NL50 - Was I too much of a nit here?

gotta fold the turn against this guy I guess but I'd bet more on turn

I would say definite fold on turn unless you have a pretty good read on him that he is going to bluff this way. I feel like if you are going to call the turn then you should call river too to completely own his bluffs when you have that read, and calling turn to fold river is just losing the max, imo.

I'd bet $11 on turn so you can put him awwwwwwin on a good river
also agree with the fold to turn raise folks.

you both are not deep, he has like $61. So just keep value betting normally. I agree with JoeDeertay's post. Why did you call the turn raise? Is it because you think your hand is better, then the river is an auto call.

Calling and hoping people check is not a good feeling.

fold turn because few people are gonna bluff raise turn and give up, so theres no point in calling it to begin with.

I agree with DooMeR, but I would bet turn bigger (probably about $12) as more value is always nice and it sets up a nicer river shove if we choose to take that route.

Maybe I misread but I thought you said he's a sick nit so I don't understand how people want to bet turn bigger to get it in on a blank river or whatever, I even doubt you are getting paid off by AQ, I'd rather check the turn to keep in the occassional AQ and ATs and shit like that and bet for value on a good river for value. Not much draws out to protect yourself from (at least, not any draws he is playing, this guy is folding any gutshot so basically draws would just be combodraws for this dude) and why bloat a pot when you probably won't get value from worse anyways from this guy, at least not by betting all streets...

Please, can somebody tell me if I'm being a huge nit for checking the turn here or not ??

Ooooh btw, as played I definitly fold the turn, he is never bluffing you here, or at least not nearly enough and if he is, he's not giving up on the river enough...

the thing is I don't know enough about the villain. I've seen some people take this line with AK as well and TPTK. They call flop, raise turn, and get it in.

Anyways I think it's a leak here by me because if I'm calling the turn I need to be calling the river. Otherwise just fold the turn.

I have this problem with TPTK type hands because sometimes I don't know where I'm at when facing returned aggression. I'm either slightly ahead or far behind.

Kilay, I really hate checking turn. It just lets him take the action away with so many hands, and you have no clue where you stand when he raises turn.

Co-incidently, I like his line as a bluff 8D

On October 10 2008 06:52 Artanis[Xp] wrote: Kilay, I really hate checking turn. It just lets him take the action away with so many hands, and you have no clue where you stand when he raises turn.

He can't c/r the turn if you aren't betting it...

check the turn imo

edit: there aren't many 16/13 6-max players giving you 3 streets here. the only hand you beat is AQ and he's ahead of you with 66/JJ/AJ/AA and splitting with AK. he's probably folding AQ a lot of the time against either a turn bet or a third barrel on the river, so just content yourself to get a 2nd street on the river.

his range is probably dominated by 66/JJ/AQ with some AA AK AJ depending on his pf tendencies. if you could eliminate the possibility of AJ/JJ/AK/AA based on his pf tendencies and also be sure that he went 3 streets w/ AQ then betting the turn has a lot of merit. but i think that these things are very often untrue of 16/13 NL50 players

I would have thought an NL50 regular/nit would be far more predictable than one at midstakes.

Therefore I believe we can eliminate the possibility of AA and JJ a very large % of the time. They will be in there sometimes, but not enough to really include in your range. AA only has 1 combo anyway, even before we discount the possibility of him 3betting it preflop. JJ will still be in there, but probably only a combo-combo and a half at a guess. It is a good spot to flat with JJ, but does a random NL50 nit recognise that? His 16/13 stats imply that he is raising preflop if he is getting involved at all.

So really, given the flop, the only possible hands we're beaten by with any kind of frequency are 66 and AJ (will he even call preflop with AJo in the BB after your UTG raise? His stats suggest he wont. AJs perhaps is likely.) He will also likely play this range rather predictably by either check/raising flop or check/raising turn. Nits do not in general slowplay hands on 3 streets. Therefore if we bet flop and bet turn and do not get check/raised, there is a very decent chance we are still ahead and beating a random AQ/ATs/JTs/QJs, etc. Unless we have specifically noticed that this player either a) will fold AQ on this board for a shove on river, which obviously means we're never getting paid by worse, or b) can slowplay sets/two pair 3 streets, there is at least some chance we're going to get paid on the river and its going to be +EV. Betting flop+turn and not being check/raised leaves us in a situation where against this player, we are either winning or splitting like 95%+ of the time. He only needs to call with a very small amount of worse stuff to make a river shove +EV. We could also not shove but instead bet half pot or so if we think that will be more +EV, and a bigger turn bet makes a river half pot bet bigger too.

