Hand reading fails me. What does this donk-barrel-call-donk line rep?
1/3, 9 handed, $500 max buy-in, Parx Philly Friday night. Rake is 10% up to $5 with $2 promo drop.
PRE -
EP limps (UTG or UTG1). He's starting out around $645-ish.
This is the main V. He's white, maybe mid 20's, just sat down with around $300-$400 maybe 2-3 orbits ago. Never seen him before this, so most likely not a reg, or at least not in this room. He won a big pot not long after he sat down, either with a big bluff that got through or hero calling a big bluff that didn't. As I'm typing this, I can't remember for sure which it was.
Too soon to assign him a detailed read with any confidence, aside from saying he appears capable of either running a big bluff or hero-calling a big bluff, and isn't scared money, but otherwise probably isn't very good when he's open limping from EP.
Hero raises to $20 with A5dd in MP. Hero is MAWG running over the table with around $2k in front of him. Should have a winning image. Haven't shown any bluffs since V sat down. Have shown a lot of winning hands, even when opponents folded, so the rest of the table may think I'm on a heater and just always have it.
Two calls from loose-passive rec-fish in LP, folds back to V, who also calls. Four to the flop with ~$80 in the pot.
FLOP ($80) 843rb with one diamond, giving us one over, backdoor flush and inside straight draw.
V donks for $25. Hero calls. Other two fold. HU going to the turn.
TURN ($130) 843rb Ks, completing the rainbow of suits. No more BDFD, just the one over and an ISSD.
V bets again, for $45. Hero decides V is almost certainly FOS when he continues to barrel here, but for such a small size, and we can rep a lot of KX as the PFR, so we raise to $125 (not going too big, just in case he isn't actually FOS). V thinks for maybe 5 seconds, then calls.
Assuming V will check in flow on the river, hero is planning on jamming on any Q, J, T, 6, 4 or 3, sizing down for value on an ace or 2, and giving up / checking back on a K, 8, 9, or 7.
RIVER ($380) 843rb Ks 5c, giving hero 3rd pair.
Hero forgot to have a plan for what to do on a 5, but it doesn't matter. V doesn't think more than a few seconds before stacking up some chips and donking for $225, leaving himself about $250 behind.
I can't remember if I've ever seen this line, and in game, I was very surprised. He donked the river for half his remaining stack, but it's just under 60% pot. Like, what is this line repping?
As hero is tanking, he looks over and notices that V is staring intensely at him, apparently trying to look confident / strong, usually a fairly reliable tell indicating weakness.
I didn't think he'd have a flopped set or 2P when he bets small and then just flat calls my raise on the turn Ks. I wouldn't think 8x would continue to barrel on the Ks turn AND flat call my raise AND donk the river on a brick.
The 5 on the river doesn't change anything, if we discount either of us having some sort of inside-straight draw (76? A2?) that gets there, or somehow arrives on the river with 85 or 54 (just 1 combo each of 54s and 85s). Are 76, A2, 85 and 54 taking this line - donk flop, barrel-call turn, donk river?
Maybe he started a semi-bluff on the flop with 65. But does anyone in his spot river 3rd pair and suddenly decide to turn it into a bluff by donking for 60% pot (1/2 remaining stack)? Without thinking more than a few seconds?
I'm guessing most here will say this is a trivial fold. Maybe it is. But I was having a very hard time putting V on a hand that made sense for value. To be fair, I was also having a hard time figuring out what his bluffs would be.
We beat 65 and worse 5x, like 52 (both open-ended on the flop). We beat hands like A4 and A3 with BDFD's, if he's donking out with bottom or middle pair + BDFD on the flop. And we beat all his random air-balls that are just spazzing. I figure he's got 2 combos of 65s, 2 of 52s, 2 of A4s, and 2 of A3s, so 8 value-bluffs, and maybe some weird air.
We lose to 8x and better. I figure he's got 3 combos of 98s, 3 of 87s, and 3 of A8s - 9 total. If we want to give him 85s and 54s, that's another 2 combos, for 11 total. Do we want to give him 76 and A2?
We're being laid 2.7 to one on a call.
What should hero do?
