Limpy limpy (2 Viewers)

AR_poker

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Got a hand from last week’s home game that I’ve been thinking on for a while now, curious what y’all’s feedback is.

Background:

$0.25/$0.50 weekly home game with good friends. 7-handed, been playing for about 3 hours. Villain (CO) is a good friend from high school. Usually a very solid player. We have a history of getting into big pots together, go to the casino together to play $1/$3, and I think he’s the winningest player in our regular game. Gets *very* tilt-y when he's down or suffers a bad beat, but he's up big tonight. Plays wider ranges than I would, but good at just milking money out of the weaker players in our game. Definitely capable of bluffing (including double and triple barreling), but slightly tilted towards value as a profile. He’ll usually raise RFI rather than open limp, but he also hates when I 3bet him (and knows that I 3bet aggressively), so his limping range does seem to expand a little when I’m on his immediate left (as I was on this night) or close to it. I’m not crazy about his limping strategy when he implements it (we’ve discussed it), but something to be cognizant of. Hero (BTN) is the effective stack with $200. Villain covers by a little.

Pre-flop:

UTG folds

LJ folds

HJ folds

CO (villain) limps

BTN (hero) bets $5 with KhJd

SB calls

BB calls

CO calls

Pre-flop thoughts:

Game has been getting pretty deep for $0.25/$0.50, and ~$4 has become the standard open. I size up to account for the limper, and because the players in the blinds are very likely to call incredibly wide. KJo should be ahead of lots of HJ’s and the blinds’ ranges, I’m almost never expecting to be 3bet in this formation, and I’ll have ultimate position postflop. If the blinds make a hand, we'll hear from them, and CO should be capped here in a normal limp calling range fashion. Some small-ish pairs, some offsuit broadways, some suited connectors, some AX, etc. Onward.

Flop:

($20 in pot)

Qd Tc 4d

SB checks

BB checks

CO leads for $10

Hero?
 
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Got a hand from last week’s home game that I’ve been thinking on for a while now, curious what y’all’s feedback is.

Background:

$0.25/$0.50 weekly home game with good friends. 7-handed, been playing for about 3 hours. Villain (CO) is a good friend from high school. Usually a very solid player. We have a history of getting into big pots together, go to the casino together to play $1/$3, and I think he’s the winningest player in our regular game. Gets *very* tilt-y when he's down or suffers a bad beat, but he's up big tonight. Plays wider ranges than I would, but good at just milking money out of the weaker players in our game. Definitely capable of bluffing (including double and triple barreling), but slightly tilted towards value as a profile. He’ll usually raise RFI rather than open limp, but he also hates when I 3bet him (and knows that I 3bet aggressively), so his limping range does seem to expand a little when I’m on his immediate left (as I was on this night) or close to it. I’m not crazy about his limping strategy when he implements it (we’ve discussed it), but something to be cognizant of. Hero (BTN) is the effective stack with $200. Villain covers by a little.

Pre-flop:

UTG folds

LJ folds

HJ folds

CO (villain) limps

BTN (hero) bets $5 with KhJd

SB calls

BB calls

CO calls

Pre-flop thoughts:

Game has been getting pretty deep for $0.25/$0.50, and ~$4 has become the standard open. I size up to account for the limper, and because the players in the blinds are very likely to call incredibly wide. KJo should be ahead of lots of HJ’s and the blinds’ ranges, I’m almost never expecting to be 3bet in this formation, and I’ll have ultimate position postflop. If the blinds make a hand, we'll hear from them, and CO should be capped here in a normal limp calling range fashion. Some small-ish pairs
Gonna skip ahead since this one's getting no traction. Thoughts/roasting on flop and turn are welcome.

Flop (continued):

($20 in pot)

Qd Tc 4d

SB checks

BB checks

CO donks for $10

Hero raises to $30

SB folds

BB folds

CO 3bets to $60

Hero calls

Turn:

($140 in pot; Hero is effective stack with $135 behind)

Qd Tc 4d (Kd)

CO bets $75

Hero raises ALL-IN for $135

CO tanks for about 5 minutes, verbally laments the fact that he bet because now he's pot committed and has to call it off and says he's still got four outs against my flush, and calls with QcTh. River bricks. Villain scoops.

