Edit: Villain is the BB (the $3 blind).
Ten-handed live $1/$3/$6 game. Hero is the only player at the table with a pre-flop raise percent greater 5 (it’s close to 15). As such, I’m perceived as an insanely aggressive bully even though I’ve mostly shown big hands in big pots and am up quite a bit. At this point I get pretty much no respect pre-flop, and even after I bomb it into a field of limpers, I can easily get four or five calls.
After four limps, I make it $50 with TT on the hijack. Folds around to a heavyset, middle-aged guy in a camouflage hat who reraises to $150. He has about $700 behind, and I cover.
What’s your plan and why? If you want to call or raise less than all-in, consider how you’ll proceed on the following flops:
a) You flop an overpair
b) You flop a set
c) One or more overcards flop
Post your thoughts and comments, and I’ll be back with my
Andrew,
A few questions which I think will help myself and others formulate our responses:
Did this guy limp-3bet or cold 3bet? I’m not entirely clear on what position Camo Hat is in, whether it was one of the blinds or not. Also, any other info on this guy that is relevant? Has he typically limp-called your raises and is there any reason to think he is capable of making a play at you given your aggressive image?
thanks, TvB
Very good question. I edited the OP to say that Villain was BB. Thanks for the catch.
I think this is a clear shove or fold spot but I prefer a fold. You’re only in for 50 bucks. Calling is terrible. Your implied odds of set mining aren’t correct or enticing, TT are hard to play post flop especially when he’s probably c bet leading most flops anyway. You’ll be faced with a brutal decision post flop no matter what if you don’t flop a set.
It’s pretty simplistic, but at relatively low stakes, 3 bets are a very narrow range. The fact that there were already 4 other limpers makes me think his range is even tighter, since in these type of games, people love to try to trap and limp re-raise “maniacs” such as yourself.
So that being said, it’s not very fun or imaginative, but in a game such as this there just isn’t a reason to get further involved. He isn’t folding a hand like QQ if you 4 bet (remember, you are an aggressive bully). Couple that with what I think is a pretty tight range, unless you are holding something back about the villain, and I think it’s a simple fold.
I would definitely fold JJ in this spot, and maybe even QQ. And I am not very tight, but I have found that having hands like TT-QQ when 3 bet by most players is just a losing proposition.
Will V play sherriff without the big pairs? You could play against AK or AQ, but then you prefer to be all in now. What part of V’s 3bet range will he call with?
I suspect he is playing sherriff and will call a 4bet with his entire 3bet range. Say this is his range, and he calls all 4bets: AA, KK, QQ, JJ, AK, AQ. Leave AJs out for now. There are 6 of each paired hand = 24 hands, and there are 16 of each AK and AQ = 32 hands. So Hero is ahead. If my assumptions are correct, then a shove is best.
If V will only do this with AA, KK, AK, then shove is still best, because there are 12 AA and KK hands and 16 AK hands. Unless V will fold AK to a 4bet. If yes, then a shove is bad.
If V will only 3bet here with AA, KK, QQ, then this is a clear fold.
If a shove is bad, then folding may be best, because Hero doesn’t have the implied pot odds for set mining. But you could call and play with position. Pot will be about $325 against $700 back. SPR = 2.15. You’ll be committed with any good flop (J and lower). With the wider range above, we only care about A’s, K’s and Q’s flopping (I assume Jacks miss his unpaired hands, and are irrelevant when he has JJ, because we are mostly losing with or without the J on the board). A’s are most dangerous, because they hit AK and AQ. K’s and Q’s half as bad as A’s. There is math to do here, but my gut feel is that if you call, you have to fold any flop with an A, K or Q. Maybe Q’s are OK though, in the case where he doesn’t 3bet with AQ. If V cbets, he is committed, so you cannot bluff an A, K or Q flop. You could bluff catch his AK and AQ cbets. This is more complicated than it looks. I think calling is bad, but not sure.
I would probably fold, but wonder if 4bet shove is better.
“You could play against AK or AQ, but then you prefer to be all in now.”
Why do you say that?
Also Hero isn’t ahead against the range you give (QQ+, AQ+). The problem with your logic is that bigger pairs are a lot more bad for Hero than overcards are good. Hero is either flipping or crushed against that range. PokerStove gives about 40% equity.
Doh, re the (QQ+, AQ+). Thanks for the correction. I should have known (I do know better, but thanks).
Re AK or AQ, you are ahead, so you want as much money in as possible. Isn’t that a fundamental +EV principle? Trying to think out loud now… IF we knew he had AK or AQ, would we be better off calling? Oh, I see the obvious mistake now, calling could be more +EV. Let me rethink this re whether calling is good.
