Full house decision

I like the flop lead for a good size.

I get your reasons for betting small on the turn, but I think you can go more like 60 here without worrying about any hero folds.

I think you've triggered a small value/protection raise here. V does not want to allow you to see the river for this price, in case you have a draw. So I think he is hoping to go check/check on the river.

I would worry about hero folds if you shipped it here. I'd like to call here, then ship it on the river. Hopefully the river is a blank and he can put you on a missed draw and find the call. Maybe if obvious draws hit, you could just lead small, hoping for a crying call.

This is a raise or fold pf. Yeah, I know you're going to tell me it was just 1 more, but it ended up being 11 more. If you were going to pay that much, you'd be better off raising that folding.

Rather c/r than donk bet into 4 people. If your goal was to start building a pot, betting small on the turn was a bad way to do it. Once raised, I'd click it back to set up an easy shove on the river.

I’d click it back to 120 on the turn. No way V folds for 40 more.

Then even a river bet of 60-80 gets called most of the time.

The turn click back may even get him to shove

Grunch:

PRE - seems okay, if a tad loose-passive.

FLOP - in this configuration, with the PFR next to act, and three people behind him, I think it may be better to go for a check-raise, not donk lead.

TURN - I wouldn't rule out that V has KK when we lead out into four people for a large size on the flop. Our donk looks pretty strong. Obviously we can't fold this hand when we get here this way, but his min-click is somewhat concerning.

With only $173 left behind, and $282 in the pot if we call, we'll only have a 1/2 pot size bet remaining going to the river. I think we can just ship it here, and pray he has AKss or AJ that just can't find the fold.

Make it 150 ship every river easy game.

I see your point, but the solution isn't to overcall and play Bingo, it's to raise to something they won't call. I mean, if you've Aces here, are they still all calling? (Yeah, card removal, but still...) Are you thrilled when they do?

So raise to like 20 or more. Folding to a 3! from the typical LL crowd. When H gets 3! from the BB, fold happily to their JJ+/AK and save whatever you ended up losing to their KK. This is a thread, after all.

AP, we can go from worst position to best relative position by starting with a check. If H was trying to freeze action with a small donk---like we wanted a cheap draw to clubs here---OK, but far prefer letting pf aggressor fire, get whatever calls from the other three limp/callers, then bet bigly with our top two.

If V has the one combo of KK that kills us, it's a cooler at 150 bb. But we could've avoided it pf.

As others said, preflop is bad both times.

On the upside, flop lead is worse than preflop.

Turn is whatever, wouldn't be shocked if V has KK/KJ/66 but we aren't folding. Difficult to tell if min raise, shove or call is better.

I don't mind completing getting 9/1. Most of the time BB taps the table and you have a chance of flopping two pairs or a straight draw, or at least TP with a dodgy kicker.

But when it gets raised and everyone calls you're now only getting 5/1 and everyone likes their hand. Now top pair will be no bueno so you need to flop two pair. Fold this time.

I like the flop lead, people will check a pair here so often and you might get raised.

The pissy little turn bet is a bit weak. I'd probably go big or check-raise now.

As played I don't mind either stuffing it or clicking back.

Maybe he raises AK/AA and maybe he doesn't ... but he's almost certainly going to bet them. So if you x/r you get two bets in anyway.

The first problem is when V has AQ/QQ and was going to bet to charge draws/Jx/etc. and is blocking KQ and AK is unlikely ... but sees a donk lead and just sigh folds.
Or when he has TT/99 and was thinking of betting anyway, but now just folds.
Or if V has KQ/QTs and decides to just call, when he'd obviously bet.

The absolute worst problem is if V works out that you'd mostly raise AK/KQ/QTs preflop and you aren't donking QTo enough, so now your donking range is roughly KJ and 66 and he should just sigh fold AA.

GTO only ever donk leads when the board is significantly better for your range than V's range. KJ6 two tone isn't even close to that.
Then if you look at something like SB vs. BB; preflop: open limp; raise; call. Flop: 872. Now SB does donk lead _some_ 87s (doesn't even have 87o and it still checks 68% of the time), but then you look at the rest of the range donk leading ... it's doing it with A8s/T6s as much as 87s. Then there's a bunch of QTs/Q9s/JTs/J9s/T9s/99 which leads almost as much, and then the "looks insane" less often leads like A7o/K6s/Q6s/86s/85s. So it's super difficult to implement well even then.

Lots of people say "GTO is bad for low stakes" but then do stuff like this which GTO is never doing, and the exploit you are targeting by deviating so much from "correct" is not clear (esp. for this size).

I wouldn't say gto is useless at low stakes, but I doubt V is betting QQ 5 ways.

i doubt completing pre is that bad and its actually what id do because i dont like playing big pots with this hand OOP. id rather just complete, have the flop be some J-rag-rag or K-rag-rag, check the flop, and start bluff catching. because of this, i dont think calling the pf raise is a good idea though. because now you have 5 way raise pot OOP with a hand that makes weak hands.

as played i cr the flop.

H thinks V has something strong like Jx. Maybe a flush draw.

