Scenario 1: Hero is small blind 98 suited. Utg raises to 5 bb, 3 callers on hijack, cutoff, button. You:
1. Fold
2. Call
3. Raise

Correct answer: 1. Fold
Look, I know its boring poker, but I’d rather call or raise with an acex suited hand that is going to win boards with 3 suits of said hand, rather than a baby suited connector getting dominated by a higher flush, especially when low stakes live limit has a high concentration of players calling with all Qx suited and Kx suited hands (yes even Q2). You should not be playing for stacks with a flush on the board with 87 suited is all I’m saying, especially out of position. Good way to minimize gains and maximize loss. Suited connectors have always been great for straights and two pairs in my opinion (in position of course)

You can also 10% raise this spot but people who say they do that actually 100% raise this spot lmao

Please discuss this heavily I know this will stir controversy

Scenario 2:
Folding the king high flush
Hero: K2 diamonds on the Button
Nit reg limps utg
3 more callers to me. I call because why not, I beat out dishrag suited connectors that want to limp in hard.

Flop monotone diamonds Q 8 5

Nit reg leads out for half pot. Folds to me I just call because I know this guy and he wouldn’t lead out for anything less than a flush here not even two pair. Completely in his checking range

Turn is J of diamonds

Leads out 3/4 pot. This is a snap fold. He is not doing this with a 10 of diamonds and you know it. He has it 100% of the time. I fold and showed him that he couldn’t get any money from me. This is why solvers recommend to bet 10% on monotone flops with 1 high card. The Queen of and Jack of diamonds blocking high flush draw combos lean villain heavily towards nuts.

However, it is still max value to maximize gains from fish in low stakes and bet big (50%) on monotone flops with a flush or top two pair. You will get calls from nonbelievers with top pair good kicker.


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You've got it the other way around. Hand 1 is a call and hand 2 is a fold pre.

I actually think they’re both folds preflop, at least in most lineups I would want to be playing in live. The suited king is closer to a call, though if we’re not happy raising for value anytime we flop a flush, I don’t want to limp that either.

I edited the clickbaity title to reflect what you're talking about, but I'm sure what your goal is here, OP. Do you just want line checks, or are you trying to make a broader point?

In either case, stack-sizes and reads on matter, but yes it generally accepted that SCs are hands to play in position, not OOP. If the Vs are LP enough and stacks are deep enough, I might consider a call.

Hand 2 is probably OK pre in position, again, if stacks are deep enough, but it's an ambitious call. AP to flop, again depending on stacks, I like a raise/fold against a nit reg. Most nit-regs who flopped a lower flush or hold the Ad and c-bet as a semi-bluff will call, giving us value and mostly checking down unimproved, and will raise their A-high flushes. AP to turn, yeah, it's definitely a snap-fold.

K2 is a call ? reason why not?

they do sell books on this page to explain the basics, may I suggest buying a couple

Hand 1 is a call preflop.

Hand 2 is 50/50 on a fold or overlimp.

Obviously, everything is rake dependent, table dependent, skill dependent, etc.

Despite the typical "fold pre" advice that people like to give, learning how to play multiway pots well is important.

If you are playing "slightly too loose" or whatever that means, you are getting more opportunities to improve your multiway pot strategy with real world experience.

It might make preflop decisions that are slightly -EV turn into +EV for you in the long run.

This is especially true if you want to move up to higher level games where the rake matters less and being viewed as "NOT A NIT" becomes important for being welcome at action tables instead of being shut out from action tables.

98s is better in the SB for 5bb with 4 villains and one behind than K2s is on the BTN for 1bb with 4 villains and two behind?

How drunk/high is everyone saying that?


Hand 1 is probably a fold in the BB closing the action, main reasons not to are showing people we'll call and not getting bored by folding a lot and playing even worse hands.

Even ignoring position and the fact you are putting 5x the money in. With K high flushes you dominate J9s/J6s type random stuff people are playing. Also dominate 98s. So many times I see low stakes players hit the 3rd or 4th nut flush in a huge multiway pot and play it like they have quads.
But like don't ignore position and the fact it's 5x more expensive, those things matter ... a lot.

