBE he's LAG enough to 3B QJhh, if he thinks you're opening too wide. He'd have to be a savage to get here with a worse flush combo.

V's range should actually have more suited Aces and Kings in it, which don't make flushes on this board, and big pocket pairs. So he could rep AA, KK, and AK for a boat, and some KX for trips, and some AX for TP, but that's about it, unless he's maniacal enough to play QQ or worse PP's this way, and you block QQ.

My suggestion to block-bet the river REALLY reduces the ranges to the point where any further aggression from V makes his hand face-up, and we can easily fold. Alternatively, we can check-fold, check-call, or bet big/jam, but I don't like any of those choices as much, the way we played this.

Generally, we'd be 4B'ing AA/KK pre-flop, and probably AK a majority of the time. Against most V's, most players would donk-lead or check-raise flop or turn with those combos, when it's such a wet board. So it's hard for us to show up with a boat here.

But we'd probably just flat call with AQ and worse AXs, KX, and our flush draws, so on the river, that's our range - mostly flushes, trips, top pair, and some tiny sliver of slow-played boats.

We can go for a check-raise with our boats, because we shouldn't have any. But we wouldn't check-raise or check-call our flushes, or our top pairs. We might occasionally but probably wouldn't usually turn trip K's into a bluff by check-raising.

Most of our range wants to block-bet to get value from V's worse AX, and perhaps optimistically fold out some of V's weaker value, though he shouldn't have much, because, again, he shouldn't have any flushes here, much less low flushes. It's unlikely, but occasionally he'll fold trip K's, if he convinces himself we'd only bet our flushes and boats for value, never AX.

Either way, our block bet keeps him from bluffing with a worse hand, or turning a worse value hand into an unintentional bluff. The fact that we can occasionally show up with a boat, and might not fold the nut flush helps protect our trip K's and AX from him raising as a bluff, and reduces his ability to get max value with his strongest hands that want to bet bigger when we check.

The worst hand he could raise here would be the nut flush, again, unless he's absolutely maniacal. Occasionally he might just flat call with the nut flush, worried we have a boat, and not thinking he can get value from anything worse. So, in that scenario, we limit how much value he can get by block-betting, instead of check-calling.

It sucks when we bet-fold to a raise, when we get snapped off by better, and occasionally when V calls with AJ, if he might have called a bigger bet. But the block bet protects the rest of our stack, and what we've already invested in the pot.

Literally disagree with every part of what you said there.

V 3B us next to act pre, and then c-bet the flop, into two opponents, either of whom could check-raise, and then continues to barrel the turn. That's just not a line we're going to see very often with a flush draw.

There just aren't that many flush combos he can have on the river that are strong enough to 3B next to act pre, and that will semi-bluff flop by c-betting into two opponents, AND barrel turn, after his flop c-bet gets called, on this AK-high board.

Whatever flush draws V has pre, he's going to check back flop at least some of the time, or definitely check back turn after c-betting the flop, because he doesn't want to get check-raised off his equity, something that will happen a lot when the turn brings in a second flush draw.

If V is REALLY aggro, he might 3B QJs and some other SC's pre, but he'd have to be maniacal to continue betting this way on the flop AND the turn. If he's playing even remotely reasonably, he's just not going to have many, if any flushes on the river, the way he played this.

Conversely, hero could have a lot of flush combos that raise pre, over-call the 3B behind V1, and continue to call flop and turn, then get there on the river. Hero could have every heart combo from 54s up to QJs.

Hero actually is getting the right implied odds to chase his draws by flat calling. Including what's left behind, he's getting almost 6:1 implied odds to call V's turn bet, when his flush draws will come in about 15%-20% of the time on the river.

Hero only needs about 5.5 to 1 to call with any flush draw that isn't also a straight draw. Hero's combo draws (QJhh, QThh, JThh, 54hh, 53hh, and 43hh) are going to get there 25% of the time, so they only need 3:1.

But we shouldn't be raising with any of those on the turn, especially not as a bluff, because V can just blast off with AA, KK, AK, any KX, and occasionally just AX, if he's really savage. It would be a disaster to raise as a bluff, and have V jam, forcing us to fold away 18%-25% equity.

We're not only block-betting the river with weak value. I'd also block bet with all our flushes, and boats, if we got here with a boat. We could also go for a check-raise with a boat, but only because we shouldn't have any boats here, and we'd expect V to bet for value or as a bluff often enough to take the risk he checks back.

V can't raise "all the time" and win, because he can't be sure we'd fold. He'd be nuts to raise with worse AX or some lower PP. It would be really risky to raise trip K's, because he'd basically be turning a strong value hand into a bluff, hoping we'll fold all our flushes, and that we didn't slow-play AA, or possibly river a boat with 88/22.

The absolute worst hand he could feel even somewhat safe raising would be the nut flush. And even then, if he thinks we might be slow-playing AA/KK/AK, he can't even raise with that. If he levels himself into thinking we might flat pre and flop with KK, he can't even raise AA.

A lot of this comes down to OP's read on V as being TAG/LAG, and leveling himself. There's a real possibility he thinks his table image could lead to hero playing AA/KK/AK/88/22 this way, and our block bet freezes him to prevent his raising with anything worse than AA/KK/AK.

Meanwhile, check-calling is one of the worst, if not the absolute worst option here. We're only beating worse AX and stone bluffs. We're chopping with AQ. We beat almost nothing he'd bet for value here. His only obvious bluffs are spade draws, a lot of which are just going to check back.

I'd rather check-fold than check-call, but it would be a disaster to check-fold if he decides to go thin for value with worse AX or some lower PP.

Meanwhile, a block bet might occasionally get called by worse AX or fold out AQ, and stops him from jamming KX and weak flushes, not that he should have any weak flushes, if any flushes at all. If we block bet and get raised, it's an easy fold.

I won't go too much into river play, but I think the 4bet pre is mandatory when the fish cold calls the 3bet with a capped range.

Yeah so I think we'd play the hand very differently. Making this block bet is probably ok if hero can have boats but I think we have zero boats. Set of 2s is our only boat and that's 3 combos and should be raising earlier in the hand really. So I basically don't like betting the river as he has huge range advantage. So to me it's check call or check fold. Agree we potentially don't beat any value so it's almost a coin flip for me if we call or not. I'd call hero's combo draws to avoid being pushed off them. But I'd raise some small number of low flush draws ,as if I get reraised off them it's not a huge disaster anyway. I don't think we have odds to call with them as you are assuming we get it in if we get the flush, and are not out flushed. So id rather use the rubbish flush draws as bluffs on the turn and I'd also raise with my best value hands.

Let's say on turn i have three sets and two a8s I can bet big and throw in 4 flush combos as bluffs

As played, on river I feel my range is potentially capped at aq! But yeah if you play differently and have Ak here for example you can play the river differently, fair enough, make the block bet also with ak


Anyway do we get the results?

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Riiiiiight. You're so smart. gosh you're smart.

This is really well written thanks doc

Not sure why you're responding that way, unless you two have some history of antagonism here. His response to your question was accurate.

Interested to see the results of the hand.

FWIW, and should have been mentioned earlier - this whole hand gets easier if we 4B pre, c-bet flop, and bomb the turn. Under-repping your hand pre kind of put you into a box by the river.

Results:

Later I realized he was 3-betting way too often and I should have 4-bet AQs for value but I'm not sure how this frequency changes with a loose passive caller up front... if it becomes closer to a 4-bet or closer to a flat call vs HU? I should add this loose passive in the blinds could conceivably have AK.