[eanderson85]

[Qh 6d 4h]
In a normal tournament.
3better has a big nut advantage. Aces, Kings, Queens, Ah Kx, Ax Qx.
Nut advantage means you should bet large, 60%-200% pot.

Caller has range advantage, more Q-Xs, many more flush draws except maybe AKs and A5s, which might 4bet.
When 3better does not have range advantage, they should c-bet less frequently, because villain is going to call our c-bet more often when their range hits the board. Meaning we should bluff less.

This is a PKO, so I know things are looser, but I haven’t studied it enough to know offhand how much looser (every situation is a little bit different).
When opponent opens he is effectively the big stack, meaning he is a threat to everyone. He also has a big bounty, but I don’t think that matters as the big stack?
When you 3bet with half his stack, he probably takes notice because you are easily covered by him and you don’t care. He is probably supposed to speculate a bit with the call because of your bounty. Very few people know how much more they should call, and this is an easy place to make a mistake. (This is why PKOs are the future of online poker, because it is too much info to put into a bot solver in time to act. See Real time assistance).
I may be totally wrong here and he is supposed to call tighter, but I don’t think so as the big stack.
Your bounty is in his pot odds, while his bounty is not in yours.
He has a lot of suited hands of which 3/4 of them aren’t hearts.
He needs a set, a backdoor draw, a Queen, or 1/4 of his many flush draws to continue. He is probably overcalling the 3Bet and is caught with a bunch of air on the flop.
He needs to call 1/3 pot to win 5/3rds plus your bounty valued in chips, so his MDF is under 20%. He has 25% of his flush draw hands, plus his top pairs and sets, that’s probably enough to cover MDF, he can fold all his total junk. If you bet larger, he would be forced to continue with middle and bottom pairs, and some backdoor draws to keep you from auto profiting.
If he thinks he has a skill edge, which most players do, does he chase a 2/3rds pot bet here with 8h 7h? A wheel draw with the Ah? Are those even in his 3bet calling range?
Or does he fold and “outplay” you later?
Maybe he expected the big nutted range bet, and when you bet small he smelled value town. To some people small bets scream value. When you have tight stats small bets sometimes work too much.
Maybe he thought you were a nit. It is good advice to pick a screen name opposite of your playing style. You also want to pick a name that won’t scare away sponsors when it is on the leaderboard. Bluffstorini is a great name for a nit.
As the middle stack at the table, it probably isn’t a bad idea to play small ball poker. Win a lot of small pots, stay away from big pots, especially when covered.

That is the range discussion.

With your hand, second pair with a 4th nut backdoor flush draw is clearly a marginal made hand, and should be used to protect your checking range as the best bluffcatcher.

[jim]

GREAT response Eric! We just recorded a podcast about this spot and I think I prefaced it by saying “I know I screwed up this spot because in real time I remember not being sure if my bet was for value or a bluff” – exactly as you describe. I think the 3betting range on this board is interesting – maybe we can develop this in one of our saturday sessions or something

[fivebyfive]

After our pod, I did run this through a solver. Made some guesses on your 3bet range and the LJ 3bet call range. The solver likes checking with JJ here, especially when we have the Jh. With the Jh, we’re checking around 70-75% of the time. I gave it the option of a microbet (10%), a small bet (33%), a PetVet disapproved half pot bet, a big bet (80%), and an overbet (125%). If it wasn’t checking with Jacks, it preferred the 33% sizing almost exclusively.

When I think about this, it makes sense, we don’t really have that much to protect against. Yes, our opponent has a lot of As and Ks and a few flush draws, but otherwise, this is a board that is fairly safe for Jacks especially with the heart. We’re either behind right now or way ahead. Overall, the solver thinks we have 59% equity. So when we check here we keep in many of the hands we beat which may then bet the turn. It sucks when the turn comes an A or K, but that doesn’t happen all that often. And if a 3rd heart comes, we can still call a turn lead and evaluate rivers.

So we can certainly stray from the GTO option here against various opponents, but just for reference the solver likes to check JJ with the Jh and is fairly indifferent between checking and betting small without the Jh.

[sirgasleak]

Hey folks, long time podcast listener, first time poster.

There are a couple of other factors to consider in a spot like this:

1) This is a PKO and villain has you covered, which means he will be calling wider pre and postflop to target your bounty. That will put more hands that connect with this flop in his range that villain might fold in a regular tourney.

2) One of the questions I always have in the back of my mind when deciding whether to bet is, “Would I mind getting x/raised in this spot?” If the answer is no, that supports betting. If the answer is yes, it is often better to check. The point is not to apply this rule blindly, but it’s helpful for identifying range advantages and distinguishing which hands might work better in a checking range.

 

[jim]

I love this bigger point by @SirGasleak – particularly for recreational players like us it’s helpful to find ‘general rules’ to help us think about spots like this, and then as he says not to follow it blindly, but to look for only good reasons to deviate from it. In this spot there just weren’t enough good reasons for the small bet, and Fancy Play Syndrome claimed another victim! Thanks for posting @SirGasleak

[imalouigi]

Using a down size bet here is a good play especially with this board texture. However, I don’t like going with such a micro sizing when we have a strong range as the 3-bettor. V should be calling with ~100% of his range with this sizing. It makes more sense to me to push exploitatively small bet sizing when we have little or no equity (or have all of the equity). I still prefer closer to 20% pot bet on the flop if we are going to push the exploit. I agree with @FiveByFive that 1/3 pot is a good sizing for our entire 3-bet range if we are going to bet. I prefer bet > check but checking is not bad.