Considering a value raise here: thoughts?

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NL Holdem 1(BB)
BTN ($261.83)
SB ($17.73)
BB ($100)
HERO ($113.80)
CO ($208.10)

Dealt to Hero: J J

HERO Raises To $2.50, CO Folds, BTN Calls $2.50, SB Folds, BB Calls $1.50

Hero SPR on Flop: [12.19 effective]
Flop ($8): 8 5 9
BB Checks, HERO Bets $3.80 (Rem. Stack: $107.50), BTN Folds, BB Calls $3.80 (Rem. Stack: $93.70)

Turn ($15.60): 8 5 9 9
BB Checks, HERO Checks

River ($15.60): 8 5 9 9 9
BB Bets $4.89 (Rem. Stack: $88.81)

100nl, BB is unknown, but probably reg-ish because they bet 1/3 very quickly (indicating they're probably using jurojin or something) . BU looks reg-ish after 20 hands

yeah raise but i think flop is a check with range and if i was going to find hands to bet i dont think this one would make it in

Definite raise. I'm ok with the flop cbet in a multiway pot here. The button can't get too out of line with the bb behind him.

Why are we betting the flop

Why is this flop a range check?
Pure pot control?

I ran it in GTO+ and it is indeed a range check, probably even more so with the extra player in the hand.
But why?
What do we gain from checking flop?
Is it purely because we keep the pot smaller and easier to play on later streets?

I can see a lot of reasons why I wouldn't check here.
We get value from worse hands and draws.
We deny equity by making draws fold.

But I do not understand why this is a check.

Do we keep the pot small because there are a lot of bad cards that can come on the turn?
So if one of those bad cards does come, we haven't invested too much?

It's because we are have an equity disadvantage vs the button. But even more importantly, we have an EV disadvantage.

We have an equity disadvantage?
Pretty sure we have >50% equity.
We have all the same hands in our range but with all the overpairs added?

Not sure what an EV disadvantage is.

Just a heads up for future reference. You can't run an accurate sim for this hand in GTO+ since it's a 3-way pot.

Majority of solvers only work for heads up pots.

Actually looking at GTO Wizard ranges, BTN should have almost no 9's or 8's in his range?
The calling range is 3.1%, so probably not very realistic?

I think the idea is that if we’re playing our range, we don’t really have many 9’s/8’s but a lot of junk over cards. So equities are probably equal-ish, even though we have the overpairs and they don’t. Generally even solvers don’t like building pots OOP without a good reason. So I think that’s what’s going on, in theory.

In practice, it can be nice because we have a middle-ish strength hand that will be unpleasant on literally every turn if we get called. Checking also allows the population to get out of line by bluffing with total junk, and bluffcatching is where a lot of our EV comes from with middleing strength hands

However, as you point out, there’s a lot of pros to betting, especially if we figure BB won’t donk very often, if at all, and that BTN will mostly play ABC because of the other player in the hand. I also kind of figure that people will let me know right away if they have a strong hand, and won’t do a ton of slow playing. My guess in game was that:

1) EV of getting called by draws will be higher than anticipated because population will play too passively with them
2) EV of getting called by worse will be higher since we’ll get called by hands like 66 more often than is probably correct.
3) since it’s iggy, I don’t have to worry about my checking range being exploitatively weak

I’m open to suggestions, I think I may have underestimated the EV of bluffcatching total junk, which will just fold if we bet. This hand also shows the disadvantage of tying to go exploit mode and over-cbetting: we end up with the effective second nuts on the river and we’re not thrilled about going for value because villain’s range got narrowed a lot OTF

For the same reason that BB checks to the aggressor in most single-raised pots. At a certain point OOP's range isn't strong enough to lead. This board absolutely smashes the BTN's compressed cold-calling range.

You need enough value to:

a) Protect your checking range
b) Build a check-raising range
Then and only then, if you have enough value leftover, do you get to build c) a leading range. If you don't, then the optimal strategy becomes a rangecheck.

If HJ leads all their overpairs and vulnerable value, their checking range (consisting of medium equity overcards) gets castrated and never realizes its equity. The solver would decimate HJ's capped passive lines.

