4 simple common situations

[Irisheyes]

Assume 100bb stacks for all these,

1) 2 folds, loose/passive CO limps, button folds, SB completes we check in the BB and flop middle pair on lets say a K 7 4 flop. SB checks, whats our line?

2) 18/10 open limps in MP, folds to us on the button with 6 7 . Raise/limp/fold? Does it all depend on how often he folds to cbets?

3) 2 folds, 42/35/4 CO who basically has no fold button raises pot, folds to us in the SB with K Q. Whats our move?

4) We hold AK in the BB, 20/12 UTG raises pot, folds to us. Call/fold/reraise?

[EzDuzIt]

1. b/f on flop rest of the hand kinda depends.

2. raise

3. 3bet usually

4. 3bet.
another thing though with his 20/12 range is look if he is positionally aware. like if he has a lot higher attempt to steal he is positionally aware so his utg raise is going to be a lot tighter than if his attempt to steal is only like 11 then he is probably opening 11% from all over the table so its not as tight of an utg range. i would 3bet either way though.

[benny999]

i play them same as ez.

[jackvance]

1. Either bet and give up to more betting, or check and call one bet, give up to more.

2. Raise if I've not been raising a lot lately.. if I have been preflop raising a bunch, call behind

3. Call.. only 3bet rarely, if I feel he's really being out of line.

4. Sometimes call, sometimes 3bet, depending on how active I've been

[Numbr2intheWorld]

3. i 3-bet or call depending on how spewy he is postflop. If he's just going to overplay everything i'd rather just call.

[Irisheyes]

2. raise

Why? His range is ahead of your hand. Are we raising as a bluff?

3. 3bet usually

And do what on a T56 2 tone flop when he calls?

[Irisheyes]

3. i 3-bet or call depending on how spewy he is postflop. If he's just going to overplay everything i'd rather just call.

Ya he's gonna be pretty spewy post flop. Do you not think we end up check/folding the best hand on the flop a lot when we flat pre though?

[EzDuzIt]

for 2 because he is weak and we want to isolate in position with him and take a lot of pots away from him.

for 3 more info on the player like folds to cbet and stuff would be nice but without that probably cbet.

[sauce123]

1) 3/4 pot

2) Raise

3) 3bet, fold to shove, check most threatening flops. get all in when we flop a pair. calling is also acceptable but i think slightly worse

4) 3bet 80% call 20%

[sauce123]

irish- we raise because we own him postflop in pos and to manipulate the potsize

say his 8% limping range is 22-99, 43s-QJs, 46s-J9s approximately (this is 8% of hands FWIW).

We raise to 5, he calls

anytime an A or K flops we basically win cause we r double barreling these cards all day

anytime we hit 2pr or set or flush we win

anytime out pair is good we win

anytime our continuation bet works we win (its worth noting that we are cbetting all flops but v coordinated mid range ones like JT6, QT4, etc, and ironically many of these non cbettable flops hit our hand hard.

so really the only time we lose this pot is when the flop comes like Q42, it goes check/bet/call and we check it down and lose or when he nuts a flop.

So raise- and be extremely happy about it

oh yea and also when we hit our str8 or flush he will semi-often hit a monster 2nd best hand like a set or 2pair and we will stack him.

[Genitruc]

1) really really depends what our other card is

2) raise almost always, hoping at least one of the blinds comes along for the ride. also I don't care how often the passive folds to c-bets. hand doesn't end after the flop.

3) either 3-bet pre, c-bet any flop and stack off when we hit a pair or call pre and CR lots of flops, esp when we hit, sometimes when we don't

4) call pre and CR every flop

[sauce123]

genitruc- convince me about 4) cause im already kinda convinced

[silu73]

Hand 1: bet/fold

Hand 2: raise preflop. Thou shall not limp before my button

Hand 3: 3-bet pre mostly. I would call with a weak/tight BB and would c/raise lots of flops.

Hand 4: I often 3-bet here but I started calling as well. I agree with Genitruc that c/raising any flop when calling is a good line.

