blonde poker forum

This hand was played by a blonde who is in my PLO group for the pokerfarm. Our whole group has been talking about this on Skype for 2 days and opinions are split.

I'm not going to give away my opinions cos I don't wanna influence anyone's thinking.

***** Hand History for Game 2985382004 ***** (IPoker)
$200.00 USD PL Omaha - Sunday, October 16, 06:16:20 ET 2011
Table Fable (No DP 50 bb min) (Real Money)
Seat 6 is the button
Seat 1: ttttaatttt ( $250.60 USD )
Seat 3: Redwalked ( $258.24 USD )
Seat 5: Jahangir1111111 ( $256.45 USD )
Seat 6: POKERENCOREFAN ( $399.50 USD )
Seat 8: run8KK ( $201.00 USD )
Seat 10: IngaZaionts ( $169.27 USD )
run8KK posts small blind [$1.00 USD].
IngaZaionts posts big blind [$2.00 USD].
** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to POKERENCOREFAN [  Kd Kh 7s Ah ]
ttttaatttt folds
Redwalked raises [$7.00 USD]
POKERENCOREFAN calls [$7.00 USD]
run8KK folds
IngaZaionts calls [$5.00 USD]
** Dealing Flop ** [ Tc, Kc, 7h ]
IngaZaionts checks
Redwalked bets [$16.00 USD]
POKERENCOREFAN ?????

Ok so do we:

a) flat
b) raise. (If raise, please comment on your sizing).

What then is your plan for the following turns assuming they get checked into you.

a) 9d
b) Jc
c) Jd
d) 7s
e) 7c
f) 2s

Assume no knowledge or reads on opponent.

Raise to $40, fairly draw heavy board and we have the nuts..get plenty moneys in now.


A; Assuming it's checked to us I bet.
b); Meh, if checked to us I check. No need to over inflate the pot. Might call river depending on oppo and whether he bets into us.
c) I bet if checked to me. 89 (Assuming no clubs) should really not be in..GL to him if he is, he becomes my buddy)
d) YIPPPEEE!...always difficult this...I am never quite sure how to get paid..when I check back the fold when I bet on the turn and I think "OH cock, should have bet". Fine with either option TBH.
e) Same as D..more likely to check now though as he might bet into me on the river more.
f) Bet (Probably around 2/3rds of the pot)

any reason why we didn't 3bet pre? Redwalked is hardly a nit, I think this is defo a 3bet.

In a vacuum I think its a pretty easy raise OTF, for reasons Boldie states, however from a range perspective I think its really important to have sets in your range ON THE TURN after you've flatted, so when you have a weaker part of your range you cant get blown off so easy on board pairs/dry turns + you realise your equity with draws more often. however if I'm flatting sets in this spot I'd really prefer to flat TT than KK as there is a slighter higher chance we've coolered him when we have top set + on this exact board there are several draw combo's we can be raising  Ac Jc /  Ac Qc etc (or at least shoudl be raising if we wanna raise KK - although i have a feeling we might not be raising them as we didn;t 3bet pre here) so that might widen the range he stacks off here OTF.

SO i'd be flatting some but raising the majority of the time here, I'd say 75/25 in favor of raising, and prolly the reverse for TT - you will get a LOT of folds raising here though as his range is still pretty weak and we look very strong. I'd raise pot(ish) although in a vacuum 40-45 is prolly better.

Pot is $54 after we flat....

a) bet $36
b) check
c) bet $36, although its close to a check IMO
d) bet $32
e) bet $36
f) bet $44

When you raise on the flop, what size do you make it Dave?

Why do you choose 40 as your raise size Boldie?

:)

you dont 3bet this readless? shamefully nitty imo.

i would raise the pot. In a vacuum obv a smaller $45~ is better but pot reps a draw better imo, meaning weak draws fold a higher % and mid-strong made hands continue a higher %

I reckon $40 is enough to;

A; either get him to 4bet me and so get all his chippies in the middle
B; get him to call.

I don't want to scare anyone out of the pot unnecessarily but A is my biggest reason.

3bet pre we even have thre suited ace blockarrrrgghhhhhhojvtitgtigjgifd.

i raise becuase he can get it in with lots of hands that he believes he has good equity with and we haz top set. This may be terrible though, I would go against potting because i would never pot in any situ, so i guess, $44-50

if we had Ac Jc we'd be potting.

First thing that crossed my mind is why aren't we 3betting pre? Only reason to ever flat is if a player in the blinds has a ridic 3bet stat, but we're "readless," so 100% raising.

Also, if by readless, you mean our opponents have no reads on us, then for balance I make it $45 here to rep a draw and probably a lot of air. Of course we can have sets in our range if we raise, but most players aren't going to auto give credit for a strong hand on this board when we're raising in position. Raising also gives us a good chance to get it all in by the river.

