2/4 - QQ on low dry board vs. tag

[zook]

Villain's running 28/20/2, 7% 3bet, 11% c/r flop over a big sample. No notes, no history I remember.

Full Tilt No-Limit Hold'em, $4.00 BB (6 handed) - Full-Tilt Converter Tool from FlopTurnRiver.com

Hero (Button) ($400)
SB ($62.70)
BB ($546)
UTG ($56)
MP ($439.60)
CO ($440.70)

Preflop: Hero is Button with Q, Q
3 folds, Hero bets $12, 1 fold, BB calls $8

Flop: ($26) 3, 3, 9 (2 players)
BB checks, Hero bets $18, BB raises to $40, Hero raises to $88, BB calls $48

Turn: ($202) 4 (2 players)
BB checks, Hero bets $100, BB calls $100

River: ($402) K (2 players)
BB bets $346 (All-In), Hero... ($200 behind)

[Renton]

i would just expect him to have K9 or 9sXs like every time.

tilting hand though.

[Alexos]

i would... 3bet bigger on flop and just shove turn.

as played fold i guess, but im sure id tilt-call it sometimes

I was thinking, how often does the donk shove get called on the river? When is it a good line to take with a bluff, and when is it a good line to take for value?

Obviously it's like a hueg levelling war on a flush river

[Alexos]

If he had a pot sized bet on river, bluff donk shoving his whole range here is pretty effective if villain is capable of folding/decent but not great handreader

[Renton]

we can have every flush and boat

[meeloche]

I don't really get why we're 3 betting the flop. It's so dry, there's so little he can have so I would just call and let him bluff it off. We're in position as well which makes me want to 3 bet even less.

[zook]

Both of these comments are interesting and have got me thinking.

i would... 3bet bigger on flop and just shove turn.

I'm hoping the smaller raise gets some calls from worse pp's and 9's. And maybe the rare spaz 4-bet. But now I'm thinking that a bigger 3bet and a turn shove might get more stacks from JJ/TT?

I don't really get why we're 3 betting the flop. It's so dry, there's so little he can have so I would just call and let him bluff it off. We're in position as well which makes me want to 3 bet even less.

This is interesting. My first thought is that I have more bluffs in my range 3betting small than I do calling. But I guess I would consider flatting with AK/AQ/AJ here given his high c/r flop %.

[meeloche]

Well it depends how you expect him to react to your 3 bet. Frankly I don't think there's a lot of people who are gonna go I don't believe you and jam where as there are much more people who will c/r then try and barrel you off it. If you think he c/r 9x or better then I don't hate 3 betting but I just don't think his value range that you beat is wide enough to warrant 3 betting.

[Alexos]

I thought 3betting was fine just b/c the guy essentially minraised, so it def can look bluffy. If he had c/r a normal size I would def never 3bet this flop barring some sick read.

[Parasurama]

Well it depends how you expect him to react to your 3 bet. Frankly I don't think there's a lot of people who are gonna go I don't believe you and jam where as there are much more people who will c/r then try and barrel you off it. If you think he c/r 9x or better then I don't hate 3 betting but I just don't think his value range that you beat is wide enough to warrant 3 betting.

This is interesting, so according to you what actually should be our range for 3betting this flop? If we take QQ+ out of this range isn't it very unbalanced? Does it even matter?

we don't have to ever 3b this flop

[Parasurama]

yeah well obv I just like to do it on occasion if I have the right image

[mcatdog]

if we had air you guys would all say not to 3bet the flop because no one believes flop 3bets on this type of board

[meeloche]

Well it depends how you expect him to react to your 3 bet. Frankly I don't think there's a lot of people who are gonna go I don't believe you and jam where as there are much more people who will c/r then try and barrel you off it. If you think he c/r 9x or better then I don't hate 3 betting but I just don't think his value range that you beat is wide enough to warrant 3 betting.

This is interesting, so according to you what actually should be our range for 3betting this flop? If we take QQ+ out of this range isn't it very unbalanced? Does it even matter?

I wouldn't 3 bet this flop with anything unless like alexos said I had some sick player specific read.

The issue for me is not whether you have a balanced range when you do it, I'd just rather have 1 wide range for this spot instead of 2 tighter ones 3 betting and flatting.

if we had air you guys would all say not to 3bet the flop because no one believes flop 3bets on this type of board

that's a much better argument than "omg balance"

[griffey24]

What you do on this flop with QQ is fully dependent on what you do with air type hands here.

