1/2, wait a minute, I don't think this turn helped me at all!
1/2 at the Legion. Primary Villain is either the second-best player in the pool or I am. (No, he's not that guy.) He has about $350 or so and I cover.
I open A♠ J♠ to $13. He coldcalls from the button. Both blinds call.
Flop ($46 after rake): Q♦ Qx J♦
Blinds check, I bet $30, V calls, others drop.
Turn ($106 after rake): A♣
I check, V bets $60 . . .
14 Replies
H's big c-bet is optimistic MW. I would bet smaller or x.
This is a very tough spot I think and we are obviously vulnerable to leveling ourselves into the wrong move.
AP turn: V's KT is good, his Qx is good etc. He has some T9 semi-bluffs I suppose but we have all the AA/AQ and I think he should x his T9. His turn bet seem value-heavy to me on a paired board because I think he should just x behind his FDs. We block the Jx stuff we want him to have here....and I don't see how he can bet that crap anyway on this turn strongly favoring our range.
We have 43 invested, not even two decent cocktails these days..
...so I think it's a tight fold here even though he can also be betting us off a chop here. I may be leveling us into a mistake though. But I'm having trouble finding his logical bluffs.
Are we to infer that you regret your decision to bet flop? I think I'd regret it, if we're now unsure about check-calling.
Looks like you'll have just over a PSB left if you call. Maybe call and play some fifth street chicken by checking again.
You got yourself into a bit of a pickle.
Are we to infer that you regret your decision to bet flop? I think I'd regret it, if we're now unsure about check-calling.
Moreso that the turn just nominally improved me but I'm still behind to everything I was before. In hindsight, I don't think betting $30 accomplished anything a $20 bet wouldn't also have done.
Looks like you'll have just over a PSB left if you call. Maybe call and play some fifth street chicken by checking again.
You got yourself into a bit of a pickle.
Chicken pickle time!
Turn ($106 after rake): A♣
I check, V bets $60 . . . Hero calls.
River ($226 after rake): J♥
Say, this river didn't help me either. I want a new deck.
Yeesh.
Let's try to think clearly.
We know we lose to any Q. But let's try to decide how likely Qx is, versus how likely some other hand is.
If V is confident in his game, his BTN calling range can be wide pre, and he could have some reasonable floats on the flop. He could have some worse JX, some KT, some AT, some diamond draws, including AXdd that ran into TP/aces up, maybe some lower PP's with a sliver of SDV. A lot of his worse hands seem likely to stab turn when we check on an ace.
His turn bet size doesn't necessarily tell us anything. That sizing looks like it could be a weak bluff or the stone nuts trying to milk us for value. Maybe he takes that sizing with KT, unsure if we're sandbagging with a FH or quads.
We block some AQ and QJ combos. We unblock KT and diamond draws. I'd think he'd have to have some frequency of 3B'ing AQ/KQ/QJs pre, unless we opened from very early position or he thinks we're too tight. I'd also think there would be some raising frequency with Qx on the two-tone flop. We cooler worse JX and worse AX.
I dunno if this is right, but I think I might just jam for a roughly PSB, targeting his worse AX and JX. Seems doubtful he's going to bet big with worse value or barrel with a bluff often enough.
We lose to maybe 16 better boats. But I'd think he has at least 9-15 combos of worse AX, and he might not be able to fold JX getting 2:1. If we discount some of his better boats, it looks like we probably have the best hand.
If he ever levels himself into thinking we have AA, and finds an insane hero fold with QX, that would be amazeballs with awesome sauce.
The alternative would be check-call. I don't think we can check-fold absent additional info indicating he's got it.
Another potential variable that may impact his range - what position is hero in? The later our position, the more I'd think he'd 3B, and the wider his 3B'ing range might be. The earlier our position, the tighter he's likely to be.
Also, what's the suit of the Q on board? Can we discount some AQs or QJs combos?
Other than him possibly being the 2nd best player in the pool, do we have any other reads?
How likely would he be to fast-play trip Q's on the flop? Would he fast-play any strong hands on the turn?
Is he MUBSy? Would he be worried that we always have a KQ or better when we c-bet the flop? Is he trappy? Does he play too wide pre, even vs an open from whatever position we were in?
Is he one of those tight-passive guys who doesn't 3B pre with AK, and by inference, probably not AQ, KQ, or any AXs? Alternatively, is he aggro enough to 3B QJs pre?
Does he show up post flop with all sorts of off-suit and trashy Broadway combos, like QTo? Is he calling pre with a lot of up-and-down suited Broadways, like Q6s and worse?
When he just flat calls the flop, while the blinds are still in the hand, and it's a two-tone board, I'd think that would make it less likely he has QX. I'd think a lot of players would want to raise with QX, to charge the obvious draws.
If we discount QX from his range, that leaves FD's, JX, KT/T9, maybe AK or AT, and some lower PP's as optimistic floats.
All his AX, KT and NFD combos improved on the turn. If he's a competent player, he may start turning KJ or JT or even T9 into a semi-bluff when we check turn. He may decide to stab once with some lower PP's or his lower FD's and be done with it if we call and they don't improve.
From V's perspective, your line kinda looks like KK or worse that auto-c-bet the flop and then auto-checked when the ace hits the turn. Or you could have AX that gets skittish when V calls on the QQJ board, and decides to check rather than barrel.
When the J hits the river, it's going to be hard for V to put you on AJ. If V is capable of betting thin for value or turning anything into a 2-street bluff when we look somewhat capped at AX or worse, I think we have to check-call.
I don't want to sound cavalier about possibly torching tree-fiddy, but the way this was played, I think it could be a huge blunder to check-fold or bet-fold river.
