Villain: 31/5, hands 42. Seems passive so far

1) Was my bet okay on the river (if it was, was sizing also ok, I tried to rep "busted flush draw") or would you rather chk/call or check fold?
2) What would you do vs chk/raise? Does villain have enough of worse 2 pair on the river?

SB: $13.64 (136.4 bb)
BB: $12.29 (122.9 bb)
UTG+1: $9.70 (97 bb)
UTG+2: $8.03 (80.3 bb)
Hero (MP1): $10.15 (101.5 bb)
MP2: $7.61 (76.1 bb)
MP3: $6.46 (64.6 bb)
CO: $7.89 (78.9 bb)
BTN: $12.24 (122.4 bb)

Preflop: Hero is MP1 with A Q
2 folds, Hero raises to $0.25, MP2 calls $0.25, 3 folds, SB calls $0.20, BB folds

Flop: ($0.85) 9 Q A (3 players)
SB checks, Hero bets $0.27, MP2 calls $0.27, SB folds

Turn: ($1.39) T (2 players)
Hero bets $0.85, MP2 calls $0.85

River: ($3.09) 5 (2 players)
Hero bets $2.25, MP2 raises to $4.50, Hero?

The turn is actually better for IP because 1) they have position and b) now all our sets and 2p are vulnerable to their flop calling range (KJ, J8 sometimes).

As this is a shortstack fish and we are probably going broke because we beat worse 2p we're still not thrilled about getting 3 streets vs an increasingly narrower calling range where our nut EV keep diminishing. So basically learn to check more. I would rather x/r the turn to trap worse value hands and draws.

AP call seems whatev. They can have worse being a fish, but overfolding river raises is fine in most circumstances. Again, I'd rather x/c than b/c though.

You can probably jam the river v. a fish but it seems pretty close between that and other smaller bet sizes. I guess call the raise since maybe they spaz w/ 2 pair or some other worse hand that shouldn't raise. Checking the river would be horrible since they're just going to x back their SDV that will call a bet, and they don't really have a lot of air to bluff with (Passive fish aren't bluffing here anyway).

I think the trouble is when we bet smaller on the flop we're giving IP easy odds to call all their broadways. Which makes their turn range that much stronger (nut conentrated) on effectively worst turn for us in the deck.



^^^I ran a sim vs a 14% passive calling fish range and the EV shift ott AP is huge, so Pio checks range:




Whereas when we cbet bigger we weed out those straights a bit and can now go about extracting value/protecting our equity:




OOP actually folds 2p to the river raise and mainly calls with sets, which is interesting. And if IP has zero bluffs calling might be even worse.

Another factor to consider: is a passive fish going to have way more value in this call-call-raise range that a solver would? I would say so. Yes they probably overcall their 2p to two possibly three barrels but they probably aren't raising them otr either. Bet/calling could be -EV imo.

You can bet bigger on every street to set up river shove. As played river spot is very underbluffed. This passive villain have almost alweys nuts or set . Vs aggro you can check river to induce bluffs from missed draws. Otherwise you have to do job yourself and barrel for max value aginst all Ax Qx etc. GL.

I think shoving would be spew and you're in essence turning your hand into a bluff

How you play then vs short stack? This is top of your range and villain have many hands he pays off that you beat. Mybe deep stack 100bb+ you dont want to shove river.

We're far away from top of range here.

AA, QQ, 99, KJ, J9s all hands we're comfortable calling off.

I would size up flop and turn lots of pair+draw combos that call you anyway. River maybe even size up to make sure he wont fold Ax.
River raise looks super nutted, its close because he might raise same or weaker 2p. Probably fold, but calling is not super punt for sure.

I did call and Villain had KJ. Thanks for all the feedback guys! I have started to experiment with 1/3 sized Cbets after I have seen a lot of streamers using them on NL100 to NL400. I guess I am still clueless when to do it and when not. Or should I do it only against the regs and against worst players I valuebet against them bigger?

Kind of. For me the lesson of this hand would be to recognise what sort of hand calls that range (i.e. if we bet either small or large).

I know people are saying value bet confidently but I'm unconvinced that's totally right, even at micros, unless you're playing known super stations. Most fish still play tighter multiway, slowplay value and we should respect their range much more when they've a) already indicated passivity preflop and b) the nuts change advantageously ott for that broadway heavy calling range and c) particularly for a hand that blocks v's worse value calling range.

It would make more sense to shove on the river if we think villain is totally inelastic with their weaker value combos but, crucially, they get here with lots of value too, which zaps EV and effectively gives us an out when they do something extremely nut heavy like raise a triple barrel.

You need to value bet against fish when it's almost impossible for them to have air and they have enough hands that will call a bet but not reopen. There is an astronomical amount of worse 2p and one pair hands that aren't going to fold to a block bet and probably aren't going to reopen, so the only question is how big you can go before you start to isolate against too strong of a range.

This is the part I'm mostly disagreeing with. 2p doesnt' tend to print vs 2p on connected boards because blockers in our hand and board. CAN they have those hands, yes. But we're looking at almost exclusively A9, AT and T9, mostly suited combos. Whereas they have plenty of combos of the nuts and will just sit there collecting EV automatically (whereas a reg would raise some %, allowing us to exploit fold more often, whilst having a more vulnerable calling range). Doesn't seem slam dunk oop because everything in gto (and hence exploitation) revolves around nut combos, and mistakes made uponeth. Whereas they probably aren't making many mistakes calling those hands down, and we might be firing blindly into a stronger than gto calling range (conversely, a passive fish is polarising v gto here -plus some of our value targets will bet themselves)

Not 100% against printing vs a station, it's obv close. I remain unvconvinced we're 'printing' vs population tho (vs doing more checking/check-raising turn to trap draws AND 2p)

A fish will also have Q9, T9, and QT, maybe all combos, along with all Ax, KQ, random Qx and other pairs that are going to call some amount of the time. The river is a bet and I don't think it's particularly close either.

I said T9. Ok Q9 and QT but almost exclusively suited and not many combos because of board and our blockers.

A passive station isn't calling many if any naked Ax to a triple barrel here (feel free to post any hands that contradict this: esp where hero triple barrel owns cold-call IP with better 2p on a dynamic runout), or KQ, Qx or other pairs. I think that's reaching deep into maybe land, and even if true to a certain %, is much less proportionally in range than the more predictable tightisth 14%ish range that emerges out of MDA. Those are super station calldowns, and we don't have info that villain is that subtype yet.

If you think a fish is folding any Ax to a block bet on the river, I'm not sure if you actually play poker.

Well a block is different. But that isn't the hand AP

Sorry I've just thought of something else....

Do we really want to block this spot? Doesn't that give too cheap a price to all the worse value we target on the turn (the river is a blank)?

What does blocking with our best 2p achieve here? If they are a station they would've paid a higher sizing with all their worse value, so we're not really maximising vs the calling range. And if we're not doing that, why triple barrel?