I would fold. Guessing he has 85 or K8 and he is putting you on AK.
So far everyone who wants to continue on the flop has seemed to ignore that the flop is 4-handed with us being in the worst relative position. And that also means the guy who led out has led into 3 people, not just 1. I think it is fine to fold here. Even if we think the flop bet is usually weak, which may very well be true, this still isn't a good spot to attempt to apply pressure. We'll have better ones, especially as long as the fish think we're going to play straightforwardly against these leads, which folding now will reinforce.
I could call the flop with the gut shot and the bdfd. But when V donks the turn K, even with the small size, I give up and fold.
Curious what the stats are when they donk flop, bet turn, get raised, just call, and the river goes check-jam. I would expect they fold river at a very high rate facing that line.
I don’t have that exact line but I was looking at Donk-Flop-Bet turn-Check River and they were folding 88% of the time vs a jam in one Database of about 10 million hands (small DB but huge folding frequencies)
I was looking at some preliminary live MDA and it looks like BXB performs much better as a bluff than XBB. It looks like population doesn’t believe you will check back strong hands OTF.
As a default I think we should be putting all value in XBB and all bluffs in BXB and only change it if our opponent adjusts.
So far everyone who wants to continue on the flop has seemed to ignore that the flop is 4-handed with us being in the worst relative position. And that also means the guy who led out has led into 3 people, not just 1. I think it is fine to fold here. Even if we think the flop bet is usually weak, which may very well be true, this still isn't a good spot to attempt to apply pressure. We'll have better ones, especially as long as the fish think we're going to play straightforwardly against these l
Relative position matters a bit less in practice than theory because of how wide the fish are but I think folding flop is fine too.
i think its too much overthinking to call the river with your hand although i get why you'd want to. am also maybe more inclined if flop is hu but i think you're just going to get beaten by someone doing something semi illogically with a depolarized range and its less likely to me he leads middle / bottom pair 4 ways as opposed to hu (where he could conceivably have pair and fd ott)
haven't read the comments but i wanted to point out "hero can represent a bunch of kx" idk if thats true when you call the flop with 2 people left to act behind u. id continue on the flop though vs this sizing in some manner
i will say 5 seems like a bad card to have otr
i think its too much overthinking to call the river with your hand although i get why you'd want to. am also maybe more inclined if flop is hu but i think you're just going to get beaten by someone doing something semi illogically with a depolarized range and its less likely to me he leads middle / bottom pair 4 ways as opposed to hu (where he could conceivably have pair and fd ott)
+1
Relative position matters a bit less in practice than theory because of how wide the fish are but I think folding flop is fine too.
The fishes’ wide ranges are very likely canceled out by their lack of positional awareness, by which I mean, they are supposed to be way more willing to fold marginal hands after we call OOrP, but they likely won’t. Which means our slowplays with big hands will work better, as will our calls with nut draws, but here we have a marginal draw to the non-nuts, so I don’t like this.
This is one I wish I could re-do. I wish I'd trusted my read more, raised over his flop donk, and barreled the turn. I think that likely would have taken the pot down.
Spoiler
I was about to fold before I spotted him glaring at me.
Being pretty sure he was weak after spotting that tell, I briefly considered jamming, but decided against it, because he still might not fold 8x, and we beat all his worse bluffs, which can't call a jam anyway. So, trusting the tell, I flicked in the call, praying he'd turn over a worse 1P, before he sheepishly turned over 87.
About an hour later, he said he was praying I'd fold, and was certain he was beat when I called. He clearly thought he was bluffing. I don't know if that meant he'd have folded to a jam, but I suspect he likely would have.
Even without raising the flop, though, I disagree that we're only repping KK for value, or that it's not credible when we raise turn. If our line doesn't rep strength in a credible way, I'd expect V to 3B the turn, or check the river. He clearly believed we had a hand that beat 2nd pair.
i misread the hand initially (i thought u raised the turn and he lead river) but i think pretty much everything i wrote still applies. i think your line is okish headsup but its just more likely his range is stronger when he leads into 3 people as opposed to 1. the flop and turn sizings dont really look depolarized to me either (if he potted i think your logic is more sound although you'd never make it to the river in that case). dunno is good ur instincts are on point but pretty easy to find assumptions where this is a torch and much harder to find them where its even ok - the biggest sticking point to me is you need him to limp call and then start blasting nto 3 people.
