temporarily 3 handed 20/40

BB is loose and a bit laggy...not overly agro post...This is the first time he has donked.

I open As5h on the button and only BB calls.

Jh7h3c...He donks, I call

Jh7h3c4s...he bets, I call

Jh7h3c4s9c...he bets....Is this a call?

I normally pay this off absent some solid read. The 9 on the river is annoying as some draws get there now, but you also beat a number of missed flush draws or perhaps some wacky donk bluff. You need to be right 14% of the time to break even. With an unusual line like this I'm paying.

It's not the worst thing in the world to grit your teeth and call the river, especially if this is a reg you may play more sh with in the future (e.g., plays late til games break) and you'll use the info.

But I'm also interested in what people have to say about the flop. Seems a little high in our range to fold right away, but has not great equity against someone who's not going crazy with bluffs or thin vbets, for that matter. I feel like I can exploit this spot pretty well live. But I check with Cepheus and he says its a clear call (barring some user error with that sweet UI). So... I dunno.

Between our over-card, backdoor potential, the fact that we might be ahead, and position, calling here seems quite reasonable. The problem is that this is just not a great spot for us, so none of our options are going to look good. I doubt that we give up much by just folding the flop.

Raising the turn is tempting to me, but I suppose that we have plenty of better candidates with which to semi-bluff.

FWIW I probably would fold the river, but I could easily be convinced otherwise.

Having the heart in our hand may tilt this to a fold for me. We want him to have bare hearts in this spot.

Also never folding flop. We're fairly close to the middle of our range here.

obvious flop call.
Fold river. Most people don't complete spaz bluff. We beat only beat heart combos with no pair. Gutshots got there. He can be betting any one pair for value.

fold nh

Was thinking about this too. In live play, when Villain donks out for the first time you've ever seen, would you adjust your play to account for him having more draws vs. made hands in his range? I think I can get behind a fold if Villain is a 'balanced' donker but this just seems fishy to me. Maybe I'm a skeptical pay-off donkey.

In my experience a live donk bet is almost always a pair or better. If it is a draw it is a strong combo draw. I can't remember the last time I've seen someone donk with like no pair and 9 or fewer outs, but I clearly have a low sample.

I usually put High-mid eq hands in their range; hands that they don't want to check raise but don't want to check call. That includes a bunch of hands like mid pairs, flush draws and the like. Occasionally some low equity thing like a naked gutter.

I definitely wouldn't fault a person for aiming to call down light to "see what he did this with", but really, if this is a range we need to get a read on, the situation will present itself again in the near future.

ran a5o w/ heart vs 64% and says you have 30% equity. i can also see someone donking any hand in that range if they choose to donk. i can also see someone barreling turn with pretty much everything but ace hi and k hi, but you're about 50/50 vs those anyway. and i can def see someone following through on this particular river with all of those hands (even thin value hands).
i don't think treating hands vs a donking opponent like they're in a vacuum. and 30% is half price.

River seems like a trivial fold, hero beats worse flush draws without a pair and weird line from kx, qx only, villain could even scoop with a better ace

how is this trivial? we only need to be folding 14% of our range if villain triple barrels 100% after donking, and this is a pretty good board to triple barrel on. if we just fold just all of our k hi's and worse, we're still folding double that.

In these spots I don't mind making an exploitative fold OTF. We have a heart which makes it less likely our opponent holds a FD. Another thing I find playing short with players that are not overly aggressive postflop but really don't understand GTO play is that the perceived weakness of their donking range OTF is absconded by the probability that BB is leading the flop with to protect a weak made hand like middle or bottom pair, and even stronger hands like Jx. All straight draws also get there OTR with the 9, which means we beat naked flush draws with no pair, and that's about it.

I like the hand as played and I'd call the river.

A few things to note:

a) We beat bluffs.

b) We don't beat any value hands.

a+b = thus even if our opponent plays perfect poker, our call is breakeven. Any deviation from perfect poker will result in an ev gain greater than or equal to zero for our strategy. If he never bluffs, then calling this hand is -ev; yet this loss of value is compensated by the ev gained when he checks. If he bluffs too much, then folding this hand comes with an opportunity cost which equals a loss of ev; yet this loss of ev is compensated by the ev gained by our other bluffcatchers, which are now more profitable.

Also of note is that there is likely a significant hole in this opponent's strategy due to the flop donk; if and when this opponent checks, we may bet for value more often exploitively on the margins, and we may also bluff more often exploitively on the margins due to our now expanded value range; we may also raise more frequently preflop on the button due to this ev gain of our marginal preflop hands, which should be folded vs better opponents that don't exhibit this tendency, which loses flop check raising value, which nets a gain of ev for the button's strategy.

Thanks for this and +1.

Your detailed explanations are the absolute best since it makes so much sense logically.

For me, in a 3 handed game, I don't mind taking what may mathematically be a -EV play of calling on the river.

Specifically because in a 3 handed game, it's critical to have an idea of what hand range a LAG villain is donking Flop, Turn, River with to potentially exploit villain in the future in the 3 handed game.

For me calling flop and turn as HERO is standard and any thing else I would classify as fancy play syndrome or subpar at best.

i think everyone, myself included overestimated the value of blockers. but this is def not a -ev call. you have more than enough equity and i don't think treating hands vs a donker like they're in a vacuum is a bad idea. this is a scary board and i don't think any bluff on the flop should be giving up on turn or river.

Curious as to the distribution you get to the river with this way that bumps A5o up to a call. We only need to continue with top 84%

a5 is top 69% vs 100% of btn defense range. roughly 99-88, 66-55, 22,AKo-AQo,ATo-A2o,KQo,KTo-K5o,Q7o,T7o,97o,87o,76o,AKs-AQs,ATs-A2s,KQs,KTs-K4s,QTs,Q7s,T7s,97s,87s,76s-75s,54s. pretty much besides a set on the river, a pair of 9's is the top of our range. with a range so weak as to be never raising river, i think folding a hi is a mistake.