It is the pure nature of the board that makes going for maximum value here so strong. Once the flop comes down, given his preflop range, we are winning an insane % of the time. Once he calls a flop bet, we are still winning or splitting an insane % of the time. If the flop was A98r it would be very different.

Also I think overestimating peoples postflop-folding ability based purely off of their 16/13 preflop stats is a rather large leak. Folding AQo to lazymej's turn bet is nigh on impossible on that turn card unless he has a pretty sick read. Having a final bet thrown at you on a random blank river is not the nicest spot to be in either, do not discount the possibility of being called. You may not call turn/call river with AQo here (I likely wouldn't call river either), but that is not important. Will a random 50NL regular call? We don't know unless we bet .

Edit: I am not saying we should stack off here given his turn raise - we should fold. My argument was for valuebetting turn+most rivers if called due to the very small # of combos that beat us and not ruling out the fact that AQo (or even worse, everybody gets suspicious) will pay turn+river. Once he check/raises turn however, his range is normally narrowed to precisely the stuff that beats us and what would be a VERY strange bluff on this board (what did he call with on flop?).

On October 10 2008 12:13 FC wrote: I would have thought an NL50 regular/nit would be far more predictable than one at midstakes. Therefore I believe we can eliminate the possibility of AA and JJ a very large % of the time. They will be in there sometimes, but not enough to really include in your range. AA only has 1 combo anyway, even before we discount the possibility of him 3betting it preflop. JJ will still be in there, but probably only a combo-combo and a half at a guess. It is a good spot to flat with JJ, but does a random NL50 nit recognise that? His 16/13 stats imply that he is raising preflop if he is getting involved at all. So really, given the flop, the only possible hands we're beaten by with any kind of frequency are 66 and AJ (will he even call preflop with AJo in the BB after your UTG raise? His stats suggest he wont. AJs perhaps is likely.) He will also likely play this range rather predictably by either check/raising flop or check/raising turn. Nits do not in general slowplay hands on 3 streets. Therefore if we bet flop and bet turn and do not get check/raised, there is a very decent chance we are still ahead and beating a random AQ/ATs/JTs/QJs, etc. Unless we have specifically noticed that this player either a) will fold AQ on this board for a shove on river, which obviously means we're never getting paid by worse, or b) can slowplay sets/two pair 3 streets, there is at least some chance we're going to get paid on the river and its going to be +EV. Betting flop+turn and not being check/raised leaves us in a situation where against this player, we are either winning or splitting like 95%+ of the time. He only needs to call with a very small amount of worse stuff to make a river shove +EV. We could also not shove but instead bet half pot or so if we think that will be more +EV, and a bigger turn bet makes a river half pot bet bigger too. It is the pure nature of the board that makes going for maximum value here so strong. Once the flop comes down, given his preflop range, we are winning an insane % of the time. Once he calls a flop bet, we are still winning or splitting an insane % of the time. If the flop was A98r it would be very different. Also I think overestimating peoples postflop-folding ability based purely off of their 16/13 preflop stats is a rather large leak. Folding AQo to lazymej's turn bet is nigh on impossible on that turn card unless he has a pretty sick read. Having a final bet thrown at you on a random blank river is not the nicest spot to be in either, do not discount the possibility of being called. You may not call turn/call river with AQo here (I likely wouldn't call river either), but that is not important. Will a random 50NL regular call? We don't know unless we bet . Edit: I am not saying we should stack off here given his turn raise - we should fold. My argument was for valuebetting turn+most rivers if called due to the very small # of combos that beat us and not ruling out the fact that AQo (or even worse, everybody gets suspicious) will pay turn+river. Once he check/raises turn however, his range is normally narrowed to precisely the stuff that beats us and what would be a VERY strange bluff on this board (what did he call with on flop?).

awesome post. i'm so happy to see someone elaborate so fully on their thoughts.

i think we've all gotta agree that folding the turn is the only way to proceed after he raises us, but a way more interesting question for me is whether we should v-bet the turn against a player with these stats on this board. we're PROBABLY cbetting the flop with 100% of our range, but how we play the turn is very sensitive imo. i agree we're way ahead of his range even if he is a 16/13 (would be great to see his 3bet %) and but his range for continuing on the flop is probably, as you said, JTs, JQs, AQ, ATs (that we're ahead of) He's not always 3betting JJ here imo (unless we know more about his 3bet % i think it's safe to assume that many NL50 TAGs who err on the side of being more tight are gonna prefer to flat JJ here). so his range we're LIKELY behind is probably JJ, 66, and of course if we're including ATs in the range we're ahead of we have to include AT LEAST AJs in the range we're behind.