H shoves. V quickly calls and shows Ac6c. He seems unhappy when he sees my hand.

Turn is the 10c. He tells the dealer he made his flush. Dealer informs him H has a full house. I think the poor guy actually thought he had a winner at first.

I was conflicted about making this post. I thought it might be a full house with an obvious decision. But it gives me a lot to think over concerning pre and flop play.

For the people that said to c/r the flop. How do you know that someone will bet? If checked threw how do u play later streets?

First off - nice hand. Glad you won.

Secondly, and more importantly - the answers to your questions come down to hand-reading, or range-reading, which is usually / generally going to flow from using basic logic...

PRE - with four limpers, most low stakes players holding a big PP are going to open for a large size, especially when they're in the blinds and will likely have to play the rest of the hand OOP. What constitutes a "large" size depends on the game and table dynamics, so you have to use your best judgment. If the normal open in this game is $6 or $8, then V's open to $12 might be considered "big", but at most 1/2 games, this $12 sizing wouldn't typically indicate a premium starting hand like AA/KK. It can't be ruled out completely, but it would seem less likely.

FLOP - there are two Broadway cards and a FDFD on board. If the PFR has AA, any KX, QJs (especially QJcc), or the NFD, he's very likely to bet. At low stakes, many opponents will float too wide, especially when in position, so when V bets, there's a good chance one or more opponents will call, and we can put in a check-raise.

There's also a chance someone will raise, which wouldn't be the worst thing for us, though it would make the situation more interesting, and our decision about how to respond more debatable.

If the PFR doesn't bet, there's a good chance someone else will, because the board is so wet and dynamic, and the texture is so good for the PFR's range. When the PFR checks rather than c-bets, many low stakes recs are going to read that as weakness, and start betting with thin value (for "protection"), or they may start a bluff with their draws.

If the PFR was in late position, and there were limpers in between us, it would make sense to donk out on the flop with our hand, to get called by the limpers. We don't care if the PFR LOL-folds to our donk.

But when the PFR is in early position, and the limpers are behind, we'd rather check, to go for the check-raise. We want him to c-bet and get some calls, so that we can isolate that dead money with our check-raise.

One of the problems with donking here, especially multi-way, and for a somewhat large size, is it looks so strong. We're basically playing face-up. This large donk basically announces we have a strong hand. If the PFR has KK here, he may call to trap, or he may raise, and put us in the blender.

Flop donks in HU pots are usually weak hands trying to set their own price to continue. Think about how less frequently people are bluffing in multi-way pots, even when action checks to them. The flop donk in a multi-way pot, on a draw-heavy board, for a large size looks super-strong.

One of the limpers could easily show up with 66, and likewise trap by flat calling, or put us in the blender with a big raise. On such a draw-heavy board, it'll be hard to fold top 2P, no matter who raises. The PFR could be raising AA for protection against the draws. A limper could be raising with some sort of combo draw.

If the flop checks through, it's not the worst thing in the world. We can somewhat discount the likelihood that anyone has a very strong hand or a very good draw. That helps us to range them, and inform the line we take on the turn and river. On most turns, we're just going to start betting our hand for value, and we should get action, because our hand is under-repped.

A6cc is the absolute worst hand I'd expect anyone to have when raising here, and I'd usually expect that raise to come on the flop. If it comes on the turn, I'd only expect it when the flush comes in, or they make 2P if the turn is an ace. It's really fishy for him to make his raise on the turn, especially when he min-clicks it after the board pairs, and it looks like you're boated up.

His hand is just toast on the turn, and his draw is next to worthless, so he must be pretty bad. That, or maybe he figured you for a hand like QT, and was trying to do something fancy, like some sort of stop-and-go play.

The decision on the turn is kind of obvious. I mean - obviously we're never folding. If V has KK, he's just getting our money. The only question is the one you posed - should we flat call, or raise, and if we raise, what size should we take?

Intuitively, a 3B here probably seems too strong. But flatting can also look really strong, whereas raising can sometimes look like we're bluffing, or over-playing some hand with showdown or thin value.

If we flat call, and V is on a draw, we're not getting any more money if his draw bricks, whereas he might think he's getting the correct odds to call off a jam, so that's why I'd prefer to just jam here. Remember that V is the PFR, and he called our large flop donk next to act. He can have a lot of strong hands here - AA, AK, AJ, and apparently A6s!

Most of his range that calls flop and raises turn - even for a min-click - isn't folding to a jam, when he'll be getting almost 2.5 to 1 on a call, and we could have a TON of bluffs in our range when we jam here. Some low-stakes recs are going to spaz-jam when an opponent min-clicks them in this line.

We could have all the combos of QT, and if V doesn't have the Ac in his hand, we could have all the NFD's. We might just be blasting off with KX, especially a combo like KQ or KT, because we block QJ and JT.

Ultimately, you just need to look at the action, and connect the dots to put it all together - he raised pre out of the BB, called our big flop donk next to act, and raised turn. He's got a hand he likes enough to call our jam, or he's FOS and we've probably gotten all we're going to get out of him. Just jam and don't worry about the result.