Raises and 3-betting

I know that in the beginning of the tourney the rule of thumb for raises and 3-betting is 3x blind for a raise and 3x the bet for a 3-bet. At what level do most people begin to scale back to 2.5x and 2.2x for the initial raise and what level do you begin (if ever) to scale back your 3-bet size?

Thanks in advance!

I begin to scale back when the blinds start to represent a significant portion of people's stacks, to around 2.5x

i.e in a sit and go, ave stack =1500, blinds = 15/30 i raise 4xpreflop, but later on,ave stack= 2100 blinds = 75/150 i will raise to maybe 350 and that will be enough

Once the 3BB Bet is around ~ 1/5 -1/7 my (and most other's) stacks, I drop back to 2.5. Normally my 3-bets never scale back, when the bets get that large and I want to 3 bet, it's normally time to push with the 3-bet.

I asked this question in one of the tournament analysis threads and didn't get a response (well, I got one but it wasn't exactly responsive). Seems relevant to this discussion, so let me try again.

loopmeister said:

This was my thinking too, and I would have played it the same. This is despite the adage "never flat a 3bet OOP".

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So why don't we flat a three-bet OOP?

bd

By flatting a 3-bet oop what do you do when you miss the flop? What would you flat with? AQ, TT/JJ ? What if the flop is KQ8, do you donk bet and fold to a reraise? Do you check to the aggressor and fold again? By either 4-betting or folding we are removing ourselves from awkward situations like this post flop

QQ, JJ and TT are exactly the kinds of hands I was thinking about. With those hands I'm not trying to hit a flop so much as control my investment until I make sure my opponent hasn't flopped an overpair.

My typical tight-passive play when I've raised with one of these hands and have been reraised is to call and evaluate the flop, with the idea of trying to control pot size and give myself some wiggle room when the overcard hits. I see the reasoning behind the 4-bet, and the concensus is clearly that I need to up my aggression level in these situations.

bd

ben_rhyno said:

By flatting a 3-bet oop what do you do when you miss the flop? What would you flat with? AQ, TT/JJ ? What if the flop is KQ8, do you donk bet and fold to a reraise? Do you check to the aggressor and fold again? By either 4-betting or folding we are removing ourselves from awkward situations like this post flop

Click to expand...

I think you can also flat 3-bets with small pocket pairs, because you won't get a lot of value if you 4-bet those, hoping to hit a set and eventually winning a big pot which I've experienced in this particular situation.

What do you think?

Misofer said:

I think you can also flat 3-bets with small pocket pairs, because you won't get a lot of value if you 4-bet those, hoping to hit a set and eventually winning a big pot which I've experienced in this particular situation.

What do you think?

Click to expand...

Ehhhh not really.

I mean, ultimately it depends. But usually when facing a 3-bet you're never getting the correct implied odds to set mine. Technically it's ~8:1 odds to flop a set, but since you're not going to get paid off every time you're gonna hit a set, you look for much greater implied odds, like ~20:1. In a tournament, this is pretty much never ever ever going to be the case.

Thanks for the response in ref: to 3-betting and raises. But this thread has turned into something more interesting for me.

So given an opponent that might 3-bet with AQ-A10, KQ, or medium pocket pairs what range are we 4 betting with?