Like 2-3 hrs in day 1. Blinds 75-150. Hero 15K (V's have Hero covered).

Hero raises MP w/ TT to 400, BTN raises to 1.1K, SB cold calls, Hero calls.

Pot 3.5K. Flop 542 rainbow. X, X, BTN raised to 2.2k, SB calls, Hero?


BTN V: Didn't have great read yet (he just sat down a few orbits ago). Seemed solid.

SB V: I suspected he was splashy, however, it was one of those things were he kept flipping over big hands so it seemed to mask his splashiness. But I am wary.


So I am now facing a bet that is 15% of my stack OP w/ 2 others in the hand. I don't feel great about it. BTN could have higher over pair but also some AK, AQ suited type stuff. SBs cold call, followed by flop call feels like a mid pair. He could even have JJ here.

Do I call and feel out turn, do I just fold, is raising even an option here?

Bigger pre before antes kick in IMO but that's more personal preference than anything.


In these spots, readless, early in tournaments, its very helpful to have a good handle on your own range for flatting the three-bet. Seems like 10 10 is going to be close to or actually the top of your range in this spot. Cant fold for 1 bet on the flop although the cold caller worries me.


Turn is going to check through a very high % imo. If the button bets turn and SB calls again, I think you can safely release the hand.

400 call is fine pre
If you call flop, you’re hoping that both players check a brick turn - at which point you’d only be losing to JJ/QQ in the SB. I think this is a reasonable call as SB cold calls are more often 99- AK AQ than JJ+ and BTN can clearly be wider than JJ+

BTN may still barrel turn with AK AQ so it becomes a live soul read at that point.

The ranges below are purely speculative... Adjust them at your own discretion as you see fit. Doing my best to ballpark.


Button Theoretically shouldn't have to many 3-bets in his range. Most of his playable hands play better as flats IP. But this isn't GTO sooooo... I'll be on the conservative side and give button V a 3-betting range of ~8% which is 88+, AQo+, AJs+, KQs, qjs,and j10s. I think this is on the looser side 3-betting, but for the sake of getting through this I'll ballpark that range. I don't like 3-betting 88's-10's here. But whatever.
SB V is most likely calling way to wide here. He also has to play the rest of the hand OOP which is super -EV when calling wide. If he is going to play from the SB profitably most of his range should be weighted towards 4-bet or folding, with the occasional strong holding being flatted for the sake of balancing his range. But again this isn't GTO... Soooo. SB V would most likely be 4-Betting QQ+ and AKos+s with 50% frequency. He flatted. So I'd say his range is something along the lines of, ~11% 22's-10's, A10-A9o, AQ's-A-8s+A5s, Kqs-K9s, Qjs-Qts, J10s,t9s, with the occasional AA or KK. This range isn't 100% accurate but if he is going wider than this in addition to opting for a less balanced range, meaning he is subbing hands like t9s for a hands like A2,3,4,6,7s then this is good for you.

Pot is 3.5k. Board is 542r. SB-V checks... Nothing too telling here. Pretty standard.
Now is where it gets interesting IMO. You have a few options. You can check. Which you do, but you need to gauge what your calling/continuing range is. Surely 10's is in that range along with JJ+ AKs looking to pair up or hit a backdoor FD. The rest of your 3-bet flatting range can fold.
Personally I like leading here. This flop is low and misses a majority of Bttn V's 3-betting range and SB-V's flatting range. It should be noted that you leading here would be considered a value/equity protection bet, and yes you are value owning yourself against higher pairs, which ok given your overall strat. Personally I like a bet size of somewhere between 3/4 pot and full pot on a board like this and then choose a descending bet size as later streets develop. Now is the time to polarize your range, considering it is a multiway pot. If this was HU I would use a different thought process.
Leading here you get value from Bttn-V's over cards that decide to continue and SB-V's lower PP's that decide to continue when they shouldn't. Again you're value owning yourself when you are behind to SB-V's sets and Bttn-V's over pairs. On this board texture that is all they can have here that beats you. Also it is better to define your hand and gain info and folds here on the flop, it is cheaper as well. Betting also protects your 10's from giving free cards to two other opponents should they check back. Leading here also allows you to potentially isolate this pot to HU, which given the line you took in your OP, should you have called there, it would make playing turns and river very tricky...
If you lead here I would consider folding to a check raise. There shouldn't be many check raise semi-bluffs on this board so its safe to say that if that were to happen you are highly likely facing an over pair...