Another potential variable that may impact his range - what position is hero in? The later our position, the more I'd think he'd 3B, and the wider his 3B'ing range might be. The earlier our position, the tighter he's likely to be.Also, what's the suit of the Q on board? Can we discount some AQs or QJs combos?Other than him possibly being the 2nd best player in the pool, do we h
He's good enough that I checked, he ripped it and I folded.
After the session he said he likely made a mistake with AQ, as I probably pay off a smaller bet with a lot of my range and he owns himself hard if I turn up there with AA or JJ.
He's good enough that I checked, he ripped it and I folded.
After the session he said he likely made a mistake with AQ, as I probably pay off a smaller bet with a lot of my range and he owns himself hard if I turn up there with AA or JJ.
Knowing your position and V's pre-flop 3B'ng tendencies might help us shape our advice better.
Yes, he owns himself vs AA or JJ. It's only one combo of each. You might play either of them this way. The fact that you were able to fold on the river points to your suspicion that he has QX when he flat calls the flop, so you might slow down and check river to trap, but most people wouldn't.
I'm not a firm believer that no one ever folds a boat. I've folded boats. Not often. I can remember doing it twice, both times when it was kind of obvious I was beat.
This one could be hard to get away from, when V is on the BTN, and if we think he's capable of making plays. I probably would have checked flop, and taken a check-call line the whole way. I'm only getting away if he blasts off on the turn and jams river. Even then, I might not.
If we reasonably take QQ, JJ, and AA out of his range, you've got the effective 3rd nuts in a spot where V could have better. And is V really paying off with AX, JX, or KT if you triple-barrel, on this board?
It seems pretty unlikely you're going to go bet-bet-bet with worse than KQ. If he calls flop and turn, and we don't think he's going to stack off with worse, we're potentially value-owning ourselves if we bet river, and so we should check.
Logically, if we should check river, whether we check-fold or check-call comes down to whether or not we think V is ever betting with worse. I wouldn't, in V's spot, but I know plenty of 1/2 players will, so it would be hard for me to check-fold.
Well played.
i think you should bet 10 at most otf
this is 3 ways so adding in another person is probably going to have us reduce both size and frequency of the bet. i think 10 is fine because its 2 chips but id think sb / bb both have trips around 5-7% of the time and btn a bit more (~10% allegedly perhaps more bc of sizing) so realistically you are going to be beat quite often if you shrink calling ranges here via putting in larger bets, esp when u block the most likely worse hands that can call (jx). you do not want to play a large pot here
its very conceivable to me that the turn is a fold if you describe v as good (which lets face it at these games is just going to be tight). i think blocking the turn might be a better option than check
Knowing your position and V's pre-flop 3B'ng tendencies might help us shape our advice better.
****, I thought I had mentioned that. I was in the cutoff, he was on my immediate left OTB. He said he only flatted AQ preflop to get the goobers in the blinds to come in.
****, I thought I had mentioned that. I was in the cutoff, he was on my immediate left OTB. He said he only flatted AQ preflop to get the goobers in the blinds to come in.
That makes sense. If action folded to a good player who opened in the CO, I'd be flatting more on the BTN when there are bad players in the blinds.
I wouldn't necessarily credit this thread as being a contributing factor, but recently I've been more aware of how often my opponents have exactly the hand I wouldn't want them to have in spots where I'm pushing the action, yet they're not dropping. It starts to become obvious what they must have.
Last night I folded the rivered 2nd nut flush when a fish donked into me for a huge size after calling a huge turn bet on a paired board. I also folded an over-pair when he donked turn kinda chunky and barreled huge on the river after he flopped trips. I folded the nut straight when a good reg raised my river value bet on a three-flush board.
As an experiment, I was mostly folding face up, to try to get my opponents to show me a bluff. Not one ever did. The one bluff I was shown was when I tank-folded bottom pair face down on a super wet and connected ace-high board. I was basically bluffing in that hand.
There were at least a dozen hands in which I took pot control lines by betting small or checking back as the PFR, and found opponents had slow-played monsters. I did a lot of internal chuckling as I watched them sheepishly show their hands and drag in a $30 pot.
"Nice hand, sir. Extremely well played!"
I said this in another thread, expecting to get roasted (and I did), but I think it's true, at least at low stakes. Many of us are trying to get better by making more theoretically correct decisions, but most of our opponents are playing so far from optimal that we can make insanely exploitable plays and just print. We just need to let go of our desire to appear "good" to other players, and instead trust our reads.
I never commented about the flop action, but Sub's sim reminded me.
In multi-way pots, my default setting is to just bet my strong hands and my best draws, and check everything else.
His sim appears to show the solver checking a little more than half the time, and using variable bet sizes the rest of the time. If we think about how human opponents play, we can probably simplify to checking our entire range on this board. Humans aren't aren't finding the creative x/r's or continuing with the ranges a solver would.
Our hand doesn't seem to benefit much from equity denial / protection. It wouldn't seem strong enough to bet for value. And it seems too strong to turn into a bluff.
If we're betting too thin, a competent human player in position can float the flop and make a play for the pot on a later street. If we're too value heavy, he can easily get away from worse. Even a bad player in the blinds can play perfectly by over-folding worse to our c-bet and trapping when they flop trips.
It's hard to see the multi-street action which results in us winning this hand if our c-bet gets called and we don't significantly improve to make a hand that can beat flopped trips or better. If we're seeking balance, I'd rather c-bet with a polar range of QX or better and pure air than a merged range that has a lot of SDV or thin value and a lot of NFD's. That merged range will be harder to play on later streets after our c-bet gets called.
Sort of expecting Sub or someone else to offer a counter argument. But I try to simplify my life in-game, not complicate it. And that would be my simple approach to a spot like this. I'd just bet QX and air, and check everything else. I expect our opponents to make more mistakes versus that strat than they will versus a more complex mixed strat.