Thoughts:

Raise the flop because board slightly favors me as the PFR. QQ, TT, strong combo draws, nut flush draws, OESDs, overpairs, etc. The donk lead seems like Qx or Tx that's worried about me checking behind and turning a scare card. I raise to semi-bluff, fold out the blinds' equity, and because we can likely target CO's one pair hands on the turn or river. Bummed to see a 3bet, and I don't see any merit to 4bet flop jamming this hand in this formation. I don't think this villain is 3bet bluffing flush or straight draws, or if he does it's not anywhere near a significant frequency (different from last week's wild and crazy villain). If villain has a one pair Qx hand suspecting me of bluffing, I think he'll call down my 4bet flop shove. He knows I can have bluffs through that line, and he wouldn't expect me to shove through with AA or KK. I can already hear him in my head saying, "If you've got a set, you've got a set" as he calls off my 4bet shove with top pair. And if I don't think I'm getting Qx to fold, then he's definitely not folding better. I'm getting a good price to continue, and my straight outs are very clean. Plan is to fold to turn aggression unless we find a K, diamond, A, or 9.

Turn top pair and the second nut flush draw. Outside of an offsuit A or 9, Kd is probably the best turn card in the deck for me. With this limp-call pre, bet-3bet flop, half-pot on the turn line, villain likely has QT, 44, or an overplayed Qx that has spazzed on the turn. I hate putting opponents on such narrow ranges, but (a) we play together every week and (b) this line narrows villain's range significantly. This villain wouldn't limp-call AJo+, KQo+ or TT+ from the cutoff. This villain could have some AdXd in the limp-call range, but I've never seen this villain 3bet bluff a flush draw (even the nut flush draw) or an OESD when he's getting a great price to just call and realize his equity. I could see him flop 3betting the massive combo draws of KdJd or Jd9d, but fortunately we block both. The only AdXd that could make sense to me with this post-flop line would be AdTd, and I'm ~100% sure he's opening that from the cutoff. I think he's calling the flop raise with Ad2d - Ad9d, as he'll limp those from the CO at some frequency. If he has J9, god bless him, but the flop play in particular is just very counter to how he typically plays. He could have KT-suited through this line, but it would *have* to be KdTd, which fortunately the board blocks.

For his made hands, we're not in terrible shape. I'm exactly 50/50 equity against QT (9 combos), beating all overplayed Qx, and have 32% equity against 44 (3 combos). Even if he unexpectedly has TT or QQ here (and I'd *never* expect either), we're 32% against those 6 combos, too. With just under a pot-sized bet, it seems like a no-brainer to stick the money in. If I have any fold equity against his two pair or 44 despite the ridiculous price he's getting (which I clearly did), let's try to press it through.

The main spot in this hand where I wonder if I went wrong is the flop raise. Might have been better to just call and see a cheap turn (obviously I wish now that I'd just called lol), but I'm curious how to best approach/counter an OOP donk bettor on these sorts of boards. I *think* that, as played, the hand plays itself from there. But reasonable minds might disagree.

And a hypothetical I'm curious about: what are we doing if it checks to us on the turn? My plan was to just check behind because then I really think he's only got a one-pair Qx and won't call off, but should I just be shoving here when checked to?
 
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I thought this when you originally posted, but wasn't at the computer so couldn't respond easily.

His donk bet felt like "protecting" a strong hand... or value betting a nut flush draw. Either scenario... with your 6 "clean" outs isn't getting odds to draw to. I considered a fold there. A call probably isn't that bad. A raise isn't so great because it opens up the opportunity to get shoved on. What hands is this strong player donking with that he isn't jamming with. In soft games, I don't like to tangle with strong players if I don't have too.
 
Pre fine, and I haven’t played in ur game but I don’t think the blinds are as wide pre with such a big open and the limper left to act.

