1/2 nlh

[Honeybadger]

No idea why people are criticising OP flatting, rather than 3betting, QQ preflop. It is perfectly fine/pretty standard to flat QQ from the HJ vs an UTG open.

[pleno1]

confirmed, 3betting here wouldnt be great, flat pre is absolutely the best line, id 3bet kk, aa and an unbalanced amount of suited 1 gappers.

[pleno1]

What does Pleno think? 

i dont get this sorry?

flop also seems like a trivial fold, i mean he is showing significant strength so even if he doesnt have a queen he likely has a draw that we are immediately flipping with and likely folding later as he will barrel his good equity, coupled with the chance of some matey boy behind continuing or perhaps even bluffing qq would go quickly in the muck here from me.

the mentality of not wanting to see a multiway pot is backwards, its incredibly important not to think how you are at the moment with the, "plus 9 dollars rather than -27 dollars mentality" even if said in jest, it is basically the rationale.

Think about your complete range and how your hand would play vs his reaction vs your 3bet. Getting 4bet here is an absolute nightmare for us and we dont want to 3bet fold QQ and turn it into a bluff.

Thinking a little more.. if we are 3betting QQ here we really will struggle to protect the rest of our range and leave ourself extremely vunerable to squeezes and our range will be too weak as well as lots of other things it makes QQ a definite call here pre flop readless.

[Doobs]

OP said he didn't want to 3 bet, as people were folding to 3 bets, hence the comment saying winning £9 isn't a bad thing.  And winning £9 is a lot better than flatting and then losing £20 or £200.  I don't particularly mind either flatting or raising, the most important thing* is for the OP to recognise his original plan hasn't worked and stop chasing.

Anyway on to the balancing thing.  If you only 3 bet a small amount of your strong stuff, and a lot of looser stuff, aren't you leaving yourself open to getting 4 bet a lot?  You may solve the problem with getting squeezed often, but have given yourself another problem instead?  I am a bit out of the loop these days in cash, but presumably some people still call 3 bets, and sometimes 4 bet stuff that isn't AA or KK?   

Surely the correct thing to do is to sometimes 3 bet, and sometimes flat? I don't think you can conclusively say you should definitely flat. 

[pleno1]

if people are folding a lot to 3bets then you just change your range by taking out the mid to low end of your value range and adding bluff combos thus making an exploitive adjustment or as you say wininng 9 dollars a lot of times, by the time they adjust you can rearrange your range, thats how dynamics build.

Surely the correct thing to do is to sometimes 3 bet, and sometimes flat? I don't think you can conclusively say you should definitely flat. 

no, readless i would say its a pretty standard flat and would always call. i dont think ive ever 3bet in this spot in say the alst 6 months over hundreds of thousands of hands for example.

its abit like 98s bvb i will literally never 3bet this hand readless and especially not vs somebody who folds to lots of 3bets.

AK would be more of a hand that I would sometimes raise in this spot, but again I would flat call this.

[Doobs]

Cheers

[Q8Holds]

Doobs you say flatting sucks and you would rather win £9 pre rather than lose £20,£200

When you flat call this doesn't happen every time and often you get more value as this is the top of your flatting range.

If I 3bet got it in and he has aces would you say you should of just flatted it's better to lose £9 than £200

My pros for flatting

It can also allow you to build history with a oppo in a match where a situation may occur and you can make more river bluffs and floats ( this would obviously take a lot more hands and you would have to be confident he was taking good notes)

There was a lot of light squeezing going on but most 3bets were just taking it down

I think you get more value in this match by taking it down the streets.
Cheers jj + pleno!

[Honeybadger]

Even with whole table to act after?

How many bb/100 u reckon flatting gains over 3b?

It is partly because there are other players behind you still to act that QQ is a flat rather than a 3bet. If you somehow knew everyone behind you was folding then it is much closer on whether to 3bet. It would still most likely be a flat call, but it would be closer. Note that this is not the main reason why we flat rather than 3bet (main reason is the strength of the UTG opener's range, which means he does not have to felt JJ/TT or AQ vs a 3bet), but it is a small part of the reason.

[Doobs]

Doobs you say flatting sucks

ORLY?  I said I was relaxed with either raising or calling.  I'd say I was probably the least dogmatic about which was best in the thread.  I thought your original reason for not 3 betting seemed like a reason to 3 bet more. 

If I am 3 betting more, I'd be more concerned with balancing that range than my flatting range, but Patrick is playing these games more than I am these days, so I guess he has the ranges sussed for today's conditions better than I have.

Think you could probably work on your game selection too, $1/$2 short handed on stars isn't going to be the easiest game on the net.

[Q8Holds]

Think you could probably work on your game selection too, $1/$2 short handed on stars isn't going to be the easiest game on the net.


What is this meant to mean lol... You dont know me

I dont see why i make a post for the first time in a while and your just needling me and on the offensive?!

[SuuPRlim]

This is near the bottom of your range equity-wise for calling on flop so you can safely fold. Also as pointed out we block a lot of draws.

This, we've got very bad equity when we run into the top of his range, and don't really crush any his of semi-bluffing/"light" hands either, I'm sure our range has a lot more preferable hands in it to take him on with here, and even if the vast majority of our range is folding here I would imagine we'll be getting more exploited being too loose here over being too tight.

Pre-Flop seems abso fine, I always think in these sort of marginal spots you just select a default that fits in line with your overall strategy (if you're an extremely active 3bettor then maybe 3bet becomes your stnd, if you're not so much than flat will be your default) and look for exploitative reasons in game based on the flow of the game to deviate between the two - if you got someone behind you going mental 4betting then you could 3bet in the hope of inducing a light 4bet, if the guy who opens is very tight and the players behind are very passive then even as an aggro 3better with this in your range you can switch to flatting, and so on...

I would Imagine that the most prudent "default-default" would be to flat. I think reading the dynamics ad the flow of the table is much more important in these types of spots.