[Miffed22001]

1. c/f 80% c/r 20%
2. raise, as a rule 100% I only like to limp if large likely hood of being 3bet by blinds OR if blinds will raise light and MP will call.
3. 3 bet. take down anything but Ace high? Always fire a second barrel if we bet flop.
4. Call 65% 3bet 35%

[Chopper]

1... i check here. i cant stand betting 2nd pair INTO a passive. they will only call. if they call, i have no better idea where i am in this hand, and i have spewed chips. in a limped pot, we get called by hands that beat us too often to get funky. its a limped pot, toss the bb into the wind...we have nothing to "protect" or "value bet" here.

2... to me, it matters how much i respect him. if i do, i tend to fold w/o others in the hand. if i think he sucks, i blast him with a raise and position. but, if i raise, i cbet/fold it w/o catching strong on the flop. strong = 2pr+ or combo.

3... 3betting is bad into a call station with no position post flop. i call here and pray if i hit the flop, he doesnt have me dominated. but, i am willing to take this one to the house since i am so far ahead of his range, especially from the CO.

4... i only call, but i tend to 3bet AK in bad spots, so i dont very often anymore. besides, i dont like 3betting it oop. if we hit the flop, and he doesnt have AQ, we dont get paid with aggression. and, if he has KK/AA, he either has a set or the A and wont raise us back most likely, allowing us to spend off our chips. i hate this spot with AK. i think we still have to play it aggressively if we hit the flop, but "sleeping with one eye open."

[Genitruc]

sauce obv nothing wrong with 3-betting AK in 4)

I've never thought out the reasoning behind the perhaps unnecessarily tricky AK flat-call pre, CR flop vs tight ppl's ranges when OOP but I've had pretty good success using it.

Here are some possible justifications for the play, along with assumptions/conditions for it being worthwhile :

-post flop a mediocre/standard nitty player will likely call 1 street with a mid-strength hand in a reraised pot if we have an aggro image, the main exception being A-high boards (one of the only spots where we want him to call)

-3-betting from the blinds and firing the flop reps much less strength to the avg nitty reg than CR the flop after smooth-calling from the blinds (wider range of hands we can have - depending on texture - more likelyhood they fold with less of their stack commited)

-we usually only fold out the very bottom of villain's range preflop (something like AJs, maybe AQo and 77, maybe 88 and lower PP's). We either have these hands crushed or else have a huge amount of fold equity when we CR flops where they don't have a set

-our hand is underrepped

-we can balance with sets and big pairs if we get caught

-vs a hand like QQ JJ or TT on a low flop, we set ourself up to take villain's stack more often when we suck out on the turn. If we CR a low flop, villain calls with QQ-TT (unusual for nit to get it in when we can clearly have a set), it'll be more likely we get paid off on an A/K turn than if we fire flop, villain calls, and we hit our 6-outer as the aggressor with AK clearly in our range

When you 3-bet and are called pre and on the flop by the nit, I think you'll need to 2-barrel shove the turn quite a bit looking for the nit to make a relatively big fold (much of the time with an overpair).

On balance I think the ev of the line is similar to that of the 3-bet pre line. What makes me think it's slightly better in terms of ev and meta game is the extra money we get from the bottom of villain's range (good aces that whiff the flop and small PP's that c-bet) as well as the deceptiveness of hitting our 6-outer vs QQ-TT on the turn.

Finally, I think that most nits have a much tougher time stacking off to an "obvious set line" (flat-call pre, CR flop, fire turn) than they do stacking off with an overpair to an aggro 3 bettor's bullets.

There are other factors I think might be important, like balancing with sets, not spewing with AK (much of this will depend on turn decisions after a CR is called) but this post is already probably too long.

[Chopper]

keep going please. i like the thinking behind this.

[sauce123]

me too

[Genitruc]

just read the ramble over and I don't think there's that much more to say

personally I tend to get spewy when I 3-bet AK and I get to the turn unimproved. for whatever reason, I seem to play the turn better when I've "trapped" the agressor on the flop and the big decision is my action OOP on 4th street.

that s just really a style choice though i think

I do however think that picking up villain's c bet when he has a weak air or low PP hand on flop is good argument in favour of flatting pre (since these hands just fold usually to the 3-bet), as well as what I mentioned about backing into 6 outs on the turn after checkraising rather than being the aggressor.

balancing this with overpairs and flopped sets after you get caught is pretty obvious...

i also am pretty confident about what I said about nits folding overpairs more often to a set line than to a dbl barrel from a 3 bettor

so ya, not a whole lot more to say since using this as a default line is only as good as you make it once you get caught

[IowaSkinsFan]

wow nice reasoning.

