Showdown Question

[TheMaster103]

Hey just had a quick question about an interesting showdown I just came across recently that has been difficult for me to understand (still pretty new to poker).

Anyway the showdown went like this:

Hero: As3c

Villain: 3d3s

Board: 6h9dQcQh9s

Hero won the pot.

My question is how did hero win the pot when the villain had a two pair of 3s and Qs?

 

[Nafor]

Welcome to the forum TheMaster,

The board already has two pairs QQ and 99. Those are higher than 33.

The better five card combination is AQQ99. That is why hero won.
If the villain would had at least TT, then his two pair would have been better. Now they both had the same two pair and the higher card (A vs 3) was what determined the winner.

 

[TheMaster103]

Welcome to the forum TheMaster,

The board already has two pairs QQ and 99. Those are higher than 33.

The better five card combination is AQQ99. That is why hero won.
If the villain would had at least TT, then his two pair would have been better. Now they both had the same two pair and the higher card (A vs 3) was what determined the winner.

Oh okay now I see! Thanks so much!

 

[Phoenix Wright]

Somewhat disheartening to hold two pair and then see yourself hit a "three pair" hand with your being the lowest of the pairs. The poker term for this is "counterfeited" as in:

"Your pair of threes were counterfeited here."

We also have to be careful of reverse odds when we improve but the opponent hits a better hand. An example of that would be something like this:

Hero: Ah 2h

Villain: Js Ts

Board: Ac Qh 2h 4d Kh

In this example, Villain was hoping to hit a King and complete their Straight. They hit the King on the River, but it was also a heart and that improved Hero's hand to a Flush. Reverse odds is when your hand "improves" to a better hand, but it actually hurts your equity because (almost always unknown since hole cards are hidden) the same card you needed improved the opponent to the best hand.

When I saw this thread title, I anticipated a hand with reverse odds, but it turns out that counterfeiting was the culprit this time

 

[Nafor]

I have to re-visit my previous answer since I made a small error.

Everything was true, except villains high card was actually the 6 on the table, not the 3. His best five cards were 99QQ6.

The important thing here is to understand that if hero would have had e.g. 22, 33, 44 or 55 the result would have been split pot since the best cards for both of them would have been 99QQ6.