Should you get called by ONE of the Villains...
If Button calls and SB folds...
Buttons range consists of overpairs and unpaired broadways at this point. 3-betting 8-10's pre IP is really bad so we can discount that.
Should the turn be below a ten. You can start sizing down on your turn bet if you decide to lead again. 1/4 pot is ok with me... Should the turn be a 3, any Ax combo now has a straight. Keep that in mind and check folding is usually the best option.
You can check call turn as well. If you check, most of the time Button will take the free card with unpaired broadways. If he bets, this is more indicative of an overpair and you can call one more street and fold river if you check and he bets the river in the same fashion. You can also elect to lead the river small as a blocking bet if you want to see show down and think villain is capable of firing huge... If turn and river run out safe... Lead turn for 1/4, then check call safe rivers...

If Button FOLDS and SB calls flop lead...
Button's range consists of a JJ-QQ's some of the time, stubborn pairs 66's-99's, sets of 5's, 4,2's, and Ax's with a gutter to a 3 and top pair such as A5s... His continuing range is actually stronger than the Buttons on this board, but you can still get value from his lower pairs, over cards, A'x with gutshots. SB will be OOP as well. If SB leads you can consider calling the turn and folding to river bets or checking back for showdown. If he checks the turn you can size up and fold to a check raise. Also checking back turns are ok as well.

If you bink a ten for the set in any of these scenarios I'll let you decide what's best for getting value considering the dialogue above...

^
If I were button, I'd love you to lead your capped range into my uncapped range on this flop. I'm raising more than half my preflop range, including all AJ+.

Just muck. What’s your best case scenario on turn and river with an SPR of 1?

I'm sure you feel pretty smug with your retort...

But if this is indeed what your are doing here, this is a SERIOUS leak and that is SERIOUSLY bad. If you can't figure out why and I have to explain it to you... I'm sad.

I debating just throwing my laptop of my balcony...

I would call.

pls explain to me then why btn cannot comfortably raise pretty wide in this spot when hero is indeed absurdly capped. id be happy to learn sth.

as played id probably fold flop and tell no one. leading is ultimately terrible for the reasons old mentioned and if the ranges you assigned to btn and sb are correct, why would you consider leading into those super strong ranges with a bluffcatcher? that leak is about as serious as it could be lol.

Thanks for the detailed feedback Living, but I agree with the others. I feel you rarely want to lead with a capped range. V's can expose us badly. Also, V is rarely calling his AK, AQ, unless backdoor flushdraw. Then turns become so tricky. Leading a 1/4 pot is literally fish 101 weak bet sizing tell we all see all the time. It screams a middling range, which again V can expose us for that.

Then how do you proceed. As Persianpunisher brings up, and kind of the crux of the issue here, is if I call, SPR is 1. It gets super super tough to play. I feel, absence a gin T, I'm just hoping it goes check, check and no over cards fill in.

c/f flop is certainly defensible, but think how SB calling otf affects this hand also. BTN will see far less FE jamming turn into two opponents and will frequently check back. once BTN checks back, you're ahead of him and looking for safe rivers and continued checking from SB.

incidentally, if it does check around on the turn, and then SB checks river, you can trap BTN by checking again and calling his desperation jam.

It’s close you can make a read c/c x/r and fold are all probably similar ev
Xr for protection and try and win vs some bluffs
X/c is fine and highest frequency option
X/f and not tell anyone is okish

I know you guys think leading is bad. It's not.

Also our range isn't capped... Not in the sense that you think it is. But the lines I gave above adjusted for this.

Betting 1/4 is on the turn btw, not flop. This is again, ok.