As has been said many times on here, with T9s-65s you want 1-2 villains not 4-6.


Folding both is also fine.

My experience is that hands such as K2 have potential to stack someone overplaying limped top pair such as K10 - K3 suited stack it off against our hidden two pair, we can also fold on the turn against double barrels if we dont connect with our two pair (I often do). Ive seen two instances of opponents last night going in for 100 bbs on the flop with both having less than top pair. Its a common live leak that opponents bet marginal made hands too often instead of checking


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Finally, someone who gets me!


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Hand 1 is an easy fold 4 ways from the SB facing a 5x raise. Calling with 98s is simply a losing play and it is a rec mentality that rationalizing calling.

Hand 2 needs a lot of reads but sure vs a super nit. Don't mind limping behind here either although it's not printing.

We're just looking to bink the flop here. Yeah, I get it, calling this is -EV in a vacuum, but we're not always going to be calling this. Table dynamics and player profiles will affect our implied odds if we hit big.

Why is over calling a SC from the SB so bad here?

There is a chance of us getting 3bet squeezed from the BB. That does hurt the EV of the overcall from SB.

Regardless, we will have good relative position postflop. I know that we will get overflushed sometimes, but we often have a skill advantage over the field. If we are confident in our postflop skills, we will manage to lose less with dominated flushes than typical live players would while making enough from our other value hands like straights and typical live players.

This is now assuming that we are somewhat deep stacked and against bad players. If all the Villains and the BB are solid, then I understand folding.

In hand 1, with a 5x open and 3 calls, out of position, if we 3-bet we are going to have to make it 7x the open, i.e. 35bb, more than a third of a 100bb stack, which means that if we squeeze we need to jam. My 3-bet jamming range into a crowd from the SB is going to be way too tight to include 98s. As for calling, it is hella difficult to realize equity out of position, especially facing a crowd, and I can happily send my hand into the muck. I'd want the effective stack, i.e. the smallest one involved, to be something like 200bb or more before I would consider playing this.

As for hand number 2, you are never going to stack Peet Starbuck when he puts down his NYT crossword puzzle to play a hand in early position, so throw K2s into the muck. (I'd open it on the button or in the cutoff, but every range has its bottom, and when there are limpers ahead of us we don't play the bottom of our opening range. Of course we fold the K-high flush when Peet bets the four-flush turn.

I'm confused - is all this stuff in the OP based on solver outputs, or just one guy's personal opinion?

If it's the former, what are the solver inputs? If it's the latter, who are you, and what have your results been?

As for the hands - meh, doesn't seem like hero is playing above the rim in either hand. What are we supposed to take from this? That OP is good enough to fold marginal hands in spots where he should be folding?

Your money, do what you want

Scenario 1 - Play Ace rag instead? Do tell how that goes when the board comes with an ace and a better ace blleds you for enough blinds that it will take 2 hours to catch up. Calling any two cards 4 ways if you have deep stacks makes sense.

Scenario 2 - You flop the second nuts with someone most having a worse flush than you 80% of the time. Just raise. If you lose K flush flopped to A flush flopped then good for them. That's so unfathomably rare that you shouldn't be worried about it.

H1, folding is fine but getting 5/1 calling 98s can't be terrible if you're careful and disciplined postflop and stick to basics. Be cautious with a pair, go crazy with two pair or a straight, play draws aggressively, go crazy with a flush but know that once in a while you'll lose your stack but that'll be very rare. All basic stuff, you won't get rich, but it's probably on a par with folding.

H2 I would toss preflop, by all means overlimp suited Kings on the button (are you overlimping 100% of suited Kings 100% of the time? Feels pretty splashy) but if you have some magic read that your opponent has a flush and only a flush on the flop then why oh why would you not raise. As played, yeah folding turn is OK.

Hasn’t this been a thing for a while (not really your hand but kx2x vs 9x8x etc.) in MTTs and prob cash opening suites Kxs wider and folding the mixed suited connectors pure since people call too much live with suited garbage?

Don't quite agree with the last sentence.
The deeper the stacks, the more important being in position.
With a 5bb raise and 3 callers, 98s from SB is a fold at (almost) any stack size.