easiest check back in the world. You can't rep anything better than what you have. V is going to call with 2-pair or better and is almost never going to pay you off with worse. I think you probably lost this hand because V probably bluffs that board with all of his hands worse than 2-pair. check back and don't tell him what you had when he shows a better hand.

The only merit to betting is it makes your hand look like AK since no other part of your range should be betting this ugly board for value. But there's just so few worse hands that can pay you off, and if he's decent, better hands should never ever be folding. so I'm always cutting my losses and checking back here.

I think this makes really good sense. Having position on this Villian (all night) was huge. I think I could have flatted his 3-bet and let him take the lead on most flops. As played, getting the 4 bet call/dark check ended up being a pretty advantageous position to have. Easy check back on turn for me.

$600. There's a zero % chance he checks two pair or better here OTR, and to a non-good player your hand looks like a draw/AK

I agree that it would be tough to get called by worse unless he really insisted I had AK, maybe missed clubs. In hand, I took my time trying to figure out the best course of action. 77, 88, 99, TT, JJ, AA all beat me along with KQ. Some goofy JT or T9 beats me as well. The only hands I could get value from would be QQ or maybe a loose AJs, ATs (with the last two being discounted heavily). He is someone who loves to make value looking bets as bluffs when scare cards hit. I have no doubt that he would have fired at this River if a club hit. I had called down his last such bet when a scare card hit the river after I flopped a set of Queens maybe an hour before ($300 into $1050. So I leaned towards his check being more of a Give Up than a Trap.

A thousand times yes! Unfortunately I didn't come to this realization during the hand!

I checked it back, he showed QQ and I won the pot. He had one of the few hands he could have that might have called a bet with worse. I opted for the safer line & immediately called myself out on it at the table. Still a nice pot. And we can all learn from my mistakes!

Dam you missed out on $600 oh well.

Yeah his hand looks exactly like QQ and maybe AJs occasionally, just hands with SDV or a random bluff that decided to stab. Sometimes AK. But you gotta bet. His x'ing range is super weak on this runout, and he's calling almost all of his bluffcatchers

Don't be too quick to handcuff yourself to flatting. There's a ton of value in 4b KK particularly against a player who has May more calls than he should and has already 3b your perceived strong range. Also, don't fall into this misconception that KK loses so much of its luster deep that you shouldn't go 'face up' as a result of depth. That's not a fair trade, particularly in position, and 'face up' goes both ways once OOP 3b-flats... if he isn't face up, then he's wider, in which case 4! for value becomes of even greater importance.

...and yeah, go for value otr. You're faring extremely well against his checking range (he's unlikely crafty enough not to bet again w >KK) however, here, I wouldn't bet 600, I'd size way down to capture a touch more of his range at 100% clip.

Results oriented thinking. He had the one hand that you are ahead of that MIGHT call a river bet (He probably folds though).


More likely he has a hand better than yours that instinctually slowed down on a four-straight board. Considering you don't have any draws in your range other than precisely AcKc, it's pretty optimistic here to rep exactly AK to get a very narrow portion of his range to call.

1/2 players arent folding QQ here to a bet. Hardly ever. It's not results orientated. He has 6 combos of QQ and random 3-bet hands preflop with jx in it. He never checks a better hand than KK here

Everybody realizes that Hero has a NIT image and raised UTG then 4-bet, right? Our range is very transparent here, and expecting to get value with KK on a 79TJ board against a guy who appears to have some hand reading ability is VERY optimistic, in my opinion.

Even if we are ahead much of the time, it's irrelevant if he rarely pays us off with worse.

not that it matters much but I'm quite sure this is 2/5.

Villain should know you have zero 8s in your range and would raise a set on the turn. He'd fire out a bet to target your KK+ range if he could beat it. I think you're safe to value bet the river. I'd go smallish to get value from worse pairs that may crying call and put you on whiffed AK. I'd make it $400 and puke call if he comes over the top.

I had an irrational fear of Villian raising any value bet I fired out. I was happy to check it down in that spot. In hindsight I'd like to put in a bet of $450-$600 & I think it gets called. Live & learn.

This is a $2/$5 game & I think he could fold QQ if the bet was sized too high. $450 seems about right in hindsight. Always tougher without all the information!

I think it would have been a puke fold if he came over the top. That's why I leaned towards the check in game. 100% agree that I missed some pretty obvious value otr. Thanks for all the great analysis, crew!

I think this villain has zero value river c/r and only bluffs

if V thinks hero will value bet KK or AA here then he should c/r his entire value range since Hero is capped at 1 pair.

This is such a villain specific street :/

If you were to bet for thin value I'd go half pot, any less you're inky representing aa/kk, any higher it looks like a trapped jj or tt

If you get raised though it is disgusting, but if he has an aj/qj type hand that would call a half pot bet you're losing out on a 100bb profit (10-20 hours of play)

Oh didnt realize there was four to a straight. My bad. X or bet are both fine. I'd probably go like 30% pot

^^^^ this
When you bet so much pre it definds you hand a lot and can see the merit of just flatting with AA against it

Sent from my SM-J320ZN using 2+2 Forums

If you're going to make it 340 pre and then panic when he calls and checks dark and you get an averagish flop, maybe just flat call the 85 pre and play in position. I think you can get good value by keeping his full range in pre. Making it 340 only makes sense if he's a drooler and you think that's the way to stack him. Any good player will fold pretty much all the hands you want to play against when you go that big. And now you've bloated the pot so much, it's going to be hard to get away from any decent board.

Honestly, my usual play in this spot would be to flat call the 3bet pre. Because I'm a tight player like you, and when I 4bet, competent villains are going to know my narrow range far too well. The fix is to start 3 and 4 betting more so that my opponents can't do this to me. But in the meantime, I hate bloating a pot when my hand is practically face up. I just don't see him paying you off with a weaker hand once you go to 340. The best case is that he flops a draw and make a semi bluff at you. Is that a best case scenario you want?

If you bet the flop, you'll either win the pot in the middle, or be put in a very tough spot where you have to make a 400 BB decision with one pair.

Why do you think the 4 card straight is relevant? Hero's hand is face-up as AK, AA, KK, QQ, so hero can never have the straight in that spot. Villain should see that and still go for value with two pair hands if he puts hero on an overpair that will bluff catch or check behind. Why would he now check two pair or a set with a 4 card straight on the board if hero can never have the straight?

I mean, the worst possible thing we can do against a decent aggressive opponent is neatly partition our range into weak flats and strong 4-bets. I like your line. I'm super happy playing with KK ip, I'm super happy 4-betting it (because I have a bluffing range against this villain).

I deeply disagree with OPs assessment that a thinking player is a bad player to bluff. A thinking player is a bad player to sustain an exploitably wide bluffing range against (yes), but never bluffing (trying to win with weak hands) ensures that you will lose against a thinking player over time and makes you incredibly easy to play against (standard tight/passive regfish bleed enormous amounts of money to better players).

This is an interesting point. I don't like the idea of 4 betting light to balance. I'm nitty preflop, remember! Flatting in this spot, especially since it is already guaranteed to be heads up with the Villian, sounds more and more appealing. It keeps the SPR in a more comfortable range where we have some wiggle room to get away on the right boards.