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live HU stud 100/200 in a mixed game format. 50 ante, 50 BI. I am not the hero, he is a friend of mine who asked me about this hand.

Hero brings it in with (22)3 montone, villain completes w/(xx)9, hero 3b, villain calls.

Hero's read so far - Villain always completes with his entire range, and calls 3-bets with his air range. He tends to 4-bet his strongest hands (the hold'em range). He generally slowplays to 6th with his monsters like rolled up hands/trips. He will also play back at hero based on his dead outs, for example hero expects him to attempt a re-steal if he holds a 3 in his down cards some percentage of the time). He assumes villain's range is VERY wide, any 2 down cards can be a part of that range on 3rd.

Hero - 6d (2 flush with a deuce)
Villain - Ts

V checks, H bets, V check-raises, Hero calls.

Hero - 6h
Villain - 5h

H bets, villain raises, H calls (note - Hero thinks that Villain range includes OESDs looking for a free showdown)

Hero - 7c
Villain - Jh

H check/calls

Hero - 2
Villain - *

Hero c/r, villain 3-b, hero calls.

please discuss each street, factor in the huge ante, and the heads up dynamic. Really interested to see what ranges you think Villain could have on 4th and later - thanks!

I think that I would just call on 3rd. We do have a pair but it is the lowest pair with the lowest kicker thus making it harder to play. Plus we aren't pushing much of an edge.
ProPokerTools Stud Hi Simulation
600,000 trials (Randomized)
22|3c 52.55% (315,284 wins, 25 ties)
**|9h 47.45% (284,691 wins, 25 ties)

Shouldn't we be capping 7th vs villain's range?

I like the line and rational other than that.

why dont you raise 5th if you think his range is skewed toward OESDS?

your giving him a cheaper showdown by not charging him more to draw, granted im just trusting your feeling about the hand, if you feel like he needs more then just a draw here then your line is very good imo.

and i would think we can cap the river. i think villain has a st8 . i would still probably c/c 6th even if we rr and he calls or caps.

granted im not great at stud, but this is just my newb $.02. ium not scared to look like an idiot in the forums. good way to learn imo.

I think that I would just call on 3rd.

I agree.

Shouldn't we be capping 7th vs villain's range?

Villain's hand looks like a posible straight, when hero c/r's 7th he is essentially announcing he can beat a straight unless he plans on folding to a 3 bet. Hero's hand looks bare, when villain 3-bets he is saying he has at a minimum a straight or that he can beat the most likely range that hero has when he c/r's - what do you think hero's hand looks like in villain's eyes? Do you still think hero should raise? Remember, there is no cap, its a live game.

why dont you raise 5th if you think his range is skewed toward OESDS?

vs an OESD villain has 34% equity, but when we factor in the rest of his range as well as the OESD, do you still think hero has an equity edge that should be pushed?

ps: I am not giving answers, I want to know what you guys think... I'll just ask lots of questions to help :-)

I agree.




Villain's hand looks like a posible straight, when hero c/r's 7th he is essentially announcing he can beat a straight unless he plans on folding to a 3 bet. Hero's hand looks bare, when villain 3-bets he is saying he has at a minimum a straight or that he can beat the most likely range that hero has when he c/r's - what do you think hero's hand looks like in villain's eyes? Do you still think hero should raise? Remember, there is no cap, its a live game.

its very very hard for him to have a st8 beat here. like ever. he needs what,... pocket 9's, 10's, 5's, J's and then to have caught on the river another pair. just seems so unlikely given card removal. much more likely he doesnt have a better boat. much more likely he has a st8 and is being retard/greedy/bad imo. i may be wrong but this makes a ton of sense to me and i dont play stud.

its very very hard for him to have a st8 beat here. like ever. he needs what,... pocket 9's, 10's, 5's, J's and then to have caught on the river another pair. just seems so unlikely given card removal. much more likely he doesnt have a better boat. much more likely he has a st8 and is being retard/greedy/bad imo. i may be wrong but this makes a ton of sense to me and i dont play stud.

Lets talk about the hands in the range you just mentioned above. (x9)9 would play this way if he caught a second pair along the way - so that includes (95) & (9T), same with (TT), do you think (JJ)9 is also possible?

Yes, its less likely within the range based on card removal, but it is possible... therefore we need to include these possibilities. We should also note that since he is a pretty good high stakes mix player (on average over a mix of games) he is less likely to not overvalue a straight vs Hero's river c/r range - but it is possible of course.

flat 3rd and raise hands like 2J2+ TT+ big 3 flushs etc to balance your raising range with solid hands and call with weaker flush draws and smaller pairs like this.

T obvi hits villains range but because we took the aggro line betting is fine. rest is standard.

vs an OESD villain has 34% equity, but when we factor in the rest of his range as well as the OESD, do you still think hero has an equity edge that should be pushed?

I don't mind pushing it but you build a big pot and hate seeing villain pair the board. I like to keep the pot small with your marginal two pair.

N/m I think the whole hand looks fairly standard.

Lets talk about the hands in the range you just mentioned above. (x9)9 would play this way if he caught a second pair along the way - so that includes (95) & (9T), same with (TT), do you think (JJ)9 is also possible?

Yes, its less likely within the range based on card removal, but it is possible... therefore we need to include these possibilities. We should also note that since he is a pretty good high stakes mix player (on average over a mix of games) he is less likely to not overvalue a straight vs Hero's river c/r range - but it is possible of course.