I’m totally OK with making a “big” fold here and moving on. If everyone is as tight as the intro makes them out to be, then you’re not going to ahead pre-flop to 4bet, and you’re not really going to get any credit post-flop if you want to turn your hand into a bluff.
If you flat pre, you’re basically committed to peeling a flop (for the most part), because he’s likely to bet his whole range, then make a good turn/river decision. If we had more information about his post-flop tendencies, that may be possible, but we haven’t been provided any, so I’m inclined to fold.
I’d fold.
Given the table description there will be much better spots than this. I don’t think I can give camo hat credit for having the cojones to 3bet bluff you here. I really think we’re crushed here a majority of the time. Also people at live games at these stakes undervalue AK/AQ and often don’t 3bet (and in some cases don’t even open with) them. Most of the time they prefer to “see the flop” with AK/AQ and then play fit or fold. This is another factor which skews his range more towards JJ+. Also let’s remember that Andrew told us no one else is really raising whatsoever, which makes me think its like 80% big pairs JJ+ 10% AK/AQ 10% random if he is just fed up by your raising and has more courage than I’m willing to give him credit for at this point. I’d fold and if he shows a bluff than “nice hand sir”
Also, at this table where it’s clear that hero has a definite edge, why would we want flip coins for big pots? There will undoubtedly be many more good opportunities
I can agee with the fold, but I really think it comes down to a read. HOW annoyed with Hero is the table? HOW likely is V to play sherriff with AQ, or even AJs, or 99 or 88 or as a pure bluff? I do agree with steeser that V should be afraid of limp re-raise here, so that narrows his range to the top.
I think this is a fold against most 3-betting ranges at the table you describe, unless you think you can 4-bet shove have get JJ,QQ,AK,AQ,etc to fold. Then I’d consider shoving.
I mean, if he’s playing sheriff and you have 66 in his range, by all means shove. But without a specific read and just your general table assessment, I think you’re dealing with something more like [99-AA,AK,AQ]. That has you crushed if you can’t get a bunch of better hands to fold.
How do we feel about flatting to setmine/rep an A OTF/rep a K if he checks twice?
You need to assign him a range, but any fairly narrow range will flop similarly:
http://propokertools.com/simulations/graph_hvr?g=he&h1=TT&h2=AxTx%2B%2CKxJx%2B%2CAQ%2B%2CTT%2B&s=generic
http://propokertools.com/simulations/graph_hvr?g=he&h1=TT&h2=AQ%2B%2CQQ%2B&s=generic
http://propokertools.com/simulations/graph_hvr?g=he&h1=TT&h2=AK%2B%2CKK%2B&s=generic
There are flops we should bluff, flops we should VB, and flops we should check behind, and regardless of what his range is exactly, those textures will be similar. We only need 30% equity to make a call immediately profitable, so unless he’s narrower than [KK+,AKs] we can call, confident that we can make profitable decisions on the larger streets.
As far as sizing goes:
I think we should b/f 1/2 pot, shove any turn when checked to if an A flops;
bet 3/4 pot/shove if we flop a set (unless he leads into us, in which case our decision will be more texture dependent);
check behind on all Q-high and lower flops unless they are wet enough that we can represent enough draws to get value from AK/generate additional bluff outs on future streets (same sizing as if an A flops, but only continuing with the second barrel if the obvious draw completes).
Is this the biggest game in the room? It makes a pretty big difference ime.
140bb is the worst stack size, it always leads to awkward SPRs. In fact I don’t mind just opening to 60 here instead so we can comfortably fold to any 3-bet.
I’m a little surprised that everyone here is automatically dismissing the possibility of calling our opponent’s raise. There’s $231 in the pot, our opponent has $700 behind, and we only need to call $100 to see a flop. So we’re getting 9.3 to 1 to call (assuming we can stack our opponent when we hit a set), and we’re about 7.5 to 1 to hit a set on the flop. There’s definitely some discounting that needs to be done here for the times that there’s a set over set situation and for when our opponent doesn’t pay us off with the AK part of his range, but we should at least be considering set-mining here. We also have some extra equity from having position on our opponent and presumably having some ability to read his reaction to the board, which gives us some additional equity against the AK part of his range that may c-bet or check non-connecting flops.
The margins for set-mining are somewhat thin here but they do exist. Other factors may push this decision one way or another (e.g. if we want to minimize variance or if we want to encourage people to take light shots at us we can fold) but I think calling for set value should be in our toolbox.
If we call here I like the following lines:
– On boards where we have an overpair, call a $200 or less continuation bet, bet if checked to, fold if opponent bombs the flop, fold to any turn bet or reraise. Be willing to reevaluate if at the table data calls for it.
– On Ace high board where we do not flop a set, bet if checked to, raise if opponent bets and looks really uncomfortable, otherwise fold.