Spoiler
If he was going to fold to a river jam, he would have folded to your turn raise.
Hands like these are why assuming that you can take the pot away from someone who leads into you is playing with fire. You get these half-right reads where you know the guy is weak enough that YOU would fold to the pressure…but they don’t. So sometimes your read that he is weak is wrong, and sometimes your read that he will fold his weak hands is also wrong.
This is why you stay out of spots like this by folding the flop or turn. You should have lost way less on this hand.
Extra +1 to what CMV said ...
Spoiler
I strongly feel like what you _shouldn't_ take away from this is that you need to blast off more because they'll fold eventually.
Even if it might be good in a vacuum the more you do it the more they'll just not fold weird hands you feel they should, for whatever reason they tell themselves.
Yes, an hour later he says he was praying you'd fold and he knew he was beat (maybe some of that is true) ... but I think it's far from certain that he'd fold if you shoved the river. So many times I've bluff shoved into people and they called it off "knowing they were losing" but it was only 200 to win 800 or whatever.
Maybe if you raised the flop he'd decide you had an overpair, but again he can easily decide to call the flop with a two pair draw and backdoor straights or whatever and then feel like he's "priced in" to calling it off on the turn.
Much better is if you can see when those "donk value" spots are often bad value and just pile money in with better value, or at least way more equity when called.
Lots of really interesting hand analysis going on here! I've been working on a tool that estimates players ranges and actions and I tried running this hand through it.
The top 5 hand combos that villain has are:
76o: 4.2%
76s: 3.2%
33: 3%
44: 2.8%
K8o: 2.2%
You're also being given 27% pot odds on the river for a call. My tool estimates that villain will have two pair or better about 40% of the time.
But how often does A5 win? My tool estimates that A5 will actually win with a call about 31.1% of the time!
It might seem crazy, but I think this is probably a marginally profitable call as hero. They will have a high card hand about 11% of the time, and they will actually have a worse pair than you about 20% of the time! They have hands like 65, 64, 32, A3, A4, etc.
However it's so close to break even that you could probably fold and sleep better at night ��
This is of course all just estimated probabilities and ranges, but thought I'd add a different perspective to the conversation
i misread the hand initially (i thought u raised the turn and he lead river) but i think pretty much everything i wrote still applies. i think your line is okish headsup but its just more likely his range is stronger when he leads into 3 people as opposed to 1. the flop and turn sizings dont really look depolarized to me either (if he potted i think your logic is more sound although you'd never make it to the river in that case). dunno is good ur instincts are on point but pretty easy to find as
You read it right. I did raise turn and he did lead river.
I don't see low stakes opponents taking this line with flopped 2P or sets, or draws that get there on the river. The 2P and sets bet bigger on flop and turn, so when he bets small twice, it's mostly weak 1P hands that will fold to aggression on the turn or river. The river donk is more often than not going to be a weak value hand turned into a bluff.
My read was right on flop and turn. V is basically just button clicking with his line. If he's capable of doing this with 8x, I think he's capable of doing it with worse, such that the river becomes a more difficult decision when we have some nominal showdown value. I'd snap this off with 99+, so the river decision just comes down to how often he has worse than A5, and if he ever folds to a jam.
You read it right. I did raise turn and he did lead river.
I don't see low stakes opponents taking this line with flopped 2P or sets, or draws that get there on the river. The 2P and sets bet bigger on flop and turn, so when he bets small twice, it's mostly weak 1P hands that will fold to aggression on the turn or river. The river donk is more often than not going to be a weak value hand turned into a bluff.
My read was right on flop and turn. V is basically just button clicking with his line. If
I've found myself wanting to comment on this hand a number of times but couldn't gain clarity. Keeping in mind that the info on Villain prior to the hand is that's he capable of either a big bluff or bluff catch, I find the 60% sizing on the river, in the absence of any busted draws, and compared to his flop and turn leads, which were closer to 30%, confusing. I mean, I agree with the read that on the flop and turn he mostly has weakish 1 pair combos, typically 8x, but the river is a bit large for a blocker bet and yet doesn't make sense as a bluff (hence the read of a "mergy-fishy-bluff" which is about a grey as it gets). I don't mind how you used a distinctive live-tell to finalise your decision.
