1/3 6-handed Ranging?

OK
Opener: still thinking this is pretty out of line and something I would not do - but maybe standard with the population

Raiser: consent that this is something I might do along with the population

Maybe I’m asking too much, I want to read these hands based on pre-flop play and there’s just not enough info.

Considering a 4Bet bluff would rely a lot on fold equity which is hard to gauge.

Don’t you think that even if I knew they had those specific mediocre hands, a fold would still be the plus ev play?

Or should I recognize that people are opening and 3Betting a lot of hands pre-flop that will not be able to call a 4Bet? Knowing their hands now, both my villains probably would have folded to the 4bet?

The resulting hands aren't outlandish, at least with regards to what these particular players are showing up with, imo.

HJ is loose aggro so her initial open from the HJ could literally be not too far off from ATC and QTo is well within that. Obviously her flat of the 3bet OOP to what we assume is a decent player sucks, but it's pretty standard for a loose player to never raise/fold preflop so this isn't surprising in the least.

CO, like all but the most passive, has a 3betting range. Against a nitty open, a decent player will likely have a pretty tight 3betting range. Against a loose aggro opponent opening from almost LP, their 3betting range is going to be expanded. KQs seems like a perfectly reasonable hand to 3bet with in this spot (I'm guessing it could be played as a flat too). But note it could easily be on the very bottom end of his 3betting range in this spot, and even still I wouldn't consider it light at all.

So pretty trivial fold preflop, especially since there's a decent chance what CO showed up with is near the very bottom of his 3betting range (and yet still crushes us).

And I also wouldn't get too play backy in this spot either, as while he'll likely fold KQs (i.e. perhaps the bottom of his 3bet range) to a 4bet from us, the majority of his range will likely just sigh continue as it is often so strong.

Gnothingmuchtoseehere,imoG

You need to look at some charts or do some kind of studying, FreeCard.

I'm not surprised to see this at all. There's this perceived wisdom that "live low stakes so any raise is a big hand" but anything other than that must be some sort of maniac who opens ATC. The middle ground sort of gets forgotten about. Charts will show QTo as a bottom-of-range and/or partial open from the HJ; they'll also show KQs as a bottom-of-range and/or partial 3bet from CO. However, this is for 3BB so both players are seemingly a little loose...but not outrageously so.

Even so, KJs is a straightforward fold from SB. Yes, you need some 4bet bluffs. As it happens GTOw suggests that KJs is actually one of those main bluffs, but given it folds AJs and KQs I would just think of it as a fold.

But these hands, while on the loose side for sure, aren't so jaw droppingly terrible as to require major adjustments

all I can say is I'm a firm advocate of never cold calling a 3bet. Besides the fact it looks fishy as hell, your range is so terribly face up to exactly nothing premium, not to mention the inevitable 4bet from initial raiser just wasting your money. In a wide v wide scenario I might actually be inclined to 4bet KJs to like 2.2x so I can fold if I get jammed on.

Cold calling 3bets from the SB is bad 99% of the time and it would be a lot easier to just never do it and spend the brainpower somewhere else. I would snap fold and if I was made to play the hand, I'd 4bet it.

Villain's hands are whatever. I'd fold QTo from HJ but I guess opening it is a small loss for me and a small win if the table is terrible.

3bet KQs from CO is completely fine and definitely optimal against this villain. Flatting would be bad.

HJ then flatting the 3bet is a fish play. She should be folding a portion of her opening range to a 3bet and this hand goes straight in the bin. This is a very common mistake amongst weak live players and a big part of our winrate should come from the type of value raise that CO is making.

Let's say she opens 25% and CO 3bets 10%, and she flats her entire range except I guess QQ+/AK. So his range has about 60/40 raw equity over hers and he has position on her. Good times.

CO's 3B with KQs seems pretty standard. What I find more interesting here, and what I think you should pay attention to, are your reads, your focus, and your recall.

You noticed HJ was LAG. She showed QTo. Your read was right.

You said you assumed CO was decent based on three observed traits - youth, silence, and possibly Russian. I'd suggest that our sub-conscious is actually pretty good at using pattern recognition to quickly intuit things about your opponents and read situations.