The raise on flop seems like an overplay and unlikely to get through as everyone’s range probably has QT, TT, 44 and Axdd, maybe some Kxdd.

The turn...I dunno what we beat here. This is like the worst card ls in the deck for us...Axdd gets there and so does J9. Dunno what bluffs V can have. Rarely he has AQ but that shouldn’t be leading turn if he’s anywhere close to competent. Toss it in the muck
 
I thought this when you originally posted, but wasn't at the computer so couldn't respond easily.

His donk bet felt like "protecting" a strong hand... or value betting a nut flush draw. Either scenario... with your 6 "clean" outs isn't getting odds to draw to. I considered a fold there. A call probably isn't that bad. A raise isn't so great because it opens up the opportunity to get shoved on. What hands is this strong player donking with that he isn't jamming with. In soft games, I don't like to tangle with strong players if I don't have too.
Totally agree that I could see a donk lead on the nut flush draw. What I didn't think was that this villain would 3bet bluff those draws. In a vacuum, do you think villain has any substantial number of AdXd or J9 through this line? If so, then I think the turn play in particular is a big mistake.

If villain has exclusively two pair and sets through this line, then we've got the price and equity to call both the flop 3bet ($30 to win $110, so we need ~21% equity, and we've got ~28% equity against hands as strong as QQ or TT or 44, obviously doing better against two pair or villain's draws) and a turn shove (it's about a pot-sized bet if villain shoves, so we'd need ~33% equity, and we've got 31.82% equity against hands as strong as KK or QQ or TT or 44), right? But if we're running into flushes or J9 on this turn, then the turn call (and I'm treating my turn all-in as essentially calling villain's shove, since I didn't see a reason to leave $60 behind) goes from breakeven to definitely -EV.
 
The turn...I dunno what we beat here. This is like the worst card ls in the deck for us...Axdd gets there and so does J9. Dunno what bluffs V can have. Rarely he has AQ but that shouldn’t be leading turn if he’s anywhere close to competent. Toss it in the muck
I think that's the thing: if AdXd or J9 are taking this line (or something like AdKx), then it's hugely negative EV. If he only has two pairs and sets, then we're definitely getting the price to call. I think we are absolutely behind on the turn, but I think we've got the equity and pot odds to call.
 
Ok you went wrong on every opportunity here. Let's go over them.

Preflop - The way you made it sound here, you expected both blinds to call your preflop raise, which means it was 4.50 to call on a pot of 15.50. Not a lot of hands will fold preflop with those pot odds. The whole purpose of a preflop raise is to narrow the field and extract information from your opponents. Your preflop raise did neither, and you knew it when you did it. Either raise more to actually extract information useful to you, or just call. Just calling would have limited your losses, and raising more might have warned you about what you were walking into here.

Flop - Villain leads out. You raise. Not a bad idea to raise here. Not going to blame you for doing that. Then villain 3 bets it. Other draws will not 3 bet here. At this point you have to know that you are going to hit the straight or lose this hand. I don't know if I can call here. The math is kinda close, so you can justify calling if you want to, but looking at how much you already put in and how much more you have to put in, I can find a better hill to die on than this one.

Turn - One of my "cardinal rules", which are nothing more than things I learned from getting my butt kicked repeatedly, is "when you are drawing to a straight and end up pairing, you lost". Villain leads out with a bet you cannot call. Either you fold or you jam, and you learned on the flop it was straight or bust. Everything here is telling you to fold.
 
I'd take feedback for how to approach the hand differently across the streets, if you have any!

At a high level, I think that you have too much money in the pot with too weak of a hand. It feels to me more like you were gambling than playing a game of skill.
 
So I am obviously a fish but here are my thoughts:

Preflop: wow huuuge raise for .25/.50 but if it is standard that is fine. I think choosing a sizing that the blinds call put you in a multiway pot and I think this isnt the hand I want in a multiway pot, so maybe choose a size that gets you HU? Isnt clear what could be in his limp/calling range. I have seen it all from AA to J3s.

