Flopped a flush draw.

Pre is good. I bet the flop about $25 to start building a pot or even take it down now -- I'm fine either way.

I just call the turn. No need to scare him away with a shove. You could put in a "normal" raise to ~$75 and call a shove if you want to gamble a little, although there is a good change you are ahead.

I call the turn because I expect him to stab again on the river, but thinking about it, I kind of like the ~$75.

Jamming the turn guarantees that the only calling hands are those that crush you.

I think preflop is a little weird given these stack sizes (looks like effective stack is just $220) and hand. ATs (due to it's meh kicker) isn't really the type of hand we're going to feel comfortable raising large, hitting an Ace, and then stacking off with (because a large raise could easily limit calling Ax hands to larger kickers)... and yet a large raise at this stack will immediately put us in a commitment spot. It also plays pretty well multiway. So I'm really torn preflop. If Button/Blinds are loose, I think I just open limp here an encourage a high SPR multiway pot. If the Button/Blinds are tight, I can more get behind a raise (but perhaps even a smaller one to setup a non-committing / more playable SPR... if that will narrow things to HU). It's a tricky spot, imo.

With two overs and the nut flush draw we should have a bunch of equity and can start flexing our FE against weak pairs. At an SPR of 5 we can setup a shove for stacks on the turn with a slight overbet on the flop. So I'd make it $55 on the flop to setup a PSB shove for any turn.

As played, we didn't play for commitment on the flop and now I'm not sure if there is any real reason to play for stacks on the turn (unless you think he'll play for them with worse). I would actually just call the turn at this point cuz as is we have a showdownable hand that doesn't really want to put the rest of the chips in UI (especially as the aggressor). It keeps bluffs / weak hands in his range and we fear very few cards due to us having the flush draw. I would mostly plan on calling a reasonable river bet and betting myself if checked to.

FWIW, I came from Limit to NL 15 years ago and it was quite an adjustment. IMO (and not everyone will agree with this), I think we have to way tone down our aggression (especially on early streets) with marginal equity. In Limit, we have to pounce on our slim equity advantage on every street because we can't make up for it on later streets (which we can in any single street in NL). Also in NL we have to be extremely careful of not getting large parts of our stacks committed with the worst of it (a very small mistake in Limit but a massive blunder in NL) and not getting blown off our equity (which we can't in Limit). It's a massively different animal, imo. If I could boil down my own personal strategy in both games to a single line, in Limit it would be "I raise" whereas in NL it would be "I call" (or even "I check").

Ggoodluck!G

You are only 30BB with straddle on. I like check back on the flop, keeps life simple, you can just take your equity and can occasionally be ahead.

Turn jam seems OK

I am not a Limit Player. Or at least, I wasn't serious about poker when I played a lot of informal limit.

A lot of NLHE is bet management relative to the size of the smallest stack, the "effective stack." Things like betting geometrically throughout the four betting rounds to encourage or discourage being able to 'easily' bet all of one's remaining chips and be called.

"Easily" here means, without requiring a large bet that causes suspicion, such as most bets near, or larger than the size of the pot. Versus bets 1/4 to 1/2-2/3 pot.

A few rules of thumb. Setmining can be discouraged by having a preflop bet be larger than ~10% of the effective stack. You know the odds of your pocket pair making 3 of a kind on the flop are about 8.5 to 1 against. Having implied odds be less than 10 to 1 helps discourage callers from continuing with those PP. (But they still do.)

Another rule of thumb is that most people, when faced with a bet which will result in roughly 1/3 to 1/2 of their starting stack size, will shove versus calling. This is (I've been corrected before) strictly a preflop rule of thumb, but I find it also valid for estimating a villain's commitment threshold during the hand as well. Manipulating bet and pot sizes to threaten or stave off acknowledgment of pot commitment is a lot of the game.

Edit: I didn't realize that your opponent began the hand with only $210 on a $6 straddle. However, jamming still feels like an unnecessary overbet, especially after the flop check.