– On boards where we do flop a set take a flat flat flat approach if his bet sizing makes it look like you can easily get all of the money in, bet if ever checked to.
I’d fold in this spot standardly just because people tend to fight back against aggression by calling, not raising. It feels gross to fold TT with your image here, but I wouldn’t worry much about that. I simply expect him to have it pretty often–not always, but often. And I don’t see you folding out better hands after the flop or improving enough vs. his range after the flop to call.
If I had some reason to continue, I’d tend to jam instead of calling–perhaps that’s a mistake, but I tend to figure I’ll do better by folding out air rather than having him continue to the flop with it, I think we do as well/better when he has something and wants to continue before the flop, and occasionally we hit the jackpot and he folds JJ/QQ or something. Sorry not to be giving a better response.
I like JoeBono’s response here. I also don’t really like re-raising since we can then put the same amount of money into the pot (or not) after the Flop that we ARE going to see .. unless we fold to the 5-bet/shove. With the table as described I am putting you against AA/KK since I would guess that a larger raise is made with AK/AQ/QQ/JJ but it is possible that the same raise is made with all these hands which puts you into bigger trouble .. unless you want to gamble.
Another angle here is to show the ‘big’ fold to let them know you can show some discretion, which in turn should create more action for you going forward. Someone will try this same move on you post-Flop when your junk hand hits and you can more safely aquire chips.
I think I show-fold or call .. even if you don’t hit a set there are tons of boards you can use against Villian if you think he has the ability to fold a pocket pair to pressure.
Given that “Hero is the only player at the table with a pre-flop raise percent greater 5”, I’m going to assume that villain is a very tight player. If he has even a modicum of understanding of position, then the fact that a very tight player is 3-betting from the worst possible position ought to be setting alarm bells off.
In general, and speaking purely from my own experience, very tight players who feel they are getting bullied will perhaps complain loudly about your aggression and hint that they are ready to play back at you in the hope that it will deter you from further aggression – but they will only *actually* play back at you when they have a genuine hand. I think it’s in the psychology of a tight player that they are somewhat afraid of getting into awkward spots and/or big pots without the goods. As such, they are genuinely scared of playing back at aggressive players because it will lead to the situation they fear most.
As such, when they *do* play back, they’ll almost always have it.
In a nutshell, I’d need to have a very good reason, by way of some sort of read (of which no details are given here) to raise it in this spot – because it looks very likely indeed that we are beaten, and that villain is unlikely to have a hand he is ready to fold.
Which leaves calling or folding. Folding seems like it can’t be a terrible mistake. However, I think calling has merit.
For a start, if we assume that we get his stack when we flop a set – which I don’t think is at all unreasonable given his likely holdings, then we pretty much have the odds we need to call, so we can arguably do so on that basis alone. Moreover, it’s quite possible that we have an extra four outs to win the pot – namely the four aces. If an ace flops, it makes it considerably less likely that he has AA, and if he’s sitting there out of position with KK or QQ he’s going to absolutely hate it, and is more than likely going to give up the pot if you bet at it hard enough. I think an ace will be *much* better for our range than for his, basically. So I think I’d call, hoping primarily for a 10, but also be looking closely to get a read in the event of an ace flopping.
In a nutshell, I call.
If we did call I think he is likely to auto-cbet his entire range on all boards.
We don’t have the odds to profitably call and just set mine giving up the rest of the time.
The problem I see with playing post flop against such a tight range is that we don’t know precisely how tight it is. if it was QQ+, then we can play profitably by set mining and bluffing at A high boards, the rest of the time giving up.
However if his range is JJ+, AK maybe some AQ. Then we know not to try and bluff A high boards and instead call when our TT is an overpair ie. (a), raise with a set and fold the rest of the time.
Either of those strategies are profitable enough to make a call’s EV>0 when we know precisely the range we face. But we don’t know that and therefore can’t profitably bluff at A high boards or call when we have an overpair. As such I think we lose about ~$15 when we call and he plays reasonably.
4b’ing isn’t an option I considered much, I think his range is tight enough to crush us and we don’t have fold equity.
Therefore I think it is a close fold unless we have any other information to suggest he will play badly postflop or to tighten our assessment of his range.
I’d like to know how long you’ve played with this guy, if you’ve played with him prior sessions, and how often the table has re-raised you pre-flop (if at all) this session.
I’m going to assume that you haven’t been re-raised by him this session and maybe not at all by anyone else at the table (and if you were, the hand ended pre-flop).
I put his range at JJ+, AK.
So I don’t like calling, because SPR is going to be only 2.3 on the flop, he’ll bet almost 100% of the time, and we won’t know where we are at (unless we hit a ten).