Flop: I'm Ok with raising the donk - a semi-bluff move - you want to fold him out of whatever he is donking and it is usually weak but you have some equity if he calls. I'm ok with the call with an OESD given your outs . His donk/raise line screams strength and I'm playing the turn and river super tight.

Turn: fold. I am the king of spewy jams and this is spewy. Sure you put him in a tough spot but what do you beat here? I dont like to be behind drawing for my stack despite the fact that I do it a lot. I am an expert in jamming into the nuts and this looks close. His line is so strong (except the limp) and I am trying to resolve not to jam into such strength as usually I am way behind.
 
I'd rather fold pre flop than go 4 ways to a flop in a 40bb pot with KJo, I would go against the grain and ignore standard opening sizes for a specific game and focus on bb amounts regardless of how deep the game is.

I would make the preflop raise 3-4bb in light of 1 limper in basically any scenario, in this instance that would have made the pot significantly smaller on the flop and would have prevented ever getting all in for such a large amount with a very marginal hand
 
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Totally agree that I could see a donk lead on the nut flush draw. What I didn't think was that this villain would 3bet bluff those draws.
That's just it... he doesn't have any three bet bluffs here. He has sets and two-pairs. Stuff that is vulnerable to a heart. His initial donk bet had flush draws there. So your raise did well to gain that information. The problem is, you should have folded to the raise because you weren't getting the proper odds to draw. 6 outs = ~12% on the next card. **edit** Since we've eliminated him having a flush draw here... your heart outs are now clean... so 8 outs = ~16% on the next card. Pot was $110 at that time... it cost you $30 to win it. Your draw is 84:16 = 5.25:1. You need to make 5.25x your call ($30) to break even... so $157. The pot isn't laying you that... effective stacks don't allow that, so not enough implied odds either. Yeah, I guess the pot is laying you that now. So its a close call on the flop.
In a vacuum, do you think villain has any substantial number of AdXd or J9 through this line? If so, then I think the turn play in particular is a big mistake.
J9 maybe... but not the AdXd.
If villain has exclusively two pair and sets through this line, then we've got the price and equity to call both the flop 3bet ($30 to win $110, so we need ~21% equity, and we've got ~28% equity against hands as strong as QQ or TT or 44, obviously doing better against two pair or villain's draws) and a turn shove (it's about a pot-sized bet if villain shoves, so we'd need ~33% equity, and we've got 31.82% equity against hands as strong as KK or QQ or TT or 44), right? But if we're running into flushes or J9 on this turn, then the turn call (and I'm treating my turn all-in as essentially calling villain's shove, since I didn't see a reason to leave $60 behind) goes from breakeven to definitely -EV.
I don't see KK in his range... limp, call, donk flop? QQ is questionable too... so are TT for that matter. Limp pre. QT, 44, J9, AdXd are in the donk range. I don't think he's semi-bluff raising the flush draw... but that is read dependent. See my calc above, I don't see the flow call as +EV.

Turn... let's evaluate the call line:
still 8 outs... but maybe a heart is dirty, lets call it 7 outs (~14%). 86/14 = 6.1:1... so 6.1x the call amount = 6.1(75) = $460. Can you make $460? nope... fold.
 
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So I am obviously a fish but here are my thoughts:

Preflop: wow huuuge raise for .25/.50 but if it is standard that is fine. I think choosing a sizing that the blinds call put you in a multiway pot and I think this isnt the hand I want in a multiway pot, so maybe choose a size that gets you HU? Isnt clear what could be in his limp/calling range. I have seen it all from AA to J3s.

Flop: I'm Ok with raising the donk - a semi-bluff move - you want to fold him out of whatever he is donking and it is usually weak but you have some equity if he calls. I'm ok with the call with an OESD given your outs . His donk/raise line screams strength and I'm playing the turn and river super tight.

