Go for thin value?

First, I'd bet more OTT on this wet board. AP, I can see an argument for b/f. You're shallow enough that V shouldn't be bluffing, like ever, if he raises, and you'll get some crying calls. I wouldn't hate a check/eval, tbqh.

You don't understand poker rights. If you hold AA, you have a right to the pot. You have KK? Unless an A flops, you have a right to the pot. You can't fold once you have poker rights. /s

I played this week at Vegas Shoe, 1/3 but mostly 2/3. I watched people exercise their rights to the pot repeatedly, regardless of board texture and action, insisting that the poker gods uphold what is just and fair.

My biggest won pots were taken from people who wanted to show me how much their rights had been violated.

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I won a pretty big pot in my last session when I rivered a straight with a SC to crack AA. Dude took it better than many would have.

I was a tad surprised to see his hand. I expected at least 2P. I guess he just had to see it.

I won a very small pot taking it down pre with AA. Someone at the table made the predictable "win a small one or lose a big one" comment.

Meh. If you get upset about losing with AA, you're more than welcome at my table.

In my experience, they are not watching you to see how you react, it’s a big drama thing acting like about to bet big, then check. Trying to scare you I guess.

It’s a sign of weakness most of the time.

You gave villain too good of a price on the turn, so he could have been checking if his flush draw was still there - and maybe considering raising with it. Being priced in negates the population trend of being weak with a chip grab.

What bet-size will villain use if he hits and you check to him? If villain misses and you check to him, will he bluff? Could villain think the flush hit you? It sounds like he’s not in a great emotional state to play solid poker.

A check doesn’t seem great and a small bet might just induce. I think I would bet 120 (really should have bet that on the turn) kinda in line with your other bets. I see so many folds on the 3rd barrel (it looks very strong) so it would be a shame not to try it here. Even if he has a flush, he may just call. With nothing but a queen, he’s probably calling too.

Exactly what I was thinking. Half pot on turn I think he raises a straight. I think he raises sets on flop, maybe he cold calls waiting for turn to bump it up. But all those draws on flop and one other player to act. River I have to at least consider a bet or check/call.

I prefer to fold and not show (don't want people to know I'm weak tight) when my rights are violated.

This is what I was thinking. Maybe a QJ or Q10 that missed his draw but now has a pair that may or may not be good. But I told myself on the turn that a flush draw would have called quickly.

I don't understand this statement.

I guess he would go big if he hits. But what does he consider big? a pot sized shove? half pot? I know we might consider a half pot bet a medium sized bet, but at these stakes the actual size would be considered quite large. In an earlier hand at a previous table I semibluffed $65 into a $100 pot and he raised to $205. I folded figured he had a set. Will he bluff if he misses? He seems like the type that would if there's a good chance to get through. But here I don't think he will. Will he bluff the flush? or a four straight? Idk, maybe.

I was thinking this too.

What other bets? Are you talking about other hands I posted? Which bet is the third barrel?

None of this is criticism. Just observation. There are a number of things working against you here, which combine to make this hand harder to play.

You're multi-way and OOP, first to act. Doesn't matter what you have or what the board is. That's always going to make it hard to realize and extract max value.

It's just not a great flop for over-pairs. All the sets are in our opponents' ranges, as well as top 2P, and a metric $hlt-ton of draws. In loose-passive low stakes games, someone could randomly show up with 93 or 83.

We can blast off and bet huge to charge the draws. But then they just slow play all their 2P+.

Any card from a 5 to a Q, another 3, and any spade are all nut-changing cards. We'll also hate seeing an ace. That's 47 cards. We're going to hate around 80%-85% of turns. Even a bricky offsuit 4 or 2, while completely safe, doesn't help us if we're facing 2P+ from the flop.

Even if we see the situation clearly on the flop, it's difficult to quickly adjust the expectations we had when we looked down and saw KK pre. Most people would try to get value, yet without value owning themselves, which is pretty hard to do here.

Betting small on the flop doesn't define our opponents' ranges much, other than possibly lowering the likelihood of 2P/sets when they just flat call. But even if we take those hands out of their range, they're still left with all the draws and worse 1P hands that will improve on a ton of turns.

The starting stack depth is also a limiting factor. We're not deep enough to put in multiple normal size bets and then abort mission on bad run-outs, nor will we be able to generate much fold equity if we decide to turn our hand into a bluff on the river, unless it gets checked through on flop or turn.

They may not always raise with straights on the turn. They might not raise JTcc or JTss. If I'm dialed in with my reads and ranging of my opponents, I might not raise any JT combos. Sometimes they miss that there are flush draws available. Even good players sometimes overlook aspects of board texture.

They probably won't raise 2P or sets on the turn when the straight comes in. If they do, their raise sizing may not tell us much. The fact that V flat calls flop and turn doesn't make me super confident about going for thin value on the river.

A big river bet mostly just gets worse to fold and better to call. A small bet looks like thin value and induces some raises. There's almost no size we can bet that won't lead to us getting a good price to call if we get raised.

We could play our hand like a bluff-catcher by check-evaluating flop, if not every street. It sounds weak, but other than spiking one of the two remaining K's on the turn, we'll just be guessing what to do, when we may have been behind on the flop. We benefit from having some more info, and seeing what our opponents do when we check.

I think checking range on the flop is fine. We can have 99/88/98, all the over-pairs, JTs, and the NFD in range, making it dangerous for the draws to start bluffing. Checking forces our opponents to make difficult decisions. Alternatively, we might bet really small on every street, to make our opponents decide how to respond. I like that better than my earlier suggestion to bet larger on the flop.

You'd have to be very confident in your read to go for thin value by betting again on the river. V already called three bets. It's hard for him to call another with very many worse hands. We'd mostly just be targeting QX, and QX can make some disciplined folds to a triple barrel.

You'd also have to be dialed in to check-call a big bet. I think all his QX would be happy to check it back, unless he's capable of deducing that he needs to turn QX into a bluff. Are you calling if he jams?

We don't beat much if any value that bets river if we check. It's hard to find his pure bluffs. He'd have to turn something with SDV into a bluff. Most low stakes opponents won't do that when they're IP, because they can just check it back and muck if we roll over a better hand.

In your spot, I'd be hating life every time it was my turn to act. I'd probably just be checking every time, calling small bets and over-folding to big bets, praying for it to get checked back at some point.

I told myself that V didn’t have a flush draw and had a weak holding based off of the “timing tell” on the turn. I also told myself to bet if the flush came in.

But I saw the spade on the river and chickened out and checked. V quickly checked. I fast rolled and he seemed unhappy that I had Kings and mucked.

I agree with docvail that this is a tricky board for Kings, which is why I posted the hand. But when is a player suppose to play the board and the situation and when are they suppose to play off of their reads. I thought he had a pair of queens, maybe he flopped top pair and was unhappy with the queen OTT. How much would he call in this situation if at all? Absolute sizes are important at these stakes. He was unhappy calling $60. Half pot or one third maybe too much.

Seriously, you can just call me "doc". Everyone does. Save yourself the effort of typing those last four letters.

I was thinking about "thin value" as a concept after I posted today. I was trying to think of situations where going for thin value is usually a good play, and situations where it isn't.

I'd think it would be fine if V check-called flop and turn from OOP and the draws all bricked. But when we're OOP with an over-pair on a three-flush / three-straight board, going for three streets seems too thin, IMO.