H has nitty preflop image. V knows H mixes up x and cbets with medium strength flopped hands. Also (probably) knows that H will fire with NFD's and combo draws.
V one of the biggest winners at the casino. Big bets, big bluffs. Plays very well when up which he currently is.

1/3
$500 eff.

2 ep limps
H is in LJ with K Q raises to 30
V is btn who flats
limpers fold

$70
K T 9

V has a solid sc's + 22-99 + broadway + Axs type range here

H x
V bets 45
H calls

$160
K T 9 K

H x
V bets 100
H calls

$360

K T 9 K 8

H x
V jams 325
H ?


I do not think V flatted me with AK preflop and whether he flatted with TT I would say is right on the edge of his range. This is either a straight or a boat or a busted flush draw which V is certainly capable of doing this with.

If V also has a K that weights my range more towards straights and boats and probably doesn't play a K this way on the turn and/or river.

It’s a close spot. I would fold with the Qd, but call with the other 3 Qs, so calling here, but I expect to be shown a better hand more often than not.

Far less pre. You’re going to do better betting flop to start. Everything is just too big though.

I think it's close call against a competent opponent.

There are missed FD, and SD that he may use as natural bluffs on the river.

It would be intresting to see how this hand played out, if you did'nt check the flop (which ist totally fine btw).

Feel like you are to far up your range on the river to find the fold, unless reads indicate otherwise. You block the nut straight (his most likely value hand) and you unblock the most likely bluffing hand (busted fd). 99/TT is probably a high freq 3bet and the Kx that make a boat rarely in his calling range (except KTs perhaps).

I'd call, but expect to be beat more often than not. But still I think this an okay spot for V to 3barrel with eg AQ, since he's blocking your best Kx, which you are even consindering to find a fold with.

Any good reasons we're sitting in likely one of the worst seats in the poker room non-short?

I just overlimp here as that is my preflop strategy from this position (although I'm well aware that won't be standard for the forum). However, with this guy on the Button I think we have to be super aware that "standard" might not be the best play. Building a big pot OOP non-short to the ~best player in the room who will often be playing his button seems extremely meh to me.

I'm fine with flop/turn. Against this guy we're trying our best to keep the pot under control and get to showdown for a reasonable price (especially on the flop). Although he has managed to make us play for stacks anyways (which isn't a surprise given he has position and an SPR which makes it easy for him to do so).

The way I would evaluate the river is like so. Sometimes we're going to have to call the river. Sometime we're going to have to fold the river. I'd compare all the reasons for calling versus all the reasons for folding. If I get a lot more reasons in the calling column, I'll lean to calling; if I get a lot more reasons in the folding column, I'll lean to folding. In this case here, almost all the ticks are in the good column. We have a fairly strong hand and have severely underrepped it. He's capable of bluffing. A lot of the main draws missed and we don't block any of them. He could actually be value betting worse. He would often 3bet a lot of the better hands preflop. So seems like a call to me.

GcluelessNLnoobG

First off, is 1/3 the biggest game in the room then, since he's supposedly the biggest winner in the casino? (I don't know how we can know this if one, there are bigger games going with seats, and two, has anyone viewed his statistics to see how big of a winner he is?). I think these are usually just guesses, maybe not in this case but you never know.

As played, he's probably doing that with missed draws and since he's a "big bluffer" we have a big bluff catcher. This is based on the player, I would fold if it was someone else who I know would be way ahead.

Been 200bb~ stack with V on my left multiple times and isn't getting out of line against my opens. Is very rarely 3 betting me and I gave the cold calling range which I think most good players would be playing in that spot. If I made it smaller I might have to play even more hands vs him so there are no easy options here aside from limping in LJ which has opened me up to big raises pre to V which means I may not even be able to play this hand if I limped.

1/3 is the only option and it's a small poker room. I can;t know the frequency in which V is making big bet bluffs because by nature of large river bets they don't always get called. All I can say is that I know he is very capable of making it 300 on the river with a bluff.

Yeah this def solidifies the call then. If he filled up he filled up, the bet was for less than pot anyway.

Is this the only table running? Is there any other seats at this table that we'd be better off in? FWIW, I also play in a room that only offers one game / one steak, but there's usually always a handful of tables going so I'm almost never sitting non-short ~directly OOP to the best player in the room (and would need very good reasons to be sitting at his table at all). So, yeah, I'd actually consider a preflop fold here until I rectify that situation.

Even in this hand here, look at the massive size in pot difference thanks to being OOP to this guy; if we were in position (and thus able to simply remove a street of betting by checking back the flop) the pot would be ~1/3rd the size it is.

Grespectpositionandskilllevel,imoG

It's a Saturday night and there are a few pros I have not played with before so there is not a comfy position at the table even though there is a nice mix of bad players as well. I view being up when shortstacking as paying for my lessons playing with a bigger stack. I do not want to sit at the table forever playing 50bb poker. I cannot move tables and seat change probably isn't going to do anything. Another guy I know is a pro who I thought was a pretty decent sized winner at the casino left early without any major decisions so that should tell us all something.

You can't move tables? Maybe your room is different regarding rules. Also sounds like it is different regarding pro saturation as I'm pretty sure I've never seen a table with a few pros at it (let alone voluntarily sat at it).

Anyways, I guess what I'm getting at is have reasons for the decisions you are making (including pre preflop). It seems that you've made conscious decisions regarding sitting where you are at the stack you are sitting at, and so if that is the case then obviously fine. Me, I'd never be sitting in this seat at this table at this stack size in my room; like, literally, never.

