$2 NLHE Full Ring: Recaping some hands from the last couple of days

Hi everyone. Today is study day and hope I can get some opinions about not the hands but the situations.

Situation 1

Villain is sitting on my left. He is absolutely silent for many hands. Suddenly he raises from the SB (I folded the hand) and he is heads-up with another player. He bet and bet and bet again to the river and was called every single time. In the river the other player bet and he raised showing pocket QQ and taking the pot.

I took a note "Extreme aggro with QQ". Next hand was this, with me in CO and him in the button:

*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to RVladimiro [10s] [10c]
RVladimiro: raises $0.04 to $0.06
Villain: calls $0.06
*** FLOP *** [6s] [Ac] [6d]
RVladimiro: bets $0.07
Villain: calls $0.07
*** TURN *** [6s] [Ac] [6d] [2d]
RVladimiro: checks
Villain: bets $0.22
RVladimiro: folds

I trust I did the right thing and folded since he never showed that level of aggression on any hand but those two hands. Thoughts?

Situation 2

I'm not posting the result because the result is irrelevant. What I want is to make some sense out of this hand and how I should have handled it. SB completes the BB to me and I check.

*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to RVladimiro [9d] [7c]
Villain: calls $0.01
RVladimiro: checks
*** FLOP *** [Js] [4c] [Qc]
Villain: checks
RVladimiro: checks
*** TURN *** [Js] [4c] [Qc] [10h]
Villain: checks
RVladimiro: checks
*** RIVER *** [Js] [4c] [Qc] [10h] [7s]
Villain: checks
RVladimiro: bets $0.04
Villain: calls $0.04

Situation 3

I was in MP+1. I think I did two mistakes in this hand. The first one is pretty obvious, I limped, I think it was a mistakes because I was playing 2 tables cause I don't really think I would limp here.

The second one is that I don't think I managed to get value from this hand. Unless someone had pocket QQ I had pretty much the nuts, so I think I could've gambled the hand a bit. I have done it in the past with some success like checking the flop and then getting some action later but I play it as it happens, not based on any firm knowledge on how to handle this kind of hand.

Opinions are welcome.

*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to RVladimiro [8s] [8h]
RVladimiro: calls $0.02
BT: raises $0.02 to $0.04
BB: calls $0.02
RVladimiro: calls $0.02
*** FLOP *** [Qd] [8c] [Qh]
BB: checks
RVladimiro: bets $0.13
BT: folds
BB: folds
Uncalled bet ($0.13) returned to RVladimiro
RVladimiro collected $0.13 from pot

Hand 1

Firstly noting that your opponent plays aggro with QQ is not gonna help you but just scare you into thinking when he bets he has something good, Playing QQ aggressively is standard, aggressive poker players do better and i hope if you had QQ and the board wasnt scary you would bet all 3 streets also.

Right to the hand, You have TT and are called by the button, make sure you're raising more than 3bb's at 2nl also, raising to .06 is just a recipe for disaster at 2nl and often too many people will just call and you'll be multi way, so raise to .08 or .10.

On the flop we have a good hand but like i said yesterday, we are out of position and betting isnt really going to achieve anything especially if as soon as he calls you check and fold to a bet. If we check here and he bets we call. Then we check again and the chances are if he doesnt have an A he isnt going to bet again. If he bets something small again i'd still call but if he bets flop and turn reasonably big you can fold and put him on an A. Hope you understand this, its called WA/WB (way ahead/way behind) because we're either way ahead or way behind As any shitty Ace hand beats us, but if he doesnt have that then we're way ahead. See how much easier this hand would be to play if we had position....


Hand 2 - nothing to say, crap hand checking is fine, lots of draws out there and over pairs, theres really nothing to say about trash like that, dont mind that you took a stab at by all means, just play tight in the blinds and you'll be fine. Always think about position...

Hand 3 - Only mistake you made was limping, Betting is fine, a lot of the time you just dont get paid for hands, wouldnt of been awful if you checked the flop and bet the turn either but really dont get in the habit of slowplaying any hands you will only help your opponents and lose money.

Keep up posting of hands, and you'll keep learning


Here, this is a good read and will show you why in situations like the TT one why checking is actually the better move: https://www.cardschat.com/f49/wa-wb-concept-76525/

General points:

RAISE TO AT LEAST .08 PRE AT 2NL!
Also, please post positions and stack sizes


Hand 1
cbet is fine, i kind of like check/calling turn because villain could be floating us with smaller pairs and other junk.

