It's 2/5 NL with a max buy-in of $300. The table just recently went to 9 handed after being 7 handed the whole session.

Hero ($315) has been at the table for an hour and has been playing TAG.

Villain (at least $600) is an Asian LAG in the sb. He has straddled every opportunity UTG. In one hand, villain raised with AA and checked the flop after hitting a set heads up. In another hand he raised from early pos with 35s.

Hero is UTG +2 and raises a limper to $20 with AQo. There are 3 callers including the limper UTG and the villain in the sb.

Flop ($80) Ah Qs 4d

Villain leads out for $35. 1 fold. I think about raising, but decide to just call and play in position. The other opponent unfortunately folded behind me. There are no draws and a set of 4s is the only reasonable hand that has me beat.

Turn ($150) 4h

Villain leads out for $75.

Hero?

call and let him do your betting. if he doesn't, bet yourself

Call, shove any river. More likely a q or a or pp than a 4.

I think you should be comitted on the flop with SPRs < 4 given the villain. Once you have made that plan, the question is how to extract the most by keeping his range the widest. I think that on the turn you do that by flatting, possibly after tanking for a bit. You are either calling a shove on the river or shoving yourself.

Also, isolate bigger next time. You want to get HU with position on the limper and to create a lower SPR situation to be able to more profitably commit with TP. So make it $30-$35 next time instead of $30 so that you don't end up in a 4-way pot.

Let me guess, dude shows up with a 4 somehow and you lost? Call turn, ship river, ez game.

Call and call river. Bet if checked to, but if he's any good it'd be a bit thin. He probably isn't though, so it's okay.

If you're beat, it's probably by A4 exactly. Other than that, it's tough for you to be beat here. Call turn, call a river shove. If he checks river, easy value bet.

$30 pre. Flop is fine. Call turn, shove river.

I dunno about this... when a LAG checks it to me I tend to be a lil suspicious because it's not in his nature to check? It's like he's giving you an opportunity to make a mistake? I would suspect a shove to a bet from your part and a suckout against A4. I see no shame in checking behind, it's not that you've been nitting it up, you're just being cautious not to get shipped by these idiots. I would check this behind and be happy to take the pot. Is this to nitty?

IMO, this is too nitty. I mean, do we think this LAG player is checking a four on the river, after our play so much reads as AJ, AT (AK raises somewheres before river, right?), a hand that, with a four, he doesn't want to risk us checking behind for value? Nah, if he checks, there is like NO WAY I can put a 4 in his hand, unless he's UBER bad river FPS.

That said, I'd like to go back to the turn: does no one see any value in raising here? I think there are a TON of hands in this villain's range we can get calls from if we raise, like {AT, AJ, Ax (not a 4), KQhh, KJhh, KThh, QJhh, QThh}. These hands make sense in this villain's range because as a LAG, he could have very well flatted a raise from the blinds with them, then donked flop as a semibluff, then picked up more equity when he turned the backdoor flush draw, allowing him to continue his semi-bluff on the turn.

I don't think raising is turning our hand into a bluff, as I see his range consisting of more of the hands I mentioned above than hands containing a 4. On the other hand, I think it's way too costly a mistake NOT to raise here--not only because of the hands we get value from, but also because if he has picked up a backdoor draw with his 2nd pair or GSSD, we are allowing him to SET HIS OWN PRICE to river us: $75. Is raising all-in here (he makes it $75, we go AI for $260) bad? Pot would then be $485, and he's gotta call $185, giving him bout 2.7-1. Would he fold?

Guess I'm just curious why no one has suggested a raise at any point pre-river, and if that line is just really bad, or turning our hand into a bluff.

You're not wrong, but you're not entirely right, and following this too hard can get you to leave a lot of money on the table out of apprehension. You should see warning signs more often when a LAG checks in a spot where he always bets, that's more scary and polarizing than bet/bet/check is. Like, for example, if he raised preflop and has a 95% cbet %, and is then checking behind an 842 board, that might spell off warning bells in my head. But even so, I'd rather b/fold with 99 in that spot than level myself into giving him free cards all the way down and getting no value if he's deciding to potcontrol instead. He is probably aware of his image enough to shove with better all the time, and he's also definitely shoving worse. I think we leave too much money on the table when we check back these hands to LAG players; IMO, this is enforcing their style's win-rate.

preflop is fine (25+/-5) with AQ EP
flop is ok but does
call turn and call/bet river

I think this lines keeps V with the broadest range. raising the turn will fold most of his weaker single pair hands and keep the monsters and AK and maybe AJ in. You want to keep in the AJ- KQ ect

this

Tnx, will keep this in mind. What if you valuebet here and he shoves? Would you call just to show him you're not to be bullied around (and ofcourse because you have a reasonable chance beating his hand)?

I'm not folding ever. There's just way too many hands you beat. Pretty hard for him to lead with bottom pair on an A high board unless. The only 4s he's betting for value are A4 or 44 and that's exactly 5 hands. He's unlkely to flat QQ or AA pre-flop. With the Ah on the board, there's not many back door FDs in his range. Do you have Qh? He may have picked up some equity with a hand like KQhh or KJhh, but still most rivers are not too scary. He might call a raise with a weaker A thinking that he's chopping with most of your range. However, I think a flat is better since you probably gain more from by letting him triple barrel the turn with his bluffs and weaker aces then you gain by getting him to call with worse or lose by letting him catch a miracle river. I like a flat here and a shove on most rivers.

This is another huge component that I sort of failed to build on in my previous post. Basically, one of the most profitable moves in LLs poker is the "bet/fold" move. I'm quoting Bart Hansen here, and it's entirely true. If we feel we have a hand worth value-betting, we can't be afraid of getting raised; the possibility of getting raised is irrelevant until it happens when we're value-betting, but of course we keep it in mind so we know whether we're bet/calling or bet/folding (we don't just bet without a plan). In this particular spot, I don't really see how we can bet/fold simply because we'll have almost nothing left after our bet and he can have worse. I would never call a bet simply to show him "we're not getting bullied around" because it's kind of irrelevant; if we call with a worse hand purposely, he wins, he doesn't care that we've shown we call him down because that's what he wanted. If we call and win, our reward is the chips, not the fact that he won't bluff us later. We want him to be bluffing into us in the future... but FWIW, in this spot, calling a c/raise OTR isn't exactly going to show him we can't get bluffed off a hand anyways since we have top-two; it's just a cooler. ^All IMO.