[Irisheyes]

anytime an A or K flops we basically win cause we r double barreling these cards all day

ty for the post. This is the only bit I don't get, why are we dbl brling A/K high flops? Just to get people to fold Kx? These are the flops that we are least likely to get floated on no?

[Irisheyes]

good post genitruc, I agree that flat and c/r any flop is better then 3betting preflop.

[Irisheyes]

What caused me to ponder situation 3 was a hand I played a few days ago where basically I 3bet with my KQ, he called and the flop came Jxx. I cbet and he called. Turn was an Ace and I shoved for ~pot thinking I can get him to lay down a load of his range but he called me with QQ.

So this got me thinking about why am I actually 3betting this guy preflop? I'm ahead of his range but I have no FE. I posted the hand on 2+2 and everyone was like "pf is bad" etc.

But is calling better. I think it is in a way but the biggest problem I have with is what I am doing on 735 and other low flops where it is likely that we both missed. I think I need to be running a reasonable % of bluffs in spots like this in order to make calling pf profitable. But I 'm faced with the same problem of having no FE.

So is folding best even though I'm ahead/even with of his pf range?

[minSim]

Nice posts Genitric.

Good thread also. I think all 4 hands could have their own thread and I really wish we would more often go into these details when analyzing hands.

Here are my thoughts and questions.

Hand1
My kicker usually plays a part as well. To me it matters wether I have A7 or 72, because when we have MPTP there are a lot more worse hands that call. That's also the reason I bet, together that I don't mind taking it down right here because lots of turn cards could be bad for us.
3/4 PSB is what I would do, but I would like to here thoughts about other betsizes.
Q: Why not PSB? Does the flush draw being out there changes anything?

Hand 2
I raise here, because villain likely folds 65-75%. If he calls, on a lot of flops he likely folds, I think 65-75% as well. Don't c-bet some flops and you're overall EV goes up even more.
If you just call, SB is likely to come along as is BB. It's much harder to win the hand without flopping good.
Sauce's respond is very I good, I wish he would go into follow ups on next streets a lot more!

Hand 3
I probably call because I expect to win a lot when I hit against this opponent. In general if villain is a little tighter I like 3-betting more.

It also depends on the gap between his CO raising range and 3-betting calling range.
If it's wide enough we have lots of fold equity, and can 3-bet lots of hands profitably because of it.
If it's not very wide, the 3-bet itself isn't very profitable and we have to look at winning flops:
- If villain calls the 3-bet light, we can 3-bet less good hands for value (AQ, AJ, KQ maybe)
- if villain doesn't call light, he basically has a strong hand (little FE, small 3-bet calling range) means we can fold preflop or 3-bet hands like small PP's, maybe SC's to flop a monster and get allin. Or call and c/f missed flops.

Calling preflop intended to c/r lots of flops is an interesting line. If villain isn't spewy postflop this can work as a bluff, because he has to have a good hand. His raising range has to be wide and his flop calling range has to be small, which he likely is.
A flop c/r is something like 2-1 and a preflop 3-bet is 3-1 followed by a 3/4-1 on the flop.
I don't know if my reasoning is anything but solid, but let's take an example:
1) Let's say pre we 3-bet 15 to win 5. When called on the flop we bet 20 in a 30 pot. In all, it cost 35.
Ofcourse we take it down preflop a decent amount of times. We only win like 5 BB's then though.
But when we take it down on the flop we win 30 which is great.

2) When we call pre for 4 and c/r a flop bet of 7 to 25 it costs 29.
We never win anything preflop. We win often on the flop, but we only win 16BB each time.

I think to take this one step further we have to assign percentages of how often we win preflop and on the flop which each play. I don't know if it's possible, it would be great to try.

Hand 4
I have nothing to add to the great input that has already been given.
Genetric, if you (or we in general) could back up your reasoning with some calculations it would be awesome.