River is definitely not a snap fold or snap call, and it's really good that you're considering the third option which is a big bluff raise. People miss out on the options available. I still think it's very dicey given there is very little left behind and I wouldn't have gone for it.
River is definitely not a snap fold or snap call, and it's really good that you're considering the third option which is a big bluff raise. People miss out on the options available. I still think it's very dicey given there is very little left behind and I wouldn't have gone for it.
I appreciate you saying all that. Thank you.
You read it right. I did raise turn and he did lead river.
I don't see low stakes opponents taking this line with flopped 2P or sets, or draws that get there on the river. The 2P and sets bet bigger on flop and turn, so when he bets small twice, it's mostly weak 1P hands that will fold to aggression on the turn or river. The river donk is more often than not going to be a weak value hand turned into a bluff.
My read was right on flop and turn. V is basically just button clicking with his line. If he's capable of doing this with 8x, I think he's capable of doing it with worse, such that the river becomes a more difficult decision when we have some nominal showdown value. I'd snap this off with 99+, so the river decision just comes down to how often he has worse than A5, and if he ever folds to a jam.[/QUOTE]
I do think it is unfortunate that you took this hand to bluff/bluff catch with. I have to agree though that he would have most likely called your jam regardless of being "beat" it was too lucrative for him not to. He was in pretty deep after all. One good thing that you most likely took away from this pot is that you got it back and then some later on. I did enjoy the process of thought on this hand, but I think if we are all being honest this just wasn't the time to attempt a steal.
I do think it is unfortunate that you took this hand to bluff/bluff catch with. I have to agree though that he would have most likely called your jam regardless of being "beat" it was too lucrative for him not to. He was in pretty deep after all. One good thing that you most likely took away from this pot is that you got it back and then some later on. I did enjoy the process of thought on this hand, but I think if we are all being honest this just wasn't the time to attempt a steal.
What this and other threads here have shown me is that many of the frequent posters here are timid when it comes to finding opportunities to raise as a bluff, leaving money on the table. The flop and turn in this hand are clear opportunities, when V donks into us when we have a range advantage, and barrels on a nut-changing turn card that favors our range, and shifts the nut advantage in our favor.
Even if we don't think V is always folding 8x to a river jam, he doesn't have to fold 100% to make a jam profitable. He can still call most of the time. He only has to fold more than 42.65% of the time. Does he fold to a jam more than 42.65% of the time? We don't know. We're just guessing. But the way this played, I think it's close.
We're being laid 2.7 to 1 on the river. In order to NOT bluff catch here, we have to put him on 8x or better, and nothing else. And I don't see how we do that when he barrels turn, flat calls our raise, and then donks the river on yet another nut-changing card, but one that isn't likely to improve his hand. That's an insane line, especially with 2nd pair.
If he's a thinking player (I'm not sure he is), he should be more likely to do this with worse than 8x. But even if he's a spaz, and he's taking this line with all 11 combos of 8x he can have, he's at least as likely to also be doing it with at least 8 worse combos that actually make some sense (65, 52, A4, A3 - hands with less showdown value than 8x). And those are all hands we beat. That's 42% of all the hands that might remotely make some sense here.
We only need to be good here 27% of the time to call. It can't be a trivial fold when we beat at least 42% of his range. It also can't be a terrible jam if we beat 42% of his range, the bulk of the other 58% we don't beat is just 2nd pair, and he only needs to fold 42.65% of the time for our bluff to break even. Now I'm starting to think he folds way more than 42.65% of the time.
All that math - it's just math. We're doing live reads and experience here. I think it's actually pretty close between folding, calling, or jamming. I made the lower variance choice to call rather than jam, and I'm still not sure it was the right choice. In fact, I think it was wrong, and I should have jammed. If we're always folding here, we're almost certainly folding too much.
I've been watching some Hungry Horse Poker YouTube videos, and he really emphasizes that when an opponent's range is capped you can find a bet/raise size that will cause the opponent to fold his entire range.
