I had a read on the limpers. Was going to move on the turn, but then had concealed draws to near nuts. You fold river every time there? I was almost positive button was bluffing. Can't SB have QJ a lot of the time?

he went from lag reg (which to me implies someone who's a very big winner) to gamble gamble

and we don't even know stacks

what read is that on the limpers? the important part is some guy is raising too much, so 3bet him for value when you pick up good hands. and don't float the flop oop to attempt to steal it on the turn against a bad aggressive player, that's never gonna work.

on the river you can call or fold, i sure as heck don't know. i can't make a read off vince mcmahon from the internet

you gotta 3bet this preflop. on the flop.... probably fold. i might checkraise. i might checkraise the tun too which is awful, but im getting some bad habits.

but if you 3bet pre, then this board becomes much easier to play. you can happily bet out, or checkraise any street. river becomes an easy call.

i think he is probably a small loser. he's just there all the time, and he is lag. and he had about 2k behind after he raised me.

i'd say my FE was about 10%, felt like 0%. after the hand he said "you push, i gamble" his english isn't so great.

he can also have AdXd, QdXd K7

he made a big raise. this player doesn't make a raise that big to fold it

ok so fold. duh

It's one of those "you had to see this guy" things. He built a stack, he was aggro and good, but after this hand he busted out after some other bad beats and such, he splashed all his chips in anger and barged out. We all know those players. Once he bet huge on the river, he either had a monster or air.

Hmm, I much prefer flatting pre. The limpers will often call 25 after three are in with QJ, KJ, KTs, etc. and pay off at least 2 streets when they have top pair, but fold to a 3-bet. Also button dude is a scary player in big pots (can just tell).

I like flatting pre in these spots. Obviously I was going for the nutsack on the flop and the turn, but I don't usually play that way. Anyway, just didn't have the guts to make the overcall. I folded, button mucked, I visibly slumped as if I knew I messed it up and SB flashed me a Q as if he thought it was the nuts as he got pushed a $1500 pot.

I'd ship this and also ship all of my value hands in this spot. The top of your range crushes his and there are all sorts of garbage hands he could be bluffing with, and you have a big draw. There isn't much that he can raise with and call it off.

Well now the entire hand changed. If you specifically think that he has AdXd and that he never folds it then there's nothing to discuss.

So yeah, this.

I was thinking earlier about how a lot (all?) of the hands you post here have very limited reads on your opponents. You've said that you think your edge comes from developing a lot of history with the players and being able to read them very well, yet the hands you post on here seem to consistently show you being pretty lost in the hand. Like in the hand earlier today you know that the player will raise his straddle really widely, yet you offer no other information whatsoever that would give any insight about whether to three barrel bluff him on a dry board. But then there's a curveball like this where it seems like you were holding back. So it just kind of leads me to wonder what's going on.

generally speaking i hate check/calling over and over. its the way bad players play. good players 3bet and raise, generally speaking.

i understand if a guy is scary in big pots. but he's also a guy who has been opening really wide. KhQh is a great hand to get into with a guy who has been opening wide and will play huge pots with you. basically if you get top pair you're stacking off *if* you 3bet.

if you don't 3bet, then you could get into a 5way pot or whatever, where top pair is likely to be no good, especially if the pot gets big.

when i play passively i tend to lose money, unless i have a specific read and a reason to play passively.

raise that vince mchmahon bitch! and when you bink the river look at him with crazy wrestler eyes when you make your bet.

Yeah so much truth here, and even though it's routinely repeated, probably still under-stressed. I was in the middle of so many just barely undersized or properly sized bets with calling fish left to act behind me, it seemed right on every street and though it felt wrong. I definitely felt like an idiot after the hand.

what's going on is that i should write up hhs better, including more reads/history. sorry. i'll do better.

and im lost in most of the hands i post because otherwise there's not much reason to post a hand.

and of course i didn't KNOW he had AdXd, but i felt pretty sure he had a hand he wasn't folding, so i'm flipping at best.

you said you "much prefer flatting pre" and me and annie both say raise. i'm pretty sure that 3betting is correct.

btw if it were me in that spot i'm 3betting suited connectors 76+ and probably J9s QTs 55+ and most AXs

You seem to be saying that button is likely to be raising his button with a wide range here, so I would threebet this hand nearly always, especially since you presumably have a pretty clean image.

The flop isn't awful for a checkraise either, depending on how aggressive you think the button will be at c-betting against a field of players.

