I've been chewing on this hand for a couple of weeks now. I'm looking at it through the lens of the Fundamental Theorem of Poker (FToP), and whether it's actually possible to force mistakes from my V's in a 5 way pot. So this is part HH, part theory thread.

Home game, NL 50, buy in 100BB. This group has been together for about 4 years, literally no surprises here. It's a social game more than a money maker.

Hero: nit by home game standards, TAG by 2+2 standards. Considered by everyone at the table the biggest winner, everyone knows I'm at the casino 3-4x/week. Sitting on about 175 BB.

MP: Whale. Prob 40% VPIP, action junkie, the guy that home games are literally built around. Historically the biggest loser by a mile, but currently covers the table, which complicates matters (see below).
HJ: Closer to LAG than TAG, but gives H respect. Used to study/play more than he does now. Overall winning player. 80BB.
Other 2 V's are generic home game players: too much pre, chase too much post, won't squeeze without a huge hand. 80-100BB.

OTTH:

8 handed, H is UTG+1 with KQ. Raise to 3BB. MP1, HJ, BTN, SB call.

Flop 16BB: Q93

What's the line ? I'm going to assume there will be a range of answers, but if I lead out, it'll be almost impossible for draws to not have the correct odds to call. If I opt for c/r, I am over 80% sure that either MP whale or HJ LAG will bet, and the other 2 V's will call if they have a gutshot +. But even this happens, a c/r will likely give them odds to chase, by the time it gets back to them, unless I absolutely bomb it. And a c/r for almost 200BB with TP2K gives the whale a chance to make the (by his standards close to correct) play, as he'll call prob with a draw (mistake) but will only call with a made hand that is ahead of me (correct play).

I suppose the simplest answer is the correct one, which is that the more MW a pot gets, the more straightforward you have to play. I'm just wondering if people have a better line for me to take than to simply bet flop, bet safe turns, evaluate if raised or bad turn card hits.

Raise more pre or just limp. You bet $1.50 so you're going to get called by the world and you won't have position. Better to just limp w KQs and play it as a speculative hand or try to get2- or 3-way and make top pair.

As played, your line is fine but I'd usually check. If maniac raises you can call, raise or fold after seeing how everyone reacts.

I thought you were playing no limit. You are allowed to set your own bet size. Could you explain this statement a bit more?

I hear ya about pf sizing, but EP raising to 4BB or 5BB pre doesn't really change much. Whether it's a home game or 1/2, one guy calls, and then everyone's gonna play their fave game, Bust The Nit. (Heck, I like the game too, tbh. ****, it's how I make my money.)

For the record, I didn't actually say what my line was. If a good discussion ensues I'll PAHWM and say what I did otf.

You're right, I could bet 170BB into 16. That didn't really occur to me. I was simply thinking about "normal" betting sizes. If I choose to lead and bet 3/4 pot, or pot, one calls, they all call.

And maybe there's no way around this. Honestly I'm asking if I'm OOP, all ideas are bad, my best option will be the least bad one? Or maybe I really am supposed to bet 30BB into 16, and I didn't give it enough thought. (I've honestly never contemplated the overbet line. I know I'm old, but man I don't want to start taking OMC lines.)

I'm all for limping in pre, your ep and your hand is a draw. Okay we have see the flop and we are top pair, good kicker. There are two cards to come and 60% of the board has been dealt. Let them chase.

Press on with pride. Bet whatever the normal flop bet is and hope they come along. If you do not get raised, repeat on the Turn and river. They will tell you if they make their hand if you pay attention. You don't want give up the lead, or leave money on the table.

If you think all your options are bad, then it's worth going back to an earlier decision point and asking whether you set yourself up to only have bad options now.

If that's not true, and all your options really are bad, then yeah, you're supposed to just choose the least bad option.

Either way, you shouldn't limit your options based on how you feel. If you think overbetting say 19 or 20BB is bad here, you should be able to (pseudo-)mathematically justify why it's bad.

Here's a question I'd use to approach the situation if you're trying to think about theory: what would you do if you had QQ in this spot? I would assume that with the nuts, you would be able to find a good option, right?

