Turn it into a bluff, or flat OOP?

BTN has a high 3bet % (13%), but not a massive sample (86 hands). Most 3bets seen so far have been from the btn or bb, but I guess it's too early to really trust the positional element of that stat.

Does everyone think squeezing is right here, or does anyone think it's potentially more profitable to call OOP?

Poker Stars, $0.10/$0.25 No Limit Hold'em Cash, 6 Players
Poker Tools Powered By Holdem Manager - The Ultimate Poker Software Suite.

BTN: $36.29 (145.2 bb)
SB: $34.43 (137.7 bb)
Hero (BB): $28.20 (112.8 bb)
UTG: $17.33 (69.3 bb)
MP: $26.68 (106.7 bb)
CO: $25 (100 bb)

Preflop: Hero is BB with Q A
2 folds, CO raises to $0.75, BTN raises to $2, SB folds, Hero raises to $4.50

Looks good, much prefer just "bluffing" with these nice blockers rather than flatting this and trying to navigate oop. Sizing looks good nh.

NB: this is a cold 4-bet not a squeeze.

Originally Posted by Carroters

Looks good, much prefer just "bluffing" with these nice blockers rather than flatting this and trying to navigate oop. Sizing looks good nh.

Blockers are something I need to think about more often. Do you think it's more marginal without the blockers (or just plain bad without them)? Eg, given the same opponent stats and positions, if I'd done it with JJ is it just somewhat worse as a play, or plain bad?

I'm way more inclined to flat JJ here. The difference is that I'd only 4-bet JJ if i was 4-bet calling and that is probably a bad idea at 10NL without some aggro dynamics, dick waving background. JJ also plays much better as people will play straightforwardly where we flop an overpair and of course we can flop a set.

You should be 4-bet bluffing this spot some non enormous % most likely, so you want only hands with blockers. If you cold 4-bet bluff 98s here your range either sucks or is way too wide.

Looks good. People have been discovering more and more that 3bets IP and from the BB are very strong and everyone does this more often now. To stay ahead of the curve you need to find spots like this.

Having an A means there are only 3 combos of AA he could have instead of 6, and only 12 combos of AK instead of the usual 16. So blockers are a nice little bonus edge. I like the hand. Gutsy play imo.

Definitely 4bet or fold here. I can't see it being profitable to call OOP 3 way without even being suited (and even AQ is probably bad). Given that you can't call, you have the nut blocker hand (AA/AK/QQ) and decent equity if someone flats you. You are probably bluffing "too often" if you do this with AQ every time though.

Originally Posted by Pelion

Definitely 4bet or fold here. I can't see it being profitable to call OOP 3 way without even being suited (and even AQ is probably bad). Given that you can't call, you have the nut blocker hand (AA/AK/QQ) and decent equity if someone flats you. You are probably bluffing "too often" if you do this with AQ every time though.

I'm inclined to disagree with this. I think this is a spot where you'll get two folds a lot and also a spot that 10NL regs aren't going to do much to adjust well to you in. Eg. I doubt people are going to be 3 betting wider pairs wise so they can ship on you or even tightening up their 3-bet bluff range too much. I'd want to have bluffs more than half the time I 4-bet here easily in order to be playing an optimal range vs these guys. I have [QQ+ AK] in my 4-bet call range for 28 combos. I'm probably going to want more combos of bluffs than that in these exact spots so my range would be at least [KQ AQ] for 32 combos, might even throw in some Axs too. If we think our image is too bad due to the fact we've been really 4 betty or active in this spot recently or for any other reason then you just constrict it at that point.

Thats why I used the "" . It's up to OP to decide if villains will adjust to "too often". If they don't adjust, then go ahead and 4bet all day.

I think I missed the "". Yeah what your default 4 bet bluff range here is should be determined by your population's tendencies. From what I've seen, regs are really straightforward at these stakes for the most part.

Does anyone think we can call AQs here?

I think so yeah. We get a fair bit of respect with our range here so people being SF vs us negates the positional advantage some. Also, we get put on mostly TT-QQ stuff so they c bet a lot of the boards we hit and give up on the ones we miss.

Originally Posted by Carroters

Looks good, much prefer just "bluffing" with these nice blockers rather than flatting this and trying to navigate oop. Sizing looks good nh.

NB: this is a cold 4-bet not a squeeze.

^ this
calling is bad
folding is meh