So let's say we've raised and we get called in one spot, pot is $112 -

9d - Bet $65, and probably fold if we get checkraised
Jc - Check back because we either rep this card and he folds worse, or he has it.
Jd - Bet $72/get it in?
7s - Take a screenshot and take legal action versus iPoker, because we have this card in our hand
7c - This is close, but he can have sets and aces, so I bet $80
2s - Bet $72

I'm surprised that people think raising to $45 reps a draw more than potting it, in my mind raising to $45 reps top set.

none of this makes any real sense to me

why do we give a shit about balance in this particular spot if its vs an unknown?

Why does $45 rep a draw and not a set? Is there any reasoning behind that

People never raise these flops with air. Like less than 2% of the time imo so I don't agree that we rep air at all.

Why wouldn't players give credit for us hand a strong hand when we raise IP? By the simple fact we're raising (and allowing the betting to be re-reraised) I think we are repping either a v strong made hand or draw.

Imo $40 is way too small. It also allows wider range of hands to get to the turn and outdraw us.

I think making it $40 lessens our chances of stacking someone

I think that's because you're so used to playing hold em rather than plomaha.

At the end of this hand are we snap cashing out and never playing versus these players again? Was going to say pot it versus an unknown to look as bad as possible, but figured we'd be playing in this game for a long time to come.


I guess I've been away from PLO for a while, but all the nits used to pot with top/middle set and flat/potbuild with draws. Perhaps we don't rep a lot of air after all, I was just musing a little bit with all the what-ifs. Also, didn't really take into consideration that we're playing full ring...

I wouldn't worry about balance though when we don't know if we'll ever see the guy again.

Also, as the first time we're playing this hand, which might not get to showdown, why are you worrying and going for that line?

Secondly, the game is 6-handed on a full ring table. I believe built around a big fish who sat full ring but since left so we should be treating it as 6-max rly.

You missed a few of the questions but I think we'll just agree to disagree as I think we obv have very very different styles/thoughts on Omaha

yh no1 ever raises this board with air.

as for why are we worrying about balance vs an unknown, the title of the thread was PLO HAND/THEORY so I assumed some range/balance discussion is what you were looking for from it?

In a vacuum I'm always raising, and raising the pot as I said earlier.

fwiw Redwalked I've seen tons around, dont have my HEM here but i reckon I've played 4/5k hands with him at 1/2~ stakes

Yeh cheers Doyle, pretty much agree with all this. In a vacuum I think raising pot is far better than $50ish as has been stated by a few. Allows us to make it circa $70 and get stacks in on the turn rather than leaving weird amounts for turn and river.

My mentor at the farm thinks raising pot is ALWAYS bad in this spot and that's kinda the crux of the whole debate.

I've played a lot against Redwalked too but my friend hasnt.

mmm, my like general rule for these spots is the dryer the texture the smaller I size my bets, and visa verca, so on wet textures I always bet bigger, in a spot like this I'd just pot almost always cos my range to raise is really just sets and draws (KT + s/d as well etc) so that whole range generally wants more fold equity.

Like I say I think it's important for our range on the turn to flat here sometimes, but I'd much rather the board was a LITTLE dryer and be happier if we had middle set

but it seems like the discussion you've had is surrounded by how best to play this one hand in this one spot and not really considering ranges at all

Meh, I hardly ever bet full pot TBH but ALWAYS is obv ridic. I don't mind betting full pot in this spot I just tend to not.

people have this idea that betting the pot is for some reason really fishy "Yeah all the guy does is POT POT POT" etc and this defo makes people not wanna bet pot in spots where its good/fine to do so

Your mentor thinks raising pot is bad because you wave a flag saying you're raise calling. You basically allow the cbettor to assign us a range and play pretty perfectly against us by b3b hands he wants to get in and folding everything else. By raising smaller you open up his flatting range and now this becomes a tough spot because he doesn't know what parts of his range to b3b and what to flat with.

When are we ever raise/folding this board though Rob? Surely our range is the same when we pot as when we make it $50? I can't think of any hands I'm raise/folding here, be it made hands or big draws.

Yeah I can't think of any hands I'd raise fold here, some bad tens/7's maybe if the the player behind jammed and the cbettor got it in aswel, but that's kind've irrelevant combinatronically although it does add slight weight to the merit of raising smaller. Smaller/Pot just depends on what you want him to do. I mean if I'm playing vs someone tilted or I have a note on saying stacks off too tight/light I'm potting it. If I'm playing someone who I know will stack off perfectly then I'l be flatting a lot more/raising smaller.

My new favourite word

sorry to bombard with questions. Curious to pick your brain as to sizing for turn/river when you raise smaller?

if readless id raise as one of the other 2 could be a fish spew monster (though if they are competent then i like calling also soemtimes)

id pot it as i want others to think I have a draw and small raises are rarely used in these situations.

I think this discussion is kind of aimless at this point. To say raising big is "always bad" is obviously completely wrong, in a vacuum readless it seems a smaller raise will always be better