The turn is even better since you've picked up a lot more equity, you no longer have to worry about the two other players who were also in the pot, and the sb at this point is also unlikely to have a hand that can handle the heat. So unless the button is a real calling station or is too scared to be betting here without a really big hand, you should pick up the pot a lot and still win enough of the time when you don't. The lack of a flush draw on the flop also adds some credibility to the slowplay that you're trying to represent.

The river is a fold. SB can't call without a hand, and button's range is uncapped. There's not much that makes sense for him to be bluffing with on this board.

If everyone knows that the button is bluffing then that does change things a bit, but no one can judge that without being at the table.


EDIT: I messed up in the part where I thought that the other players had folded the flop.

so basically legend played almost every street wrong. good job!

The goal in NLHE is not to flop one pair against four opponents when you are out of position against three of them and when aggressor in the hand is going to be squeezing you between the other players. Just so many things in the hand have to go right for you to first actually flop top pair, and be up against someone else that has a worse top pair, and not get beaten by any of the other three players in the hand, or have the other guy spike his kicker. And then when all of those conditions are met you have to actually manage to extract value despite the positional problems in the hand while still actually making sure you're not just getting owned, or end up folding the best hand, etc.

There is already 13bb in the pot when the action gets to you and depending on the proclivities of your opponents, you can either win that 13bb uncontested a lot of the time or you can build a pot against fewer opponents with a strong starting hand and lots of credibility to spend on a flop bet.

Anarchist, definitely raise turn bigger with AQ. Your sizing is so far from a geometric growth that it just winds up owning you when the strat that a weak straight wants to play there (call turn, fold river) also does best against the sizing that you choose.

It's a weird spot. It seems unlikely that you'd have many bluffs because against 2 players it would be likely someone would have a Queen, but if people are able to fold straights even when the flush misses it should be a massively profitable spot for you. You can play AQ, Q and flush draw, and even naked Qs aggressively to fold out chops, and that lets you comfortably bluff any Adxd and expect lots of folds. But definitely turn raise should be a couple hundred more.

Yup pretty much. And my live tells were also the worst if anyone was paying attention. It was a just a weird hand where c/c-ing seemed okay on every street, and then I c/f the river even though I have a pretty good read and am getting all kinds of odds to make the last call in a big pot with TPGK. 2-5 too much for me?

i dunno if 2/5 is too much for u. i doubt it though, especially if you have decent results.

anytime you want to post hand histories in here i'll be glad to help!

Well I was on the waitlist for 1-2 and was killing time, which may have caused me to call instead of raise pf and on the turn, but I've sat plenty at 2-5 and felt comfortable. I forgot to mention if the river bricked I was planning on betting if SB checked.

But I'll definitely post hands with you. My biggest problem currently seems to be misreading morons.

This dude went all in pf at 1-2 with a stack between 100-200 about 17 times in 3 orbits, no calls. He slows down slightly, folds maybe 6 straight hands, but then started going AI again (he actually limped one time in the middle of this, but folded to a flop bet). Finally got called on maybe his 22nd AI and his A7o beat 88. Three or four more uncalled all-ins on the next orbit. Then another all-in and his AKo doubles through JJ. Now he confesses to the table "I had everything during all those AIs....sometimes 55, sometimes J8o, whatever...just wanted to build up my stack." Two hands later he open pushes AI again from MP for about $440. Folded to me in SB, I have AKs. I have him covered. What do you do?

hahahahaha!!! hahahaha!!!! you SNAP call!!!


i'd call with 99+ and ATo+

annie posted a relatively short post about how to crush 1/2 and 2/5 poker. it was very good. i quoted it a couple of times. and added a little. i'll try to find it for you if you're interested.

Yeah that was a super thinly veiled bad beat story. I tanked and then called, dude flipped AA natch and laughed pretty hard. He racked up two hands after. FML.

Edit - yeah, quote it if you can find it.

i disagree with him about people rarely raising AQ. i think people raise A9, KT, whatever random hand. it varies. i'd happily call a raise with AJo preflop.

one thing he doesn't talk about is bet sizing. raise preflop BIG, especially if you're playing 1/2. you want pots big so rake is less proportionately. and people will call your big preflop raises. people have been sitting there waiting forever to get a hand they can play. just cuz you made it 5bb or 6bb instead of 4bb, they aren't going to fold their T8s.

i always cbet, so i tend to make my cbets smaller. if you aren't worried about sizing tells, then cbet smaller when you miss and bigger when you hit. i usually cbet half pot if post flop is heads up. if it's a wet board and multiway, you're gonna wanna adjust your bet.

Yeah, I'm on that level and slightly above it. I was offering some hands that were unconventional.

It is true raising PF and C-betting with just about anything is super profitable at 1-2.