[minSim]

I remember reading a thread on 2+2 where someone (El Diablo) was experimenting calling every CO and BTN raise from the blinds and c/r-ing every A high flop.

Conclusion was that the play was very likely +EV. Someone else (samoleus) advocated doing it on K high and Q high flops. I haven't done much detailed thinking on it myself yet, it's at least interesting though.

Well...I don't know what that really adds to this thread....but it just crossed my mind

[Genitruc]

i think the most important factor for the flat-call CR flop line to be profitable is for villain to be c-betting a huge % of the time

as for hand 1 (6h7h 2nd pair on flop) I think the other card in our hand is more important in terms of improving to a backdoor str8 or flushdraw on the turn than simply in terms of kicker value

[minSim]

as for hand 1 (6h7h 2nd pair on flop) I think the other card in our hand is more important in terms of improving to a backdoor str8 or flushdraw on the turn than simply in terms of kicker value

So much interesting stuff in this thread.

I never thought about that. In my experience backdoored flush draws are approximately 1,5 outs, but that is of course for 2 streets and 2 streets alone.
But it's indeed interesting to see how having turned a flush- or straightdraw can change our play. Have you done any additional thinking on this?
I.e.: what changes for you having A7 with no backdoor FD, or 72s with a backdoor FD?

[Chopper]

personally I tend to get spewy when I 3-bet AK and I get to the turn unimproved. for whatever reason, I seem to play the turn better when I've "trapped" the agressor on the flop and the big decision is my action OOP on 4th street.

i think this is why i got so much from that thought process. i am the same way.

I do however think that picking up villain's c bet when he has a weak air or low PP hand on flop is good argument in favour of flatting pre (since these hands just fold usually to the 3-bet), as well as what I mentioned about backing into 6 outs on the turn after checkraising rather than being the aggressor.

again, i completely agree.

balancing this with overpairs and flopped sets after you get caught is pretty obvious...

maybe i missed this one, though. what do we do on the turn when we got called, and didnt hit our 6 outer. we now officially have air, and cant be confident in firing again. seems all that does is build a pot for villain. anyone who calls our 3bet and calls our c/r on flop is either super strong and "trappy" or just the biggest donkey i've seen in awhile.

and, btw, i got a chance to try it last night. i had AK from bb and villain popped the raise. i called, like usual, and c/r'ed the flop, not usual for me. board was only T high, and he said he dropped JJ! i dont know if i believe him, but i guarantee you he was thinking, "its so obvious you have a set. this is an easy laydown, you donkey."

obv, it was only one time, but it sure looked good to me.

and a small humorous comment to minSim...when you said that backdoor draws are good for 2 streets ONLY, i went, "well, duh. how many backdoors do you get on the turn that complete on the river?" i had to giggle to myself at that one. but, i know what you meant. it was just funny.

[BigPapi]

the next question is; do we even need AK to make this move? if we check-raise AK on a T-high board we can do this with practically any hand...

[EzDuzIt]

the next question is; do we even need AK to make this move? if we check-raise AK on a T-high board we can do this with practically any hand...

sometimes. AK is good for it because it does good if they call, better than a low pp or something like that.

[martindcx1e]

the next question is; do we even need AK to make this move? if we check-raise AK on a T-high board we can do this with practically any hand...

sometimes. AK is good for it because it does good if they call, better than a low pp or something like that.

Ya AK is so good for this move bc you always have 6 outs if you miss the flop.

[Chopper]

the next question is; do we even need AK to make this move? if we check-raise AK on a T-high board we can do this with practically any hand...

sometimes. AK is good for it because it does good if they call, better than a low pp or something like that.

Ya AK is so good for this move bc you always have 6 outs if you miss the flop.

dont get too carried away, martin. there WILL be times when you run up against KK+ and dont know it because you only call the raise pf. in those cases, you dont have 6 outs, and you missed the flop. you will be lucky to have 3.

not trying to nitpick...just wanted it noted that we still cant be shocked when we "get our way" and find we were still smoked.

it goes like this...villain raises pre. you call. you check flop. villain "cbets." you raise. villain only calls (with overpair). you hit your "6 outer on turn and think, "its go time." you lead out. villain shoves over with a turned set, and sticks it in your pooper.