I haven't yet implemented this in a game yet, but am looking for the opportunity.
Is anyone here doing these massive overbets/raises on the rivers to get these kinds of folds?
I've been watching some Hungry Horse Poker YouTube videos, and he really emphasizes that when an opponent's range is capped you can find a bet/raise size that will cause the opponent to fold his entire range.
I haven't yet implemented this in a game yet, but am looking for the opportunity.
Is anyone here doing these massive overbets/raises on the rivers to get these kinds of folds?
Yes. Just made a thread where I did this.
I've been watching some Hungry Horse Poker YouTube videos, and he really emphasizes that when an opponent's range is capped you can find a bet/raise size that will cause the opponent to fold his entire range.
I haven't yet implemented this in a game yet, but am looking for the opportunity.
Is anyone here doing these massive overbets/raises on the rivers to get these kinds of folds?
I'm struggling to remember a recent hand where I made a massive over-bet or raise on the river with a bluff. I have made some stupid-small raises on the river with bluffs, which have mostly gotten through, and I'm pretty pleased with myself for pulling them off.
Marc is a big proponent for sizing up or down on the river based on V's likely range, but betting the same size on the turn with both value and bluffs. Like, he'll go 1/3-1/2 flop, 1/2 or over-bet turn, and then big or small depending on if he wants calls or folds and how strong V is likely to be.
I've definitely been putting in some big over-bets and raises on the turn, with both value and bluffs. I'm not sure it makes as much sense with value though, because opponents in my games just seem to over-fold to the over-size turn bet or raise.
It seems like I'm just letting them off the hook when I have value, and not getting that extra bit of value from my bluffs, because they're not calling turn and folding river, just folding turn.
I don't want to challenge Marc, when he's been more successful than I've been, but my personal experience recently is that sizing up with value on the turn hasn't worked out as well as sizing up with bluffs.
I've definitely been putting in some big over-bets and raises on the turn, with both value and bluffs. I'm not sure it makes as much sense with value though, because opponents in my games just seem to over-fold to the over-size turn bet or raise.
It seems like I'm just letting them off the hook when I have value, and not getting that extra bit of value from my bluffs, because they're not calling turn and folding river, just folding turn.
I don't want to challenge Marc, when he's been more success
Although I don't really understand the math, I know that overbetting on the turn with both value and bluffs allows us to bluff with a greater ratio than the standard turn ratio of 1:1.
Is it possible you're not bluffing enough on the turn when you overbet?
Although I don't really understand the math, I know that overbetting on the turn with both value and bluffs allows us to bluff with a greater ratio than the standard turn ratio of 1:1.
Is it possible you're not bluffing enough on the turn when you overbet?
"Enough" meaning a large enough over-bet when I'm bluffing, or bluffing often enough when I'm over-betting? I think I may be betting turn too often in general, for any size, and not checking back enough.
I'm thinking about instances when I'm semi-bluffing or betting with thin value, get check-raised, and have to fold. Also thinking about instances when I'm betting with showdown value, get called, and have to figure out what to do on the river when opponents donk on a brick, or check again on nut-changing river.
But when I over-bet, my sizing is generally the same whether I'm value betting or bluffing. I just think the size may be too large, especially when the pots are smaller. Like, in a recent hand, I turned trips, checked to my opponent, he bet $50 into $100, and I raised to $300. I can't be sure, but I think he may have folded top 2P, based on the way he tanked and how disgusted he seemed when he mucked.
It feels good when I'm bluffing and they fold, but the point is that we want them to call the turn, whether we're bluffing or value betting, and fold the river when we're bluffing. So I have to be missing some value if they're over-folding the turn. I'm not always getting value when I have it, and I'm not always getting them to put in that second call when I'm bluffing.
I may be wrong, but my sense of things is that low stakes players tend to be more price sensitive facing a big bet on the turn than Marc at Hungry Horse makes them out to be in his videos.
I think it's just a matter of calibration, where I just need to keep dialing it back until I find the bet size that gets called more often. Instead of x/r'ing to $300 in the hand above, I could have made it $150 or $200, and gotten called more often.
