$1/3 game. We're in the big blind with pocket 3s and a $300 stack. UTG limps, and it fold around to the small blind with about a $275 stack. Small blind, mid 30s and new to the table, pops it to $15. I call as does the limper. Pot is $45.

Flop comes 963 rainbow. Small blind cbets for $35. Even though the limper still has to act behind me, due to a tell I'm pretty sure he's folding.

Given that there are 30 combos of overpairs, 16 of AK, and 16 of AQ, I feel like raising or calling both have merit. Plus the board is dryish too so a raise could look strong.

In game I raised to put stacks in play, targeting overpairs and hoping villain would put me on an open ended str8 draw.

Do you agree with the raise? If so, what's your sizing?

I probably donk out when SB checks to me, as played I raise. Reason is we are OOP, if we call and then he checks the turn back, we miss value.

My bad, the pf raiser cbet. Post has been edited.

OK, well I call this board IP and 100bb effective, it's relatively safe. Planning to raise every turn.

Deeper I would raise to get stacks in.

Flat call -- because he is OOP and you want to give him a chance to make a mistake on the turn.

I call. Don't need to raise to get stacks in. If you call, there's $115 in pot, and $230 behind. If SB bets again, you can call or raise depending on his sizing. If SB checks, I bet $80 on turn. With a call, pot is $275 and only $150 behind, so shove river.

I'd be more apt to raise if OOP or if there was a flush draw on board. As PFR in SB, hard to put V on 87, so he probably has two outs at best.

His sizing is fairly strong. I'd suspect his range is mostly overpairs here, so I think we can flat and wait for him to fire on the turn.
He should be firing $60 - $70 on the turn, at which point we can raise to $150 and cram most rivers.

By the time he calls the turn, he's got over half his stack in and doubt he'll be able to find a fold.

Only calling

There is nothing in that board to warrant a raise. Asking V to put us on a SD from a raise is a little suspect.

This is a good point. I know others disagree, but I think V's are much more likely to put you on a flush draw than a straight draw that requires two cards to make a straight. If this is the case, one implication is that it's easier to project a semi-bluff if there's a flush draw on the board rather than a 2-card straight draw. Other implications are that 2-card straight draws have better IOs than flush draws, and that it's easier to bluff when the flush comes in than when the straight comes in. Note none of this implies when the straight draw only requires one card to play (i.e. on a 567 board, people are very wary that you have an 8, but on a 58x board, they're less wary that you may have 67).

Call and it's not close. You're in position and can raise almost any turn

I think a call is fine and sometimes I will do just that. But I like a raise a little more here.

Villain's sizing suggests an overpair, and as others have noted, this is a dry board. If we raise, the only hand that really beats Villain is a set, and at these levels it's really hard to find a fold with QQ, KK, or AA (or even 1010) to a single raise on a dry board.

I pop it up to $85. If Villain has a nice overpair, they are calling (or shoving) and stacks are getting in on flop or turn.

Another minor reason to raise: even on a dry board like this, there can always be action slowing turns. For instance, if Villain has Queens or Kings and an Ace rolls off on the turn, the hand might very well end there. Not many turns are terrible for us in this situation, but still, I don't see Villain folding to a flop raise and at that point they are going to get rapidly committed to this pot regardless of whatever turn and river might come.

SPR is good enough that if V continues on turn with any reasonable sized bet you can easily get stacks in by either raising there or on river.

I'd much rather flat this bet with the flop being so dry. Seems to me that more hands may continue on the turn that would quickly shut down to a raise on the flop.

I'm cool with preflop. We're probably only going to go 3way (not great, we'd like to go eleventeen ways when setmining), but we're in position (easier to get paid off) plus this is a raise out of the blinds (which is sometimes fairly strong, although with only one limper it could easily be cheese). I'm guessing setmining is still going to be profitable here.

SPR is trivial on the flop to get stacks in. I'd just call and hope our read is off and other guy comes along. Board is pretty bone dry with no scare cards to really slow down action. We're in position and can always make sure a bet will go in. No need to blow this guy off air if he wants to continue barrelling. I'd probably just call the turn bet too unless board got more drawy.

ETA: FWIW, if he bets $80 into a HU pot of $115 on the turn, he'll only have $145 left in a $275 pot on the river (about a 1/2 PSB), so still trivial to play for stacks on river even if he doesn't bet it.

GcluelessNLnoobG

What do you mean by that?

Were you the guy who got into bankruptcy law by flirting with some dude's wife when you were delivering her pizza?

It's been the dudes signature for as long as I've been posting here.
Apparently he used to think he was a clueless NL noob, so he signed his posts as such.

I agree with the raise but not for the reason stated. If villain doesn't have a made hand, then a slowplay only works if villain improves.

I would raise whatever was necessary to rep a made hand, however you would play TT in this situation. And then just hope he continues. Strike while the iron is hot.

Smoothing the flop and then raising the turn should set off an alarm for most villains. If he's an idiot it's probably fine.

You also need to consider what happens if you smooth the flop and then a card comes off that villain really dislikes.

Call flop bet, call turn bet or bet 1/2-2/3 psb, call/raise river bet to play for stacks.

Don't raise flop bc you don't want to get worse to fold.

This. If he has just overcards, he's only 7:1 to hit one. While a flop raise may get him to stop bluffing, it won't get him to fold an overpair which he could do if a scary card turns.

Crazy amount of straight draws on this board. Bizarre board texture.

This is pretty close, I can see merits of both.

Raises on the turn look so much stronger than raises on the flop at low stakes.

Probably raising here- b/c villain cant put us on many 2 pair hands-- so we almost always have a draw or a set.... And people dont come to the casino to fold so he will find a way to convince himself we have 78.

Edit: If I decide that villain will keep barreling a high frequency of times I will probably flat. Maybe even tank FLAT a turn.

With such an incredibly dry flop I'd probably flat and raise/bomb turn. We could even flat turn again as it barely matters, if he bets big on the turn, he's either bet/calling river or check calling river.The spr is favorable enough that I feel like all raising does it says "I have a really strong hand!". If he checks turn we can bet 90, setting up stacks getting in on river.

Just feels like more likely way to get paid off these days. We also give him another chance to fire his air which we almost always fold out with our raise.

I min raised, looking to keep in all of his pairs and sometimes AK, AQ. Plus if he has a pair that he perceives as value, there's a reasonable chance he'll pop it again for "protection".

In the end, our raise prevented air from continuing (which it easily could in a 3way pot that is reduced to HU on the turn) plus prevented him from hitting most likely a 6 outer (where he'd probably be committed). On drawy boards there is more merit for raising the flop to prevent scare cards from stacking an overpair, but here, especially in position on a dryish board with stacks trivially in play by the river, it's a pretty good place to slowplay, imo.

G"cluelessNLnoob"referstomyselfG