I'm pretty sure meeloche floats this flop with a bunch of his air/overs, so it's not surprising that he'd want to flat this c/r IP.

I'm re-bluff 3betting this flop a decent amount, so I'm for sure going to 3bet QQ here. Like Alexos said, I'd probably 3bet bigger on the flop and once I'm called on the flop I'd always assume he had some sort of hand. So I'd just bet strong on the turn.

115 on the flop and shove turn.

[Parasurama]

if we had air you guys would all say not to 3bet the flop because no one believes flop 3bets on this type of board

that's a much better argument than "omg balance"

mcatdog, I wouldn't say that. I b/3b with air on this flop (and get folds fairly frequently) because I also do it with QQ+.

And I was not making an argument I was asking a question. I was wondering whether not 3b'ing QQ+ means we can't 3b with air here (at least against good observant opponents).

[zook]

What you do on this flop with QQ is fully dependent on what you do with air type hands here.

I couldn't disagree more given that we have no history. What we do on this flop with QQ is fully dependent on what we think villain thinks we would do with air type hands here.

[Alexos]

yea zook i agree..

both 3bet this flop (because he minraised) and calling are fine. I wanted a bigger 3bet because you can just jam the turn, but the best line is prolly your sizing, and following up with a 75$-80$ bet on the turn and jam the river. Just cuz board is so dry

[bspahn]

if this is a 2flush flop, how would you alter your sizing if you decided to 3bet, plus would you also 3bet as a bluff with air? and by air do you mean really nothing or at least two overs??

[Da GOAT]

i dunno, this hand is just an example of some theorem on 2p2 right? except this is where you have a strong hand compared to air. You're looking to just level someone here on flop is rebluff air etc.

obv bet sizing could be better to shove. i dont think we need to get too hung up on flop action though. Calling appears stronger than reraising imo. especially if opp is decent and on 2p2.

[Irisheyes]

I'm with meeloche. I think in general more villains will bluff by betting turn and river after check/raising than will bluff by shoving over a flop 3bet.

That said though in this specific case I don't mid a small value 3bet because his raise is so small.

[bspahn]

if board is 2flush, would you prefer to 3bet still or just flat, as his range will now include a lot of Ax FD's?

[Numbr2intheWorld]

if we had air you guys would all say not to 3bet the flop because no one believes flop 3bets on this type of board

This really needed to be said. Too many poker players illogically think that nothing will work sometimes. But, if they're never going to believe a 3-bet, only 3-bet for value and do it with thin value. If they will always believe you, 3-bet bluff the shit out of this board. It can't go both ways!!

[Numbr2intheWorld]

i would... 3bet bigger on flop and just shove turn.

as played fold i guess, but im sure id tilt-call it sometimes

[Marshall28]

When you guys 3bet this flop, your opponents all auto-shove JTo and 88? I have only experienced this when I'm playing 32/25 and showing bluffs constantly.

When I'm trying to play solid I can't think of any reason to do anything but flat a raise in this spot.

You guys all seem really worried about your range, but what about trying to extract the most value out of villain's range? Why is it that lately I feel like I'm the only one on these forums who even considers this?

If he has a 9 he's likely not paying off his whole stack, so call flop and when he chk's through turn w/ 9x value bet the river he'll call. If he has air, we should call also because he's going to bet the turn and we extract more value from his pure bluffs. If he has a hand like JJ/TT, it's not like he's going to just check it down. These are arguably the only hands you might lose a little value from by just calling, but even in those instances, for him to stack off here when we 3bet he has to be a good hand reader in the sense that he should know our flop 3b value range should really only consist of like 99 and 3x and both of those probably flat, AND he has to think we aren't merged w/ a hand like AA-QQ (so I guess JJ/TT stack off thinking they are getting value from 9x? RLY?). This is just too unlikely against someone who has minraised us.

[Parasurama]

Thank you Marshall, you may have illuminated the reason why I've been losing lately. I've been putting way too much focus on making myself unreadable instead of focusing on extracting value against unsophisticated villains who probably aren't trying to read my cards anyway. I need to stop putting myself in their shoes and just accept that not everyone thinks like me.

[zook]

You guys all seem really worried about your range, but what about trying to extract the most value out of villain's range?

This is all I worry about 98% of the time. I think I've typed "balance is overrated" in this forum enough for it to be my custom title. I 3bet small here b/c I thought his range included a fair number of worse made hands that would call. I'm not convinced it was the best play but I thought it had more value than calling.