Guys, use some critical thinking here... Think about the hand for more than 2 minutes before just assigning standard "poker logic" and moving on.

Grab a glass of wine, hop in the bubble bath and think about it. You'll have an ah-ha moment eventually if you actually think this through.

I know I'll get eaten alive because I'm saying some pretty non "standard" **** but jesus guys... You're missing some pretty important points, and no one has even mentioned them yet.

$100 venmo'ed to whoever figures it out.

wtf happened to this forum

I’ll break this spot down for the 100$ promise you’ll ship when I’m right?

LOL

yeah, anyone with less than 500 posts and some strong positive feedback should be posting far more questions than essays for sure. i mean, there's a way to propose unusual alt lines, but it starts with a humble question to the forum rather than a statement or, lord love us, an essay.

i used to take this sh*te to heart, but i'm smashing it atm and don't care. just arrived home from cashing the opening event, then on same day winning my 6th main event satellite from 17 starts , which is equal 1st among a few of us local ME sat grinders with a conversion rate that's ludicrous.

then i get home and read this nonsense. i pissed myself laughing. i'm eating these guys alive atm and they have no idea why. donk at me, I dare you.

i do miss the old days though. we had some amazing discussions a few years back. so many of these guys would eventually win huge events, including WSOP ME, major Euro titles and other scores. even ellie got preposterously good in the end and had a massive recent online score in something. George is still lurking and cracks me up. there are some great old regs from HSMTT that are still posting here (I won't name them, they know who they are).

maybe poker is largely solved and every concept that can be discussed has been discussed. i think most of the value these days comes from room-specific exploits, but the good fields are just really good. someone asked me whether i was going to cash some tickets to play the $25K event and I just laughed. as if I have an edge in a $25K field.

Just got home.

Light me up guys. Lol.

Added to Ignore List

Entertaining thread.

I call. If btn bets turn and sb flats it's a snap fold while if sb folds its a trusting fold. He barrelled into two ranges dense in overpairs.

I enjoyed the back and forth actually. I've been starting out with local daily tournaments practicing and making a lot of good deep runs. For me it def depends on the table. If my image is good and I'm running well and table is soft or not calling a lot pre, I'll open standard and flat the re-raise. the sb call can be a LOT of diff hands (from my experience in these types of daily tournaments) from small pairs to just rag Ax's even out of position for 3x4x raises. On flop with the overpair to board, im def. watching the cards as the flop and the players. It's important to try and gauge your opponents throughout the hand. If SB checks, I think there is merit for checking or betting, but I think I would check instead of donk-bet and watch and guage the button. BTN has to decide based on their hand vs two callers and that gives me information. If BTN bets say 1/2 pot and SB calls, it can get dicey on turn trying to dodge straight and overcards with no idea where i will be. I could also check-raise and invest maybe 3k for a definitive answer on the flop, folding to any shoves or weird flats/cc's. Live daily tournaments mix in a lot of the logic but also some of the more disapproving antics, like in many of the tournaments, others bankroll each other, play like maniacs, bust and rebuy and whoever makes deep just kicks back. This personally drives me nuts as I have to play against multiple-bankrolled players. It came up when people were trying to get a 2-table agreed chop. Once I found the players discussing the chop and bankrolls, i put them on the never-chop-if-these-people are still in. anyway, bit of a digression. any answer later in the tournament to what the btn and sb had? how did the rest of the mtt go?

Yeah, I'm struggling to think of a reason to lead flop here. We don't really deny much equity because it's hard for me to see any of BTN or SB's Ax's ever folding to a single bet and overpairs are certainly going to at least call and sometimes raise. So yeah, we fold out some broadways and maybe get stuff like 77-99 to call but that doesn't seem like a great tradeoff.

As played, I think x/r is defensible, maybe even jamming considering we have 13.9K behind and 8K in the pot. It does deny equity to overcards better than leading and on low card boards we can sometimes get someone to stack with worse. I do like x/c more as we may not have sets that often in which case we may not even want any x/r. I think TT is too high in our range to ever seriously consider folding.