[Genitruc]

re : AK flop CR

if you get called after CR flop it's basically the same spot as getting called when u C-bet OOP in a 3-bet pot and have air on the turn

it all comes down to history with villain, your image, etc etc etc

as for the 27s (w back door draw) vs A7 mid pair top-kicker, I'm more inclined to bet A7 for value whereas I prefer calling with backdoor draws

it ll be almost impossible to put us on a back door draw if we pick one up, lead the turn and hit the river (lots of other options like calling flop and CR turn if we pick up a back door draw)

other thing is we get called much less often by worse when we bet 2nd pair meh kicker and have no idea where we are at , OOP on the turn and are forced quite often to give up or turn our hand into a bluff-catcher

i d prefer leading this flop with complete air than with 2nd pair meh kicker

[sauce123]

POKERSTARS GAME #12962635189: HOLD'EM NO LIMIT ($5/$10) - 2007/10/31 - 19:13:02 (ET)
Table 'Rimito II' 6-max Seat #2 is the button
Seat 1: betterthnpar ($563 in chips)
Seat 2: Pipedream17 ($779 in chips)
Seat 3: teacuppoker ($2502.50 in chips)
Seat 4: Sauce123 ($1000 in chips)
Seat 5: EmpireMaker2 ($2302.50 in chips)
Seat 6: ArdyJay ($345 in chips)
teacuppoker: posts small blind $5
Sauce123: posts big blind $10
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to Sauce123 [Kh Ac]
EmpireMaker2: raises $20 to $30
ArdyJay: folds
betterthnpar: folds
Pipedream17: folds
teacuppoker: folds
Sauce123: calls $20
*** FLOP *** [2d 4s 6d]
Sauce123: checks
EmpireMaker2: bets $50
Sauce123: raises $110 to $160
EmpireMaker2: calls $110
*** TURN *** [2d 4s 6d] [3d]
Sauce123: bets $210

[thizzSantaCruz]

Sauce you say in example 2 when the flop is A high we double barrell all day. What if the turn brings out the second ace. Is this still a double barrel? It has to look scary for opponenet but if hes holding Ax hes most likely felting it.

[Genitruc]

sweet sauce now value bet river if he calls turn!

p.s. sucks if he shoves over your turn bet but i d doubt it since pair + gutter is decent part of your range

[Numbr2intheWorld]

Wow this turned into a sweet thread

[Genitruc]

how sick of a spot is this if you are Empire with QQ and sauce has a good image and fires the turn?

[Numbr2intheWorld]

POKERSTARS GAME #12962635189: HOLD'EM NO LIMIT ($5/$10) - 2007/10/31 - 19:13:02 (ET)
Table 'Rimito II' 6-max Seat #2 is the button
Seat 1: betterthnpar ($563 in chips)
Seat 2: Pipedream17 ($779 in chips)
Seat 3: teacuppoker ($2502.50 in chips)
Seat 4: Sauce123 ($1000 in chips)
Seat 5: EmpireMaker2 ($2302.50 in chips)
Seat 6: ArdyJay ($345 in chips)
teacuppoker: posts small blind $5
Sauce123: posts big blind $10
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to Sauce123 [Kh Ac]
EmpireMaker2: raises $20 to $30
ArdyJay: folds
betterthnpar: folds
Pipedream17: folds
teacuppoker: folds
Sauce123: calls $20
*** FLOP *** [2d 4s 6d]
Sauce123: checks
EmpireMaker2: bets $50
Sauce123: raises $110 to $160
EmpireMaker2: calls $110
*** TURN *** [2d 4s 6d] [3d]
Sauce123: bets $210

Really love this.

[biondino]

Just a thought regarding the donk in example 3. I've noticed that there is a real urgency to get all in with bad players whenever possible; but OOP with a poor hand like KQo and a villain who never folds - even vs an ultra-donk surely circumspection is preferable to a head-down charge. I think you can call here, and you can check/fold the flop if you whiff - the value comes from when you do hit on the flop, and you value-bet the tits off the guy.

It's a long term game and that doesn't change just because it's you and idiot boy heads up.