ahead: JTs, JQs, AQ, ATs.
behind: 66, JJ, AJs, possibly AA (probably 3betted pf)
split: AK (probably 3betted pf though)

with those ranges a turn vbet is probably folding JTs, JQs and most of the time ATs. it MAY fold AQ because depending on our stats and whether or not the tight TAG is a thinking player, b/c would you be betting the turn w/ anything less than AJ/AK/AA/JJ/AQ/66 against this guy? he's gotta feel he's at the VERY bottom of your range with AQ. so if he's continuing with AQ, ESPECIALLY for 3 streets it's a cry call and not happening 100% of the time in a vacuum. thus i really don't see us extracting a lot of value with a turn bet that we couldn't get from a river bet, and by extension we probably get value out of nothing with a river bet if we bet the turn (because the only remaining hand is AQ and that's seriously an unthinking player or a major cry call)

so instead doesn't it make more sense to check the turn and extract maximum value from JTs/JQs/ATs/AQ by checking the turn and calling or betting the river?

check turn

Yeah check turn, value bet river is fine here. Probably call a river bet too.

If you bet turn and get Checkraised, you are either folding right there or calling and planning to call a river shove.

I personally don't mind betting the turn though cause I've run into nits like that giving 3 streets with AQ.

Good post failsafe.

My initial instinct when I first read the handhistory was to check behind turn and call a riverbet/bet myself, so I am absolutely not thinking betting turn is 100% correct, good to have a discussion!

I think against a decentish regular at midstakes, with no history, checking turn is definitely correct for all the reasons stated. Against him, we will sometimes be bluffed/valueraised off of the best hand on the turn, and he is not likely to call turn+river with a wide range that we beat, ever. Therefore we are likely to only get 1 more bet in general, and the river is the best place to get it as it is probably more likely to get a call from a random J (probably, our line might actually look like a completely standard pot-control-top-pair line and he will probably fold river anyway).

Against a random 50NL regular though, I don't think these things apply. I havn't played at 50NL at a while, but I am fairly certain we do not ever need to worry about a nitty regular there check/raising turn as a bluff with either air or a picked up flush draw+pair. It just will not happen. Therefore if we get check/raised on turn, fine, we pitch the hand being VERY certain we are beat and not taking the opportunity to check behind/see showdown for one bet on river did not cost us anything. Seeing a showdown vs a hand that beats us is not worth much, the bonus to seeing a showdown is that you cannot be bluffed. Against this guy, we are not going to be bluffed anyway. Checking behind against the 400NL regular is to stop him from occasionally taking away pots on the turn with random stuff, where he is still not doing it enough to warrant a calldown. He is allowed to get away with some bluffs that we just cannot call down against lest we pay off his far more likely good hands. Against the 50NL guy, his range is like 100% value, 0% bluff, always.

He will also call down sometimes with AQ or even worse! The reason he is on $50 tables is either because hes a busto high stakes shark rebuilding because he needed to withdraw everything to pay for a kidney transplant, or more likely, hes just not that good yet. He will make mistakes. I am not saying hes awful, but the average skill level on these forums, even 50NL players on these forums, is likely considerably better than random people that are attempting to play OK having read an Ed Miller book a week or two ago. Just because you can correctly come to the conclusion that AQ is likely not good on the river in this spot doesn't mean he can.

The final point is that he will turn his hand face up with his turn play. If he check/raises, he has 66, AJ, JJ, etc, we fold. If he check/calls, we are winning a very high % of the time an thus have the opportunity to go for a third street, if we want. We do not always have to bet turn and follow it up with a river bet, checking behind river will often be the best thing to do based on his timing/the river card. I just think allowing ourselves to set up a situation where we can correctly make yet another +EV decision (for a large bet) on the river using our superior judgement has to be pretty powerful. I guess I am saying that a turn bet has to be +EV over the long run unless the guy will literally fold virtually all worse, although likely by not quite as much as a bet on river having checked turn would be, but this is made up for by the fact that we have the opportunity to make yet another +EV play on river should we decide a river bet will be +EV. Its very important to remember that betting turn/folding to check/raise has not lost us any more than checking behind turn, calling river would have done. We are losing 100% of the time both when we call on river and get shown a better hand, and when we bet on turn and get check raised.

I hope im making some sense! I repeat that my initial instinct vs a good, solid player was to check behind turn, but then thought about this alternative given that the guy looks like a standard low-limit, predictable regular.

lol why would you check the turn? 16/13 (probably way too small sample size anyway) doesnt tell us too much about him. people are bad at this level, I bet for value all day - easy game

On October 10 2008 13:21 [vital]Myth wrote: check turn

Ty for confirming that my initial plan about checking the turn was probably right.