Turn: fold. I am the king of spewy jams and this is spewy. Sure you put him in a tough spot but what do you beat here? I dont like to be behind drawing for my stack despite the fact that I do it a lot. I am an expert in jamming into the nuts and this looks close. His line is so strong (except the limp) and I am trying to resolve not to jam into such strength as usually I am way behind.
Re: the PFR, once a couple of people have to rebuy/add-on the game plays much more like a $0.50/$1.00 game. I'd rather we just started that way, but I think other people in the game are uncomfy with the idea of having their initial buy-in be ~$100+. Just a weird psychological thing, but I don't push it. $5 or so had been getting the pots HU or 3-ways, but you know how it is, sometimes the blinds look down at whatever they have and think "but I've got a discount!"

Flop: agree. I'm curious if this is a flop where we want to have no raising range. That's an option. And, in retrospect, I think my hand is a *much* better raise with KdJh instead of KhJd. It gives my hand a little more resiliency if we pick up a diamond on the turn. If his flop 3bet was bigger, I think this becomes a fold. Though I'm also very guilty on the flop (and in a lot of other hands) of forgetting that equity on any given flop means equity if you for sure get to see the next two cards. On most turns, villain is gonna keep his foot on the gas with value, meaning that flop equity is often illusory. Especially so in these spots that leave us with 1:1 SPR on the turn, where my ability to maneuver is restricted and I kind of just have to hit my hand.

Turn: I think we're thinking the same thing but come to different conclusions? I've got a pot-sized bet left as the effective stack. I treated his $75 turn bet as a shove, for all intents and purposes. I'm putting villain exclusively on sets and two pairs when he 3bets the flop and continues on what should be a gigantic scare card for him in the Kd. I think I am 100% behind here at this moment, and I didn't include any "random bluffs" or a spazzy QJ in thinking through the spot at the table or try to build out his range further. The only hands we really don't want to see here are AdXd (I'm stone dead) or J9 (mostly dead). I don't think those hands are here, for reasons others have said. I'm not raising for value or to bluff, and I'm expecting him to call with all of his hands. I'm shoving because I'm treating his bet as a shove in this spot and seeing my raise as a call (my guess is he just didn't realize we were in a 1:1 SPR spot and that if he'd counted to see that I had just a pot behind he would've just gone all-in). Had he just shoved, we need 33% equity to call. If he flopped two pair (say QcTd), I have 22 outs (Kc, Ks, Jc, Js, Jh, 4h, 4c, 4s, Ad, Ac, As, Ah, 9c, 9s, 9h, 9d, 8d, 7d, 6d, 5d, 3d, 2d), right?. In that world, we've got at least 45% equity, and I think it's closer to 50% but I'm not positive. If he has KQ, I've got ~34% equity. And if he has any of the sets (KK, QQ, TT, or 44 [disregarding the fact that KK, QQ, and TT are unlikely as played]), then we've got ~30% equity with 14 outs (Ad, Ac, As, Ah, 9d, 9c, 9s, 9h, 8d, 7d, 6d, 5d, 3d, 2d). Even if villain only has sets, we need 33% to call a shove and we've got ~30%. So if villain only has sets, this is a losing call from a pot odds perspective. But even if we give villain all 12 combos of sets of KK, QQ, TT, 44 (again, unlikely) and all 9 combos of QT, we've definitely got at least 33% equity against range, something like ~36%. In what most people seem to agree is the likeliest world, we're gonna see QT or 44. 9 combos of QT and 3 combos of 44, we've absolutely got the odds to call a shove against range, right? But, treating his turn bet like a shove might've also been a mistake. We've got a slam dunk price for a call against that range, and we can just fold the river unimproved. But in my head, I thought villain isn't putting another cent in the pot when the fourth diamond comes in or the A hits or a K or J hits the board, so I wanted to win the max when I do get there on the river. That might be a better philosophy if villain bets $110 and I've got $135 behind than when villain bets $75 and I've got $135 behind.

I think @JWC is partially spot on: in these neutral-EV or slightly losing-EV spots in tiny stakes like $0.25/$0.50, I'm happy to gamble. But I think if the range is QT and 44 (and we can even include all TT), we're getting the right price, right?
 