It is only correct for someone to call a big bet with a draw if you're going to pay them off when it hits. If you pot the flop and c/f bad turns then the FToP says you win when they had a draw that got there.

That's actually a decent Q, though apparently for you the answer is easier than it is for me. (Your idea that I did something wrong earlier in the hand, I honestly don't even know what to say about that.) With QQ I bet pot or close to, and obvs I feel better about it than TP2K, but one of the first 2 players comes along, then the train begins. Maybe there's no way around this, and that was the point of my post/Q. I suppose if 4 people come along, and I have 40-50% equity in a pot that I only put 20% into, that's a win for me, even if I'm overall likely to lose the pot. I think this is a LHE way of thinking (I haven't played LHE since, well, since anyone played it), but it seems pretty useful in LLSNL/lol-NL home games. But I'm mostly from an online background, and thinking deeply about 5 to a flop is new-ish for me. I'm still working my way around the maths.

I've played in this home game for years, but tbh, I don't need to work hard to make money there. I assume many people here know what I mean when I say that. But this hand had me thinking, not so much about these clowns, but in general, is it possible in a MW pot OOP to force V's into mistakes, or like I said, putting in 20% with 40% equity is as good as it gets.

I'm on board with this, and if I bet the flop and get a train, and scare card hits, I'm cool assuming someone hit it and c/f. I was just wondering if there's more merit in a c/r the flop vs bet flop/decide turn.

way too late to edit the OP, so I'm sorry, but BI was 100-200BB. I don't think it's particularly relevant, but just putting it out there.

tl;dr Pot the flop.


Longer version:
You can't always force your opponent to make a mistake.
But that doesn't mean that you can't make +EV plays your self.

There are times when it will be +EV for you to make a play that is also +EV for your opponent.

Imagine a much more simple situation where the pot is somehow $1,000 on the turn.
You and your opponent both have $100 left and he has a naked flush draw with 9 outs. (Assume no one bluffs.)

If you bet he will get there about 19% or the time. So he should call. Since obviously getting 11:1 on a 5:1 shot is a great deal for him. He will make on average (19%*$1,200) - $100 or more $128.00 by calling. Clearly +EV for him to call.

You on the other hand can check in which case you will win (.81*$1,000) or $810.00
Or you can bet, he will (correctly) call, and you will win (.81*$1,200) - $100 or $872 by betting. So did you make a mistake here by betting even though he was correct to call?
Obviously not. We are making more money here when he calls.

This can be the case in the flop here as well.
Granted it's more tricky since there will be future decision points. And there are more players. But that ideas that you can't force some of your villains to play incorrectly doesn't mean that you aren't still making money.

It also doesn't mean that you can't force any of your villains to make mistakes.
So pot the flop and print money. If they call a flop pot, then maybe you should think about 2x the pot on the flop with hands like KK/AA/AQ in this type of situation going forward and see what happens. There's a huge range of bets that can be made betwen 3/4 pot and all in here that might have some fun and profitable results.

It seems a little overthought to me. It's a pretty standard spot, right? We have top pair, good kicker in a 5 way pot with a pretty draw-y board, that ought to fit into our opponent's ranges. We're suspect we're in the lead but not super comfortable that we can keep it. Okay - so we play poker... just be aware that our equity in this hand is fairly low relative to the field and we might not win - we won't every time.

The obvious points occur to me.

3x pre seems light (based on my games). 5x - 6x will likely create less callers (although with KQss - I don't really mind volume).

OTF - I wouldn't necessarily go to a c/r here. It's pretty high variance (some of the villains you noted may well have hit 2p+ here). I'd prefer a 'normal' bet of about pot. That should get you down to only a couple of callers. On scare cards (lol... and lots of thse about) - you'll need to decide whether to barrel or note...perhaps A/K and cards <8 non diamond. If you meet stiff resistance - you may well have to let this go...

Thanks for this. It gives me good stuff to think about. I really don't have an overbet in my arsenal, so I want to look at spots where it would be good to have one. (I'm not saying this is the spot, but I have wondered what I'd do with KK in this hand.)