As to the hand, with V having 220 to start, bets totalling 70-85 or so, are going to start having V wondering if they should shove instead.

I think pf is fine. ATs is in my CO opening range, and a 3-3.5x open over a straddle seems right. 632ddx should slightly favor their calling range over our opening range. Are we opening 54s? Are they defending with 54s? V will need to bet another 50-65 before feeling committed.

It used to be that one cbetted very frequently, and half pot or more was it. Now, a lot more players check boards unfavorable for their range, despite being the pf aggressor and they often cbet for smaller amounts. I don't mind taking a free card here. It strengthens our checking range as well.

If we hit though, with a 40 pot, we'll likely need to bet turn and river to get their stack. Whereas if we bet 10-15 on flop (and didn't get raised), the pot will be 60-70 on the turn, and V will have 35-55 more before feeling committed, which could be a 1/2-3/4 pot sized bet. We may be able to get our free card on the river then with a small flop cbet IP, and still conceivably bet a larger, callable amount on the river. It all depends on how fast the pot grows versus what everyone has left.

I like Java's small raise on the turn AP. Calling a shove by V, if necessary, and hoping to bink.

I know this flop range doesn't favour us, but I really think we're getting things backwards if we're more gung ho about raising preflop with the slimmest of equity advantages (which will often get obliterated on the flop) and little FE and yet are checking back flops like this with very good equity and good FE (especially when we can put a bunch of pressure on all while we have a nice equity advantage and the risk versus reward of big pot to small stack is so worthwhile).

GcluelessbassackwardsnoobG

Slimmest of equity advantages and little fold equity preflop? We only have four players with random hands to get through and have a strong suited Ace. There's every chance it gets through and when it doesn't, we're likely in position with a hand that can flop hard. If we get a call then we aren't likely dominated; the trickiest spot is likely to be if we get 3bet and then catch an Ace on the flop.

On the flop, our bet has excellent chances of getting folds from Kx, Qx, Jx and Tx...all the hands we beat, while never getting folds from overpairs. We have a middling strength A-high which has showdown value, plus a flush draw. A bet isn't terrible, but with so little stack depth against this particular opponent it just doesn't make a lot of sense because we're never folding our hand. If we were deeper I could see an argument for a cbet.

As compared to this postflop spot, yes, imo.

And I'm the exact opposite, where deeper at a much bigger SPR we're more cooler with checking back due to not wanting to get in huge chunks of stacks to fight for such a relatively small pot (high risk for low reward). But in this spot at this small SPR, we get in huge chunks of stacks while having great equity and can still have great FE by the turn (bigger Ax will never make the turn and pairs will be put in a blender facing a PSB turn shove for stacks, all with us still having great equity if called at any point).

Again, I just find it odd that people are more than willing to build pots preflop with little FE and a slight equity that will change drastically on the flop, and meanwhile when they actually flop monstrous equity with FE postflop in a big reward for (relatively) little risk (due to SPR) they pass on that spot.

GcluelessoppositenoobG

Thank you guy's for the great discussion.

I ended up calling his turn bet.

($90) 6d3c2dThQs...He bets 50

price is too good to fold the river, call and see. i doubt you're good though this is a very value-heavy bet. he probably flopped a set or backed into QT two pair. you only have to be good 1/3 to win.

With all the draws busting, our flop show of weakness, this price, the fact he can be value betting worse, etc., I think the river is probably a crying call. We're probably going to be shown better more often than not (and feel like an idiot), but I think we'll be shown worse just enough to be profitable over all.

GcluelessNLnoobG

PRE - standard.

FLOP - I'd c-bet range for 1/2 pot as the PFR, HU and IP. Might sometimes go slightly smaller than 1/2 pot because of the straddle.

TURN - As played on the flop, I think I raise this turn bet to $60 or $65, to build the pot and set up a less than PSB river jam. We almost certainly have the best hand here, and if not, we have tons of equity. If he 3B-jams, I'm calling.

Can't fold. Must call.