You may not have been simply "assuming" something based on a lack of info, but rather predicting something based on limited info. That fast-read on CO appears to have also been right. He does seem at least minimally competent.

So, maybe in game, your gut instinct told you she could be getting OOL (she was), but he could be strong (he was), so you begrudgingly folded KJs, which is almost certainly the highest EV play.

You could have stopped paying attention after you folded and forgotten about the hand. But you didn't. You stayed focused, saw the showdown, and remembered their exact cards, with suits, their positions, and the pre-flop action.

You sought verification of your suspicions that she was LAG and he was solid. At some point, you thought to ask how they can be exploited.

In many of your threads, you demonstrate that you're pretty good at developing reads on your opponents. Often enough, even with very limited observations, your reads are pretty spot on.

What often costs you EV is doing something which isn't logically supported by your reads. Here, you went with your reads, and were proven right.

If you can consistently develop good reads quickly, AND trust them enough to make plays that are logically supported by them, you'll add to your long-term EV.

It doesn't matter if what they're doing is "typical". Don't try to extrapolate from what these two opponents are doing and apply it to the entire pool. The only question that matters is how to exploit what you see them doing.

It may help to take note of what they're doing, and ask what it means when they do the opposite. Some examples and fast exploits:

1. She's probably opening light from every position, based on this showdown. When she limps, it may mean she's more polar, with a hand that wants to limp-3B or a hand that will auto-fold to a raise. We might be leery of raising over her EP limps, but we can relentlessly attack her LP limps.

2. He may be 3B'ing with a wider range than the rest of the pool, at least when he's 3B'ing over her opens, based on this showdown. If he flat calls, he probably has a more speculative hand that just wants to see a flop. We can probably put in some light 3B-squeezes when we see him flat call her MP/LP opens.

3. If we see her limp-3B from EP, we can probably attack her EP opens, whenever he folds or flat calls from EP/MP. Both of their ranges are likely to be weaker in that scenario.

4. We should probably be leery when she opens from EP and he 3B's from EP/MP, because he's probably more concerned about the players left to act behind him than he is about her wide EP opening range. His range is likely to be stronger, possibly strong enough to 4B, especially if we 3B him from IP.

5. We can't assume his LP opens and 3B's are always going to be light, just based on this one showdown. But we can guess that he'd rather play HU and IP vs a bad LAG than flat call and allow the players on the BTN and in the blinds to come along. That could mean he's opening / 3B'ing wider than GTO from LP, and he's likely to over-fold vs aggression post, whether HU as the PFR or multi-way as one of the field callers, because his range in both situations is likely to be wider / weaker than optimal.

I'd watch to see if either of them tends to stab at the pot whenever action checks to them, especially when they're last to act. If we see either of them stab as a field caller when the PFR checks, I'd be thinking about attacking those bets.

I'd be over-folding whenever either of them plays back at us, or barrels off. I'd worry less about their early street aggression, and worry more about their late street aggression. I'd expect them to give up on a lot of turns and rivers when their earlier bets get called.

In multi-way spots on the river, especially when the turn checked through, I'd be a little more sticky and curious if I see them "wake up" and bet from middle position, especially if their bet size seems suspicious, and the river card is just a brick, or completes some draw they aren't likely to have.

None of the above is from memory. It's all the result of a few minutes spent trying to find some logical inferences derived from a single showdown. You can do the same thing in-game, with discipline, focus, and practice.

Yours was a good post for me doc, because I realize that I am pretty good at sizing people up quickly, but I’m not really using that info as well as I could to predict future play and exploit what I see them doing.

I still get people missing the point and suggesting charts, but I’m kinda over the ignorance. No, these are not outrageous plays, but I am trying to read hands(people) and it was not what I expected.

As mox said, their play is not out of the ordinary enough to warrant major adjustments. I already exploit wide openers, but her aggressive tendencies are not typical of that player type. It kinda masked me from seeing that she’s looser than I thought.

I think gg has once again kept me straight in that jacking up my 4Bet bluffing is probably not a good idea.

I think I’m just dreaming of finding a way to narrow the range preflop when there’s simply not yet enough info.