GcluelessputtingmyselfingoodspotsnoobG

(I can't move tables)

One thing that I am noticing within these conversations here and thinking back to the game Saturday night is that the table was a different mixture of skill levels compared to what I am used to and maybe didn't adjust pre.

The normal game is a small circle of old farts who are probably all varying degrees of slight loser to breakeven and 1 good studied pro who either wins or loses big and 1-2 really bad players.

Saturday was what I would consider 2 very good pros, 2 medium winning pros and 3-4 players who were terrible with big stacks. The bigger bet sizing was pushing the people who I wanted to play with out of the pot and either getting folded around or HU / 3 way with the people I don't want to be in a hand with.

The "terrible" players are the ones folding to the preflop raises?

And it really sucks that we don't have a table change option (wow, that is such a weird room rule, I've never heard of that?) because I highly doubt that being the 5th best player at a table (fair ranking?) is ever going to be longterm +EV in a 1/3 NL rake trap game (although it seems the EV of the game ranks low in terms of why we are playing).

Anyhoooooo.... if our big preflop raises are somehow isolating ourselves against the better players and folding out the terrible players who suck on a deepstack, then I think a pretty fair adjustment would be to limp in and attempt to play deepstack poker postflop against the terrible players, no?

GcluelesstwilightzonepokernoobG

Id say I am 3rd but everyone thinks they are better than they actually are. I played 1-2 hands an hour so the sample size of "all bad players folding" is still very small but yes they make it very hard for me to get in a hand with the fish. The times I limped along on the previous Friday nights game the V in question, who was directly on my left for 6 hours, raised approx.66% of the times I limped which felt a lot more like me being targeted compared to this V cold calling once and never 3 betting me. If I am raising premiums and limping okay hands that makes this much easier to do of course so I will try limping most of my range next time I am in this deeper stack tougher table environment and see how it goes.

It seems unpopular here, but I'm not wild about the flop play. You hit top pair second kicker and a gutshot. What were you hoping for when you raised preflop with KQs? This isn't a check-call, check-call situation. How sick would you be if he had checked behind on the flop and then an A, T, 9, 8, or 7 came on the turn? All of those could have taken a hand that would have folded and put it ahead of you.

As played, I think you have to call. He could easily have KJ and think he's betting for value.

If you think he would call your preflop raise with QJ off, then maybe fold, because that gives him a lot of combos that beat you. If his QJ holdings are limited to QJs, then it's an easy call: Those are balanced by the Axdd that he could have.

KdTd9x is a very dangerous board for TP2K is it not?

It is, but it is also dangerous-looking to him, as well. Think of all the Axs he has that are not diamonds, all the TJ, 98, 22-88, etc. that would just fold, but are then going to be inspired by you checking, and then might hit something that has you in a lot of trouble. If that board is too scary for you to bet out, then maybe making big raises preflop with KQs is not for you.

JT folding? Maybe read the board before you call someone scared. What if my flop x inspired V to bluff off all his chips into trips?

AP river seems very close. I do have some suggestions for taking yourself out of this xc xc line so you can avoid difficult river decisions like this one. In my experience these low-stakes games are quite passive with very little triple barrel bluffing. The only reason you would want to put this hand into a xc xc xc line would be to induce bluffs and I just don't think that will be the most profitable option against lowstakes grinders. I would love this line if we were up against a whale who has 40%+ range and fights for every pot. Against tight/solid reg I would rather just bet 1/3p on the flop, 2/3p on the turn, 2/3p on the river. I'd do the exact same thing with AA and I would happily fold to a raise at any point in the hand.

If you think that's likely, then it was a good idea. But you're here asking about whether or not you should call this river, so you obviously aren't that confident it would happen.

True you can't see his hands but you can see the frequency. If he is big betting every hour or so he likely has the goods; if he is big betting twice every orbit he is either the luckiest SOB on the planet or is bluffing often.

Id argue that betting a few hundred on the river per hour is still very high frequency, its not like this V is a maniac playing every single hand.

Anyways, I tank called. V showed 99 and stole my lunch money.

They’re never bluffing it’s a tale as old as time.

You should stack off this way never. 16 pre (what kind of madness is 30 over 2 limps w this much stack in play?), bet small otf and see what he does. There is just never any bluffing on pair K, flopped QJ straight, high-ranked boards no matter how good your ‘1-3’ opponent is. You’re going to lose some money here but you completely let your defense down and lost a ton more than… more than I would’ve here.

Saving yourself a ton of money and still leaving in all the stacking equity going about it my way. If you chose to Ckc ckc ck-decide thwt also is viable, and then you get to see how greedy he is. You coolered yourself by taking a stack off line-sizing in a spot where you beat nothing but air and overplayed KJ.

There could be reasons to go large pre, like if one of the limpers or blinds is a whale who will call way too wide versus large sizing. Absent such a situation I’d go to $20.

This board type (3 connected high cards) may very well be underbluffed, as many of the natural bluff candidates are hands with decent showdown value, such as AQ/T9s/98dd/pair plus gutters, and many people don’t turn hands with decent showdown value into bluffs — however, I don’t think I am good enough to fold river. I get that KJ is probably discounted in Vils range when he uses this flop and river sizing, but idk, Vil is repping so thin, basically just TT/99/QJs (and you block one combo of QJ). If he has a few bluffs and a couple overvalued KJs combos I think you’re getting a good enough price to call.

Again, fold river may very well be correct, but I suspect this is one of your best bluffcatchers and there is even a small chance you beat some value, so it’s a tough fold to make. I’m personally not capable of finding this fold in game versus a guy who throws money around.