If you run flops on HJ vs BTN (GTO) cold-call scenarios you'll find that HJ ends up rangechecking many flops, and typically leads about 20-30% of the time across all possible flops.

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Multiway I think HJ should still be rangechecking. As played, definitely go for value on the river. Sure they'll have quads and one combo of straight flush sometimes, but you're gonna get called by worse boats, maybe flushes, and you can find an explo fold when they shove with a range that's way too value-heavy.

Ah right, got so stuck on how good our hand is that I totally forgot about protecting our checking range, thx!

I am 100% on board with having an unprotected checking range in this 3-handed spot and just playing my hand at face value and betting all my TPGK+ and high equity draws. Even if it caps our range, the BTN still has to contend with BB's mostly uncapped range here if he wants to barrel air, so the BB is in a way protecting our checking range for us a bit. Buying position for the turn and river, exactly like what happened here, is a very good outcome as well.

3handed so solver my ass. I like cbet, i like turn check, now raise river to 15-20 and fold to a shove, i m not sure if bb is even allowed to donk on this river, rather on turn i would say. i know it's super str8forward, but without reads i would go with this

our hand sucks on this board lol especially vs the ranges we're facing. except for monotone and maybe some of the very low boards i can't think of a board an overpair is worth less on. its vs two regs too. vs bb in a srp if he isnt donking you're supposed to split trending towards small size if u do bet without a club in my sim and in this exact iteration he's going to have a tighter range because he's overcalling so most of the dogshit is going to get folded. in a srp vs the button you cant cbet at all. so idk how u can say **** the sim im going to bet 1/2 pot here and expect to win vs 2 regs with a hand and a range that really cannot stand up to aggression both immediate and future on a variety of runouts. as for having the same sets as the button it doesnt matter if hes playing 1/4 of the hands that you are.
river i kinda think u can get stationed because you aren't really supposed to have this kind of hand but you're also capped and opening yourself up to getting wrecked if you're raise folding your entire range. if i had to pick combos to call that dont block bluffs KK looks like the best one followed by AA off the top of my head but you might just never win in practice vs b3b

[QUOTE=submersible;57433677]our hand sucks on this board lol especially vs the ranges we're facing.

We dont know this, plenty of people have very wide btn calling range, we have same amount of nuts as btn and bb is oop, 3handed makes harder for btn to raise us with marginal hands, and getting rid of just 2 overs is good for this hand

nah man JJ objectively sucks on this board compared to most others where its an overpair. button is a reg so i dont think you should assume he has a very wide calling range. it doesnt matter if you have the same number of nuts as the button if he flops them significantly more often than you. also its a board you wont be able to retain / realize equity and ev on and the board will change enough that putting in a bunch of money early is going to dick you with a hand that can't improve or pick up equity. also their continuing ranges have a ton of equity against you (and will be able to raise as a result fairly often) and you're facing 2 people. its just a really obvious situation where you need to play passively and if you do want to bet you need to be very polarized / well constructed

not the worlds most ideal sim but in my ep vs btn sim ep has 2p + 3.6% of the time while button has 2p+ 8.7 of the time. in a srp mp vs bb, bb has the nuts 5.3% of the time - i think this will be more in this particular hand because i think alot of the random offsuit combos get folded here because of the button's call. so as a collective your opponents probably have the nuts 5-6x as often as you do? also there's a fd which is usually better for the caller(s) and theres a whole bunch of hands that have added equity bc of board texture. like just look at the board. any 6, 7, T, J, Q or club changes the nuts.

it also doesn't make sense to me that you think the button can't raise marginally but we get to bet much more marginally because of the presence of the 3rd player. the sizing seems too big too but i just think its a spot you need to check

I'd have checked flop but the bet is fine.
On this runout we have what is effectively the nuts vs a 1/3 bet, so raising seems mandatory. If we face a reraise I suppose we just fold but thats gonna happen very infrequently compared to the times they just fold or call.

The reason checking plays otf is not because the BTNs range specifically or the BBs range specifically, its the combination of both ranges which puts us at a relatively severe equity disadvantage compared to a HU hand.

Villain had 8s6s

Seems like an easy raise simply because of his sizing. 6c7c and 9x are all betting at least pot hoping for a pair to make a hero call. Surely not in theory but ime.