I don’t know if you will be receptive to hearing this, but the fix was not in. Other than the last hand, it doesn’t appear that you faced an inordinate amount of bad lack in this session.
Moreover, perhaps you should consider that it was your lack of aggression (another topic which you have discussed extensively) in this situation that put you in a losing position.
In this situation, QQ is an awesome starting hand and there is a less than 1% chance that your opponent has a KK or better – QQ wins 80% of the time over the long run. Heads up, this warrants a shove on your part, and that would have probably ended the hand. Now, if you get looked up and lose, I would not be too concerned about that, since it is the correct play. Given the size of your bankroll, losing 50k is trivial.
I also think that your post-flop decisions could have been better. Why the check on the flop? You are an 83% favorite to win here and your opponent has a 12.5% chance of having a straight. On the turn, his chances of having a straight improved to 37%, but it’s here that you decided to bet, and it was a minimum bet too. If you decided to check the flop, what was the rationale behind your decision to bet the turn when your chances of winning declined? What did you hope to accomplish with a minimum bet? Even if he had a drawing hand, you have gave your opponent an acceptable price to call (it’s marginal, though) and more than sufficient implied odds.
The fact that your opponent re-raised your bet on the river, essentially putting you all in, should have been a red flag. Never mind the probabilities - when an opponent makes an aggressive move on the river, it’s a polarized bet, and in most cases you will be behind, but you insta-called his bet.
In several of your other posts, you have given me the impression that you sometimes give up in situations like this, even when you know you are beat. Some of your opponents may have picked up on this tendency and may be playing looser against you because it is profitable to do so.
The thing about shoving preflop is that it tends to win me minimum pots, when V folds, and in a HU game with QQ I want to get them to play the hand. I can comfortably shove pocket pairs in a HU situation, but my issue with that is getting calls. If I’m not getting enough calls, then the shove is still +EV, but isn’t +EV enough to be optimal. I am looking to get value out of a hand like QQ, not chase V off the pot.
True, it runs the risk of them flopping better than 1 pair and beating me, because I’ve allowed them more information for a lower price. So I understand that it means higher risk, but I’m hoping that it pays off better in the long run by winning me larger pots on average than I would get by shoving and mostly just winning blinds, while occasionally winning V’s stack, and somewhat more occasionally getting beaten for my stack.
I guess the ideal play in my mind is to figure out what is the maximum raise V will call with any two cards, and make that raise, then shove the flop if my pair is over it, and hope they didn’t hit it better than a pair, or have a bigger pair themselves. Or, even better, figure out what’s the biggest bet V would call with while holding an inferior hand. If someone can explain the flaw in that thinking, it will help me understand why the shove is the better play, and then I can just do that, and stop thinking so much.
Part of what is informing my thinking on this is that standard poker strategy advice tells us that if we raise different amounts with different hand strengths, it gives our opponents information. If I shove AA, but only open QTo to 2.5-3BB, V has a good idea what I’m holding if I shove, and can easily fold, right? This takes value away from those strong hands that bet big, and it also weakens the hands that we don’t bet as big, since not shoving is also telling V that we have a weaker hand.
Game theory would tell us then that if I’m not shoving, then perhaps they should shove on me, and then I should fold. This gets us into a very meta-heavy preflop game, where we incrementally 3-, 4-, 5-, 6- bet each other with our junk hands because we’d both rather close the hand without seeing any more cards, and then one of us eventually folds because we finally realize that 35o is not a great hand to show down most boards with, and we’re sure they’re probably holding 74s.
In many of these HU games, a random/generic V will fold to 3BB or more more often than not. Accordingly, I tend not to overbet with strong hands, and trust that I can play better, as long as the board doesn’t suck for me. And I find the board sucks for me so often, it makes me wonder how anyone could possibly ever profitably shove pairs, if my luck is at all typical. I strongly suspect it is not.
Alternatively I guess it’s possible that through sheer coincidence I only pick hands to slow play that make V a straight or a flush 70+% of the time, but that’s highly unlikely.