Hand 2
I assume this is blind versus blind. You need to raise this hand pre because you'll be more likely to take it down later since you showed strength pre. We can assume the sb's hand is pretty weak since he's in the sb and he open limped so attack! As played, what are you betting the river for? What worse hands do you think he calls us with?

Hand 3
Obv raise pre. If you're making mistakes like this because you're multitabling, cut down on tables. First off, why did you donk bet(betting when you weren't the original raiser preflop)? The flop is pretty damn dry so it'd be nice to just let the btn cbet so we can get some value out of him rather than just have him fold to our donk bet. Also, why are you potting it? As mentioned the flop is so dry and you have the 2nd nuts so no need to go crazy. Betting more is going to make people less likely to come along.

Firstly noting that your opponent plays aggro with QQ is not gonna help you but just scare you into thinking when he bets he has something good, Playing QQ aggressively is standard, aggressive poker players do better and i hope if you had QQ and the board wasnt scary you would bet all 3 streets also.

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Indeed I would. That note had a impact on my play indeed. Point taken.

Right to the hand, You have TT and are called by the button, make sure you're raising more than 3bb's at 2nl also, raising to .06 is just a recipe for disaster at 2nl and often too many people will just call and you'll be multi way, so raise to .08 or .10.

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After reading this I checked more hands from yesterday. I was trying raising according to position, which I really think it's a good idea. On the other hand it was nonsense at these limits. Previously my standard raise was 3BB and I recall getting a bunch of callers. I'll play 4BB tonight and leave fancy stuff when I get to higher stakes.

If we check here and he bets we call. Then we check again and the chances are if he doesnt have an A he isnt going to bet again. If he bets something small again i'd still call but if he bets flop and turn reasonably big you can fold and put him on an A.

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This is exactly the kind of mindset I'm not into yet. If we check and he bets it is a standard c-bet. If we call that will make him wonder what do we have. His next bet will help me get him in a hand and I can decide. Did I get it?

Hand 2 - nothing to say, crap hand checking is fine, lots of draws out there and over pairs, theres really nothing to say about trash like that, dont mind that you took a stab at by all means, just play tight in the blinds and you'll be fine. Always think about position...

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This hand confused me. I saw a bunch of draws and waited to see what was happening. Vilain did the same. I tried to take the pot, as simple as that. He had [Ks] [Qs] go figure. I have no idea why he didn't jump on my throat. I guess he was affraid of the flush draw, but why didn't he bet?

Hand 3 - Only mistake you made was limping, Betting is fine, a lot of the time you just dont get paid for hands, wouldnt of been awful if you checked the flop and bet the turn either but really dont get in the habit of slowplaying any hands you will only help your opponents and lose money.

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I'm positive the limp was not intended. The times I'm limping is in late with very speculative hands and some limpers ahead of me. I don't slowplay hands unless I have something big on the flop which is very very very rare.

Also, please post positions and stack sizes

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Apologies. The positions are in the notes but I guess it's easier to read in the hand.

I assume this is blind versus blind. You need to raise this hand pre because you'll be more likely to take it down later since you showed strength pre. We can assume the sb's hand is pretty weak since he's in the sb and he open limped so attack! As played, what are you betting the river for? What worse hands do you think he calls us with?

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Yep blind vs blind. I bet on the river to take the pot since I had just made a pair. This whole hand is just weird, like I said above, he was holding KQs.

If you're making mistakes like this because you're multitabling, cut down on tables.

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It was my very first multitable and 2 tables only. It went quite alright actualy. I don't recall any other mistakes based on the fact that I was multitabling.

First off, why did you donk bet(betting when you weren't the original raiser preflop)? The flop is pretty damn dry so it'd be nice to just let the btn cbet so we can get some value out of him rather than just have him fold to our donk bet. Also, why are you potting it? As mentioned the flop is so dry and you have the 2nd nuts so no need to go crazy. Betting more is going to make people less likely to come along.

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Until I got the answers from you guys I didn't even know it is common to check to the raiser. Heck I didn't even know what a donk bet was. but yes it makes sense. Question though: let's say I was the first raiser, my cbet would have the exact same result. So the outcome is mostly based on the fact that I did not raise initially (as I should).

The result could or could not have been the same. People tend to give less credit when you cbet so I think you would've been much more likely to get calls. People don't really know how to react to donk bets so they either go apeshit or shutdown.