I gave the villain a range where he will have at least two pair by 5th along with straights, trips, and flushes on 6th. I also factored on 7th, villain flashing one of his 4 boat cards (which depending on what he had underneath could rarely give him quads). I discounted totally rolled up 9's from his range, as according to your friends read, he would slowplay that until 6th against especially against the hero's dry board.

ProPokerTools Stud Hi Simulation
600,000 trials (Randomized)
22d|3c6d6h7c|2 88.53% (531,160 wins, 0 ties)
*h*h,55,95,9T,9*,KQ,87,jj,TT|9hTs5hJh|J, T, 5,9 11.47% (68,840 wins, 0 ties)

I concur with how the hand was played except for 3rd where just calling is best. If it wasn't for the huge ante, I would fold. I included (TT) in the villain's range that he would generally slowplay until 6th to give him the strongest range on the river. Also included (55) that would make for an optimistic c/r on 4th and got lucky on 5th.

I don't feel that the villain necessarily has to have a boat in order to 3bet our c/r on 7th. I would put a 4th bet in as even if the villain has a boat he won't always 5bet it, as he would have to fear a higher boat or quad 6's putting in a 6th bet. Straights and flushes and even trips are such strong hands HU that frequently multiple bets go in on 7th. I think the liklihood of our hand being best is too great to pass up a chance to put another bet in. It's very infrequent that both opponents boat up on the river, especially HU, although it can't be discounted. I think the 88.5% is pretty close to the certainty that we have the best hand as I would expect the villain to be confident most of the time that straights and flushes (infrequently trips) will be ahead of our c/r range (unless for some reason he believes that we will only c/r boats on the river). Our hand could look like a 7 high straight, rarely trip 6's, and even on rare occasions going for thin value with A's up (although his board does look a little scary). He could also be 3 bet bluffing a non-zero percentage of the time using his board and how strong a 3 bet against a c/r on the river looks. All these assumptions are opponent specific as against some, I would expect my opponent to have a bigger boat the majority of the time. I would expect a decent mixed game player but not necessarily a strong stud player to overvalue straights quite often HU. It seems that according to your friend's read, that 4 betting his strongest hands (the hold'em range) would tend to indicate absent any other reads that he probably is mostly a hold'em player and therefore play his hand according to the value that he perceives it would have in hold'em.

Lets talk about the hands in the range you just mentioned above. (x9)9 would play this way if he caught a second pair along the way - so that includes (95) & (9T), same with (TT), do you think (JJ)9 is also possible?

Yes, its less likely within the range based on card removal, but it is possible... therefore we need to include these possibilities. We should also note that since he is a pretty good high stakes mix player (on average over a mix of games) he is less likely to not overvalue a straight vs Hero's river c/r range - but it is possible of course.

(TT)9 seems unlikely given the explanation. Sounds like (TT)9 would 4 bet 3rd, but would not c/r 4th when the 3rd 10 hit, instead waiting for 5th. I believe the villian has (T9)9, (59)9, or (5T)9. Actually my vote would be (5T)9 with a 9 on 7th.

If it wasn't for the huge ante, I would fold.

I meant to omit this. When I wrote it, I wasn't taking into account that the play was HU and the opponent is opening wide. Obviously not folding any pair HU on 3rd especially against an opponent completing any 2 down cards.

Grunch on OP.

First, *warning conversational nit alert*, lets not go the way of NL nomenclature, villain competed, and we raised not 3-bet. Keep stud sacred, imo.

I would 100% call on 3rd, but I call a ton on 3rd and description of villain sounds like we are not creating any folding equity, in fact, by bloating the pot, we might be ruining it.

Was the villains door card the 9h? I think this is very very important, but have to assume it's not since it was not reported as so.

The river is very important to what we think the villain would do with (55), (TT), (JJ) on 3rd, if he's just calling those and waiting to raise 5th every time then the rest of the hand looks standard. His raise on 5th is alarming, we jammed 3rd and paired our door card. This is a live game, I would just call the river 3 bet as well.

His raise on 5th is alarming, we jammed 3rd and paired our door card. This is a live game, I would just call the river 3 bet as well.

Joe, our door card is a 3, so we made an open pair on 5th. Therefore, we can't have a boat until 7th unless we started with (36)3, (67)3 or (77)6. Obviously, (66)3 would give us quads.

Also, villain C/R 4th street which is not consistent with his line for playing monsters according to the description where he slow plays his trips. Neither is his raise on 5th. I just put in (55),(TT),(JJ) just to give villain the strongest liklihood of making a boat, not his most realistic range. Furthermore, I would assume that villain would think that we in turn, would slow play our monsters until 6th street where we just C/C instead of raising.

Therefore, I would assume that villain would not give us credit for a boat unless we rivered it as we did here. His play is more consistent with straight draws that got there, and depending on whether villain's doorcard is the 9h flush draws (he still could have rivered a flush starting with two hearts underneath). His most likely hand is either a straight, or two pair that rivered a boat like us (flush is moot because the relative strength of the straight against our likely hand is the same). Based on the hero's read of villain, I would greatly weigh his hand towards straights. It's only because of his 3 bet of our C/R on 7th that I consider boats to be in his range.

I presume your recommending just calling the 3 bet on 7th because you fear being 5 bet. How strong of a hand do you need to put a 4th bet in? Also, how strong of a hand does the villain need to 5 bet us?

Grunch on OP.

First, *warning conversational nit alert*, lets not go the way of NL nomenclature, villain competed, and we raised not 3-bet. Keep stud sacred, imo.

hahaha picky picky! i wonder if this is a tell in live games when people mess up the naming