This flop is pretty good for me; I make a set, and I have two cards over me to trap a player holding Ax or Kx. Checking the flop, I was playing a “strong should look weak” strategy, hoping that, like in just about every other hand, they would respond to my check by betting pot, and then I could raise them and see where we go from there. Naturally, this is the one hand where V decides to check back, and now I’m looking at a smaller pot. The Turn makes the board suck, and I’m thinking “yeah but how likely is it that the other guy got a Ten? Probably only about 93%, right? So definitely go all in no matter what here.”
Of course he does have a Ten, confirming that the whole thing was just an elaborate setup the whole time.
Of course in the reverse situation, when I shove on a nut straight made on the turn with one of my hole cards, if V calls with a set, the river pairs the board so they are making a boat or quads approximately 75% of the time, which ruins my EV for shoving made hands.
As I say, any time I go for a big bet, the very next card to fall is going to ruin me.
You don’t have a 3! range on a 12bb stack. Even if you want to try this play as an exploit, you need to shove that flop and hope villain has caught a piece of it. This is extreme short-stack play and the strategy is different than it would be for 30bb+ pots. If V folds to your jam, you increase your stack by ~35%, which is huge. If you are called, your hand is miles ahead of his range and you are thrilled to get all the chips in right then. If V overfolds to your jams, jam more. If V overcalls your jams, tighten your shoving range.
If you want to play these turbo games, I think it would be a good idea to work on your push/fold strategies. There are tons of cheap/free apps that can help you get a better idea of what maximum EV plays look like. If you spent 10-15 minutes a day practicing, you’d get much better in a very short period of time. You can set them up to see what hands you should push or fold, depending on what you think opponents are raising/calling with. In short order, this will become instinctual for you. Its not about playing multi-street poker, its about pushing equity and getting a ton of volume in.
3Bet range: what are you 3betting in a 3 player game if not AJsuited? AA KK QQ AK? That’s super tight. 3Bet & punish loose play.
Donk bet: means betting out of position and against the aggressor & is also called leading. There is many rules in poker and times to break them OFC. One rule is called: check to the aggressor. If you consistently break the rules with little regard for them you will struggle to play decent poker.
I doubt many good players would not 3bet. I doubt many good players would Donk bet or lead.
If this player is bad enough to call your 3bet, then its very difficult not to lose this pot & that’s poker. No one is ever happy to lose a big pot but I’m less unhappy if I played well.
How do I play this hand better? Aggression and thinking about your 3bet range. Try and follow the poker rules most of the time like: check to the aggressor!
These basics will improve your whole game not just this one hand.
If your not getting action your probably playing too tight. Give action = get action. I’m not giving a tight player any action. Its way too obvious they have me beat.
Play QQ aggressively and raise but also mix in some other hands too. This is called balancing your range. You dont need to start raising 72suited & garbage. Pick some strong hands like AT, KJ 77 etc. Readjust your range as you play. If you can get away with it then expand your range, and play looser. If V gets more aggressive and pushed back then tighten up your range to 99 TT & better or whatever your comfortable with. As you’ve previously mentioned even K4suited on the button is a good hand HU.
Don’t expect to make massive pots just bc you have AA QQ etc. You can win decent pots by out playing your opponent with many other hands
Here’s a free trainer that might be a good place to start: https://www.pokerstrategy.com/poker-software-tools/icm-trainer-light/
ICMIZER has a great SNG training program but it isn’t free. Pairrd is another one if you ever want to study really advanced strategies. As a caveat, you need to adjust off the charts and not just memorize them. Understand the concepts and adapt them to the players you are facing. Don’t assume that the other players know these strategies or will play by them even if they did. Build a good foundation of knowledge and then tailor your specific strategy to exploit your specific opponents.
ADDED - if you look at some of these simulations, I think you’ll be shocked at what you see. The vast majority of players have no idea what hands are profitable to shove or call with by position. You’ll see people shove or call with any Ax or pair or unsuited Broadway. In many instances, these plays are enormously -$EV. The consistent equity punts people make are incredible. If you really want to be a good tournament player, you need to understand how to shove and call off properly. You need to understand stack distributions and risk premiums associated with each confrontation you think about engaging in. You will gain a gigantic edge over other players (here and elsewhere) if you put in a little time on this material.