I think there is value in re-raising all-in as a bluff. Say that gets him to fold JJ, QQ, and AK and he calls with KK, AA. So fold=70% (pairs = 6 combos; AK = 16 combos) EV=0.7*$231+0.05754*$931-0.24246*$700=$45.55 So a shove is +EV.
If you have a reason to think he’s going to call with more of his range, then the shove becomes -EV and I favor a fold. If it’s only slightly -EV then there might be some value for table image/future play, but if he’s also calling with Q’s all the time then I don’t think that it’s enough to compensate (EV=-$47.1784).
Now, maybe I’m off on his range for re-raising you, but my feeling is that straightforward players only re-raise pre-flop with really good hands (especially the first time they (or the table) do it).
Grunching here but
I think we have three options here: first, to fold. Second, to call. Third, to re-raise to 250.
Arguments for the first, is that people simply don’t make this play often enough for us to profitably continue.
Second, to call, well, you probably can outplay this guy to a large extent. I wonder how wide his range has to be for calling to be profitable. Surely it should include some AJ and 99 and random hands.
Third, the click it back. I think if we are going to reopen the action, shoving is pretty bad and that the only potentially good size would be this size, since he will call with everything that isn’t kings and aces and, having capped his range and noted his comfort level, we can then go to work with the betting initiative and position. Eviscerate him, as it were.
This is probably the wrong answer, but I would just fold without any specific reads on this man. A few reasons:
1. Given your image, I doubt he would re-raise you with a hand that he didn’t intend to call a shove with, since he would probably assume you are crazy enough to go all-in with a relatively wide range. Even at the most optimistic, this range is probably AQ+-JJ unless your image is truly bizzare(I myself am used to ridiculously wild cash-games in India where people open-raise 8x- 12x and on occasion one can get in 400 or 500 BB with JJ profitably, so it’s difficult for me to appreciate exactly what a wild “bully” image would constitute and the answer depends on this a lot). The bottom line is I don’t think he’s ever doing this with the idea of folding and its highly unlikely you beat his range.
2. Given that lots of the combos in his hand are AQ/AK, set-mining is out of the question since you won’t get paid off often enough. Additionally, you can’t very well flat and just call down safe boards either.
As such, this looks a pretty bad spot, and regardless of dynamics, your bully image doesn’t actually mean you can get it in light in this particular spot, on the contrary, its probably giving you a great chance to level yourself.
It is tempting to think that because Hero had Hyper-LAG image villains’ range is wide. But in my opinion two pointts suggest that his 3-bet, and his range, is strong.. First he reraise OOP an active but strong (from showdown hands) player with four live players active… If i was in his shoes I would thinking that someone of the limpers slowplay a big hand expecting a raise from active Hero in late position.. Second, being OOP and deep stack a raise of only 3x from a normal (and not tricky from Hero description) looks like looking for action.. So with TT, obvious at top of Hero LP raise but at bottom of 3-bet calling or reraising range, I fold.
A tight passive table suddenly wakes up and one of the nitrocks 3Bs you OOP.
Most guys like this at these type of tables don’t push back without big hands (ever).
It is just not in their DNA.
In fact, you stated that they are opening less than 5% (99+, AQ and maybe down to ATs) and many will limp call AQ, JJ (and even AK) rather than open. If they are opening less than 5% (and your 15% range is considered maniacal), then their 3B range is likely squeaky tight also (AK, QQ+ and maybe only AA and KK).
These guys just dont like to risk any chips until they have the nuts or near nuts.
That is what makes tight passive players nitrocks!
Your hand is crushed by his range (AK, QQ+ = 36%) and you are flipping at best, but more likely dominated. I doubt he 3Bs you even with AQs or JJ (and maybe not even QQ), even though he is WAY ahead of your raising range after a bunch of limpers.
He probably knows that, but will still wait to see a safe flop before commiting his chips.
The safe play is to fold and pick a better spot.
Shoving does nothing for you (in fact it lets him see all five cards with AK (maybe AQ).
It folds all of the marginal hands in his range that you were beating (if any existed).
You could call and try to out play him post flop if you don’t hit your set, but why bother?
An over card will flop almost 2/3 of the time and you will not know where you stand.
Can you profitably bluff an Ace if he fails to CB or slows down on the turn?
I didn’t think about Gareth’s click back 4B, but that is why Gareth is Gareth!
I don’t know what you gain from it except being more sure of your fold when he jams?
Can we expect him to call OOP for almost 1/3 stack with anything in his 3B range?
I think the mark of a really good player is to pressure the table by picking up all the pots where nobody has much (and take a few away by folding out marginal hands on later streets), but releasing when they meet resistance (especially from tight passive players).
Here you are clearly meeting resistance from a tight passive player.
Release!
I look forward to your thought process.