So this is something that I have been having a hard time with recently. I am a big time regular at my casino and it is where I have the vast majority of my live experience. Because of this one of my greatest strengths is playing against the other regular and semi-regular players, as I am pretty good at noticing everyone's tendencies to the point that I am crushing this game pretty consistently. Every night the game is about 8 regs and 2 rotating players that just happen to stumble across the game. I keep having a very hard time assigning ranges to these 'new' players as I feel like I tend to give them way too much credit without any real reason.

Hero (~$300) UTG raises A Q to $12. UTG+2, MP, V1 (~$300) in CO, BTN, BB all call.

Flop (~$68): Q 8 4
BB checks, Hero bets $35, UTG+2 folds, MP folds, V1 raises to $100, BTN, BB, fold. Hero?

The table started less than 15 minutes ago, the only thing I know about V1 is that apparently he's the son of a big time whale that comes in, gets drunk, and loses >$1000 every Friday. He is white and in his late twenties, when he bought in he took out a wad of at least 2k.

The board is so dry I have a hard time coming up with any hands that play like this. I can maybe see KQ, QJ doing this to "see where they're at" but how much of an unknown's range is that?

Against a total unknown, I'd just dump it.

You've made two strong moves and you're getting played back at pretty strongly. If he's the type of player to do this with a hand you're beating (KQ, QJ, TT...), there will be plenty of other opportunities to get the money. Your hand looks exactly like QQ at best and AK at worst. His hand looks exactly like QJ at best and 88 at worst.

with your read, i call and probably have a hard time folding on later streets.

Against an unknown, I would probably let him have it and start paying attention to his game and make the necessary adjustments.

You're supposed to have a strong range here. No reason why you can't have a set or OP, and yet villain is still raising you on a bone dry flop.

Given his physical image, it's possible he's running a bluff trying to show off his game, but I've also seen guys with this description play pretty tight too.

If you think he's full of it, you might try calling and seeing what he does OTT. If he was raising to find out where he's at with KQ, QJ, he'll check it back.

If he's bluffing or has a set, he'll continue firing. But you have a BDFD, so if you pick up the diamond, you can shove into him or CRAI.

Against any other villain i'd probably fold this as well, but given his image; you might as well call it down or re-raise all in.

Until I have a better idea of what villain is doing, I'm not going to stack off 150 BBs in a hand with him with TP (which we're on the road to doing if we call here). I'd just fold, especially considering villain still has a couple people yet to act behind him.

And I'd rather limp preflop than raise and go to the flop eleventeen ways.

I could justify a call here usually against the info u have on this villian but with multiple players yet to act behind and the board being this dry I think a fold is a better decision.

Interesting. What game conditions do you want to see to make limping AQs UTG your preferred play? Not trying to troll, just learn. I'd err on the side of raising large-ish over limping (which is still going to go to the flop eleventeen ways).

Just muck it. It's gonna be way too hard to play a turn and river oop with limited reads, and we have essentially a bluff catcher.

I have no problem with raising large, but I'd also have no problem with limping and seeing a flop for cheap multiway with this decent multiway hand. I hate raising normalish and getting 6 callers cuz it sets up difficult spots postflop where we can make a large mistake. If we limp (probably my preferred choice at a very loose table, otherwise I'd lean towards raising with the goal to limit the field), we keep the pot small and don't have to put ourselves in a situation where we'll be making decisions for our stack postflop with TP and we can possibly make the large mistake of (a) calling off our stack with the worst hand or (b) folding the best hand in a huge pot (mistakes that we won't make in a limped pot).

GtryingtoavoidlargemistakesG

Im assuming this game is 1/2 but it wasn't specified. I agree that this is bet/fold all the way. With no real idea of villain's tendencies I'm not calling down or stacking off here.

Limping pre is so bad. I really wonder if you're a winning player given the preflop strategy you use. It is consistently weak tight.

I'm guessing there's more than one way to win at this game, but so far my "weak tight" approach is doing just fine. My goal is to get in a hand with a bunch of idiots, flop a monster, and stack one of those idiots. Again, I'm raising AQs in EP at the majority of tables I'm sitting at, but if that raise ain't gonna limit the field (especially in deepish games), then I have no problem limping it.

I'm with you on avoiding big mistakes.

Obviously this type of thing is very table dependent. I can see limping AQs because the possibility of over-flushing someone is so lucrative. Would you ever be l/c AQo? That just seems like a bad idea to me. I wouldn't have that much of a problem with l/c AQs under the right conditions.

As I'm re-learning all the time - this game gets so much easier when you play the majority of your hands IP.

As for GG's being a winning player - this weak tight strategy might be a problem at different levels, but players make SO many VERY BAD mistakes post flop at 1/2 and 2/5 that it is pretty easy to see how you can make up the money from what some might consider leaks PF. There are a ton of ways to skin a donkey at this game/level.

grunch. I snap fold. I need a read they raise KQ here to continue, not a read that they don't.

I ended up folding and Villain showed a Q and proceeded to lose about 600 the next couple of hours. It is the third session in a row I get played back at by someone I don't know only to find them to be fairly wild and not getting any other opportunities to take their money other than the one hand early in the session. Kind of frustrating, but it is what it is.