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AK and AQ
I feel like pople are playing slightly differently than they used to a couple of years ago... Its just a gut feeling, I have nothing other than that at the moment...
People dont seem to be 3betting and calling all in's with AQ anywhere near as much. Instead of thinking "AQ is ahead of their range, I'll 3bet" people now think more along the lines of "AQ is ahead of their range, but I will flat his raise in position to keep the hands I dominate from folding, and potentially win a big pot". I'm just talking in general here, obviously there are still plenty of occasions when people 3bet AQ etc, but in my opinion the general trend is towards a more passive line preflop.
Would you agree with my observation?? or am I talking out my @rse?
This then lead to a further question...should you be less inclined to try and get it in with AK? It feels like I bust tournies alot with AK. Outside of the usual blind v blind/ button vs blind antics, it seems rare to get it in vs anything other than a PP of some kind. Without many hands that we dominate, should we be more inclined to flat a 3bet for example rather than 4betting.
I'll give you an example of what I mean...
superoller, you have 35bb and raise from mid position to 2bb with AK
villain has you covered, and 3bets to 6bb. Villain isn't overly agro, and has a reasonably tight 3betting range.
...flat, shove or fold?
Comments
the main argument being that early in a tournament, when there are lots of poor [relative to their high standsards] players still in, a seat in the tournament at that stage is more valuable than the few chips in ev you gain by comitting / 3betting with hands like AK and AQ. they even go further and in the book fold top pair second kicker when out of position against a single bet v tricky players OOP etc.
i've seen it here myself. in DTD last month i had the pleasure of having one of the sites big-hitters on my left. even when folded to me in the SB he flatted AKs and AQo v my raise into his BB. its likely a measure of the post flop edge that he has.
he prolly feels that the proposition of engineering a flip situation or picking up my raise is less valuable than having position, a strong range and a disguised hand v someone he has solid edge on.
certianly made playing ace high flops a nightmare against him.
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re your senario:
much of the value of AK comes from fold equity. you're right that if we have little fold equity AND dominated hands like AQ, AJ KQs aren't three bet / calling then jamming AK becomes less attractive over a three-bet. but i guess it's summat we have to do, certainly OOP. IP can we flat? just seems so meh and passive?
i'm jamming personally, but am more than open to being wrong.
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another question who would you rather play against:
someone who is passive v raises pre: flats a lot of raises, 3 bets a polarised range that is weighted to value and whose range can be strong on a wide variety of board textures post flop
or
someone who is aggressive v raises pre: 3bets you liberally, has an expanded value range that make it hard to 4 bet bluff, is often weak on ace high boards in single raised pots
does it change if you are IP or OP?
should that inform our own playing style when facing a raise?
In Response to Re: AK and AQ : Funny. On the final table of the £22 deepstack last night you raised me pre-flop and I called with AQ. You had A10 and the hand was split. Afterwards you said I should've three-bet pre to get it in!
I think the majority of players flat AQ + JJ as a default now. (May be wrong, just my experience)
In your example I'd be factoring in villain's position/stack size/image into my decision. Readless I still think 4-bet Gii is optimal.
As far as three-betting AQ is concerned though. It's one of my most hated starting hands, because it seems to get me in a lot of trouble, so I am generally very cautious with it. I'm far more likely to three-bet with AJ than I am with AQ.
This is a good topic that you've made as I have noticed recently that whenever I am 4bet jamming AK I'm usually always walking into a pocket pair mainly JJ+ and sometimes AK. The times they fold I guess I'm folding out AJ-AQ (hands we crush) and low PPs.
Could it be profitable to flat the 3bet IP?
Let's say blinds are 100/200, both have 7k effective stacks, we flat the 3bet, pot is 2500 and villain leads for 1200
Flop:
A58r - Villain probably cbets and gives up once we call
8h3c2c - Villain cbets we fold? villain chks to allow us to bet our AK, AQ
TQ4r - Can we get villain to fold 88-99 here? That's if he has this in his 3bet range
I guess what I'm trying to say is, if we flat the 3bet, will there be more favourable flops for us than against? Obviously if villain has AQ, AJ then we have him crushed, but in your scenario with him having a tight 3bet range I would guess it would be something more like JJ+, AK
I do love exiting a tourne with AK though, i must say. The classic 'ahh well i had AK, what ya gunna do'
AK is a hand i take a step further and do a 4betting as that could get some to do jamming with QQ and if i have KK i have better chance of going all in ahead.
3 betting with AK AQ could get more QQ and JJ to 4bet allowing KK to get itself ahead more often.
4 bet shoving with AK i see as a way of allowing the vunerable JJ and QQ to feel safer now that some middle pairs might call.
If he's got a pretty tight 3b range and isn't particularly aggro, especially when stacks are shallow and it's the super roller he's never 3betting hands that we wouldn't mind getting him to fold like 88-99, apart from the odd AQ (which not everyone 3bets) we're probably getting vvv few folds and will never be getting it in better than a flip (or a chop with AK). Also I think 35xBB is pretty big to ship over a 6xBB 3bet.