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That's just it... he doesn't have any three bet bluffs here. He has sets and two-pairs. Stuff that is vulnerable to a heart. His initial donk bet had flush draws there. So your raise did well to gain that information. The problem is, you should have folded to the raise because you weren't getting the proper odds to draw. 6 outs = ~12% on the next card. **edit** Since we've eliminated him having a flush draw here... your heart outs are now clean... so 8 outs = ~16% on the next card. Pot was $110 at that time... it cost you $30 to win it. Your draw is 84:16 = 5.25:1. You need to make 5.25x your call ($30) to break even... so $157. The pot isn't laying you that... effective stacks don't allow that, so not enough implied odds either. Yeah, I guess the pot is laying you that now. So its a close call on the flop.

J9 maybe... but not the AdXd.

I don't see KK in his range... limp, call, donk flop? QQ is questionable too... so are TT for that matter. Limp pre. QT, 44, J9, AdXd are in the donk range. I don't think he's semi-bluff raising the flush draw... but that is read dependent. See my calc above, I don't see the flow call as +EV.

Turn... let's evaluate the call line:
still 8 outs... but maybe a heart is dirty, lets call it 7 outs (~14%). 86/14 = 6.1:1... so 6.1x the call amount = 6.1(75) = $460. Can you make $460? nope... fold.
I agree: no bluffs, just two pair and sets! On the turn, we've got 22 outs against his two pair (except KQ, which has us with about 34% equity) and 14 outs against sets. We need 33% equity to call a shove. Against a range of two pair and sets, we've got that, right?
 
Ok you went wrong on every opportunity here. Let's go over them.

Preflop - The way you made it sound here, you expected both blinds to call your preflop raise, which means it was 4.50 to call on a pot of 15.50. Not a lot of hands will fold preflop with those pot odds. The whole purpose of a preflop raise is to narrow the field and extract information from your opponents. Your preflop raise did neither, and you knew it when you did it. Either raise more to actually extract information useful to you, or just call. Just calling would have limited your losses, and raising more might have warned you about what you were walking into here.

Flop - Villain leads out. You raise. Not a bad idea to raise here. Not going to blame you for doing that. Then villain 3 bets it. Other draws will not 3 bet here. At this point you have to know that you are going to hit the straight or lose this hand. I don't know if I can call here. The math is kinda close, so you can justify calling if you want to, but looking at how much you already put in and how much more you have to put in, I can find a better hill to die on than this one.

Turn - One of my "cardinal rules", which are nothing more than things I learned from getting my butt kicked repeatedly, is "when you are drawing to a straight and end up pairing, you lost". Villain leads out with a bet you cannot call. Either you fold or you jam, and you learned on the flop it was straight or bust. Everything here is telling you to fold.
My b, must've been unclear re: preflop. As the game gets deeper, it plays more like $0.50/$1.00. Raising to $5ish normally gets the pot heads up or 3-ways. Didn't expect both the blinds to autocall. They did. Shoulder shrug. I also think the blinds are *extremely* likely to donk when they connect here, so once CO donks the pot is essentially already heads up, if that makes sense.

Flop: I'm revisiting the raise. Do you think there's any merit to having a flat all strategy against villain's donk here? And if I have a raising range, should I only be raising KJo with the Kd so that my backdoor diamond equity is a little stronger? That would also leave me not having to consider folding so much equity when I do get 3bet on this board. And I think you make a very good implicit point: we might be too shallow for this to be profitable. Yeah, on the flop we've got 8 outs, but that's only if we for sure get to a showdown, and villain is super likely to keep the pressure on on the turn. With a 1:1 turn SPR, villain really should be shoving all of his value, keeping us from realizing our equity across both streets.

Turn: same pot odds point as elsewhere. I treated villain's turn bet as a jam, expecting him to call with all two-pairs and sets, and expecting him to have no other hands here. 22 outs against QT, 14 outs against his sets. Against that range, we've got enough equity to call.
 

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