It went to SD and villain had AA. I believe I misplayed the hand on the river. My justification at the time of calling was that I was at the top of my range (which isn't true, since I have KJ and some sets) and that he could be bluffing a missed flush draw (also less true because of my blockers). And I did not take into account villain's HUD stats of river AFq 17% and PFR of 10% (and probably even lower UTG).

When we 3b PF and he 4b what do we do?

I think 10% UTG is being very generous considering his overall PFR is 10% and 221 hands is enough for this to have converged.

If we choose an opening range more like 6% (88+, ATs+, KQs, AQo+) then the math will work out as follows:

UTG opens to 3.5
We 3B to 11 in BB
UTG 4B to 30 (because he potted pre, let's say he pot 4-bets)
We 5B jam to 100

Since he's so tight let's assume that he doesn't have a 4B bluffing range per se but rather defends 100% of his 4-betting range (which he'll have to do because he comitted himself with his pot 4B). We'll define his 4B/call range as JJ+, AK+ (1.8%). Our equity vs. this range is 42.8%

So our EV for 3-bet/5-bet jamming is thus: (4.2/6)*(3.5+0.5+11)+(1.8/6)*(0.428*200) = $96.1

I know there are a lot of assumptions here but this goes to show that a 3-bet/5-bet strategy is at best only breaking even/slightly losing vs. a really tight opponent. 

Whereas if we flat pre-flop, we can get into a situation where villain puts money in when he's much further behind. Looking back at that 6% range, we still have ATs-AQs/AQo (18 combos) which we can dominate when we flop an Ace, KQs (3 combos) which we can dominate when we flop a King...

Hey Bdon22,

I like the math, but we can't tell enough about his UTG range in less than 40 hands (221/6) to say he is at 6%. Does he have a limping range? If he doesn't then its almost impossible for him to be tight enough to get to 6%. 

Also its break even to get all in against the worst case scenario. Every other situation its positive EV.  We make more money against his 3-bet flatting range than we do against his betting ranges. We hit one of the best flops for this hand and we are going to have to fold the river, so we can't possibly be making a ton of money postflop with this hand. 

Can you explain this calculation to me. I am getting a different result????

(4.2/6)*(3.5+0.5+11)+(1.8/6)*(0.428*200) = 0,7*15 + 0,3*85,6 = 10,5 + 25,68=36,18

Also there is a mistake JJ+, AK+is actually 3% not 1,8%

About the situation it is true that the sample is small, but I don't think that the numbers will change much, even if we hypothetically assume this are his actual stats, than I would assume his 4b/call range to be much tighter something like QQ+ perhaps even without AK. I think it might be more profitable for us to 3b PF and play against his flatting range and just exploitably fold to his 4b. What do you think about this?

@guljo

bdon probably got 1.8% of hands by removing combo's as he has an A and K in his hand.

@Tyler 

I disagree that 3betting is mandatory, or even the best play. When you say 'we dominate his 3b/flatting range' I don't think this is really the case... If villain does infact open 10% of hands to 3.5x and we 3bet to 11x his MDF is only 33% or 3.3% of hands. This would mean the only hand in his flatting range we dominate is 3combo's of AQs. Considering we don't do great when 4bet why shouldn't we take flops instead and keep in all his weaker Ax/Kx hands and XXss combo's ?

I'm saying it doesn't happen enough to matter. We have 23% equity against a range of AA and KK. If we go allin preflop we are risking 54 dollars to win 5. We need this to work 9 in 10 times to show a profit. It works 19/20.  

If we can open jam over his raise profitably, sure we can 3-bet profitably? ? ? ? 

@guljo, are you suggesting we 3bet/fold it?

So to avoid tough spots just get it in preflop which is likely 0EV at best?

@toothpaste 

We dominate him a lot more by flatting than we do 3betting, and if you assume he is not folding KQo on this flop how can you argue flatting is not best? When we 3bet we are bloating the pot oop vs a continuing range that we are about 45% against. Say we 3bet and it comes Kxx, what do we even get 3streets from? Then on Axx we stack 2combos of AQs?

Given we assume villain isn't likely to be the toughest of players why are we worried about being stuck 'holding our dick in our hands?'. Given his stats and AFq it is pretty likely we are likely exploiting him folding this river.

@okaygo

3 betting is not 0EV, its going to be +EV. The problem is everyone gets upset when we get 4 bet because then they wish they would have called instead. But we cant argue that flatting is better simply because we dont wanna be upset the times he 4 bets.

I think we are going to be slightly ahead of his range that calls a 3 bet (we are going to have around 54% equity vs a range JJ-77 AQs, AJs, KQs, and some combos of JTs QJs). 

I agree we are prolly exploiting him by folding the river (its actually prolly pretty close to 0EV tho), but hes exploiting us all the times the board bricks and we end up c/f. Since we dont flop an A or K very often when hes holding one, this is going to be a lot.

Im not trying to argue flatting is -EV or something, obviously its not. I'm arguing 3 betting is better, and I'm doing it prolly over aggressively just because I think the "we should just flat because it sucks to get 4 bet" logic is far to prevalent and not the right way to look at situations. 

okaygo, youre forgetting all the ev of 3 betting and barelling him of 55-JJ with runouts. where if you flat you are the one with your dick in your hand getting barelled because its very rare to reverse dominate him by both flopping an K or an A.  

Toothpaste,

I'm not just flatting because it sucks to get 4bet, I'm flatting because we don't do great vs his continuing range - whether he calls or 4bets. 

I open 14% UTG and don't defend AJs, KQs vs BB 3bet so I doubt a 17/10 is going to. 

It sounds like you guys are saying 3betting is best just so we at least have some fold equity. But the thing is if he is opening 10% and we 3bet, that means he needs to fold JJ pre for us to make any EV from preflop fold equity. If he over defends with 50%, AND always 4bets KK+ we still only have 49% vs his flatting range, so we can't count this as a value 3bet either. We are just bloating the pot oop.

We don't just lose the pot every time an A or K doesn't come off by flatting either. There's going to be a lot of boards better for our range than his since he is so tight. 

HOTSANDWICH,

I'm not forgetting, I just don't think there is much. He likely doesn't even open 55 pre so he won't be defending it. Although flopping something to reverse dominate him is rare it happens a lot more often than we dominate him after 3betting. 

Look, there are merits to flatting and I do it about 1/3 of time.  an opponent who isnt strong enough to open 55 utg is exactly the type of opponent you want to bluff off a range of 77-JJ here.  Im much more inclined to flat an AKo which will give us less barrell opportuities and protect us on A high and K high flops.  AND if you show this AKs down you will never be able to 3 bet bluff small suited aces ever again in this spot.  To sum it up, if you show this down and your 3 bet in this spot exceeds 3% you are going to get 4bet to death.  

A lot of very good regs fold 22 - 55 UTG. I'm not suggesting we flat this vs everybody, I'm saying flat is better than 3b vs this guy... As for us not being able to 3bet bluff after this I don't think that is worth thinking about considering how little this spot comes up where a 17/11 opens UTG, and everyone folds to us in the BB and we have one of our 3b bluff candidates. 

EDIT: we probably don't even want 3bet bluffs vs this guy, he is never folding > 67% that we need him to. 

When I talk about poker now a days it really is more about gto.   but in this example vs this guy why not 3 bet all AKs and flat 1/3 to 1/2 of AKo combos?    Seems pretty reasonable for all the merits stated for such a simple spot and for such a weak opponent.    I would say this spot comes up a shit ton, especially if your playing 4k hands per day.  youd be likely to see this spot dozens of times in a week.