You’re sitting in the hijack at a 6-max No-Limit Hold’em cash table, playing online poker for real money at Ignition. Here come your hole cards: Eight-Four suited, both Hearts. Not exactly a premium hand – but you’re feeling spicy, so you open anyway. The big blind calls, and the flop comes King-Five-Three with two Hearts and a Club. You continuation bet, the big blind calls. Turn is a Nine of Clubs. You bet again, the big blind calls. River is a Six of Clubs. You’ve got absolutely nothing – but you go all-in! And your opponent folds!
Congratulations: You just ran a sick poker bluff. There’s nothing quite like getting your opponent to fold and surrender all those chips when you’ve got a trash hand. In fact, if you want to be a winning poker player in the long run, you have to put moves like this in your arsenal. But as always, there’s a time to bluff and a time to just muck your cards. This guide will show you what bluffing is all about, and how to develop poker bluffing strategies that will pay out handsomely in the long run.
What Is a Poker Bluff?
The word bluff is a familiar everyday term in the English language, but it first came to us from the Netherlands. Its use can be traced back to 1791, and probably comes from the Dutch word bluffen, which means “to brag” or “to deceive.” The word bluffen was later applied to card games where players with a weak hand can trick their opponents into folding; in fact, brag itself was a British version of one of these games, a precursor of modern poker that was played in the 1700s.
Poker bluff is an efficient strategy if done well. Learn how to buff in online poker and when you should do it. Read our bluffing guide to trick other players.
Sep 13, 2017 Floating the Flop to Bluff the Turn – Poker Strategy Power Moves. Spend three minutes right now learning to float the flop in order to set up a sweet bluff on the turn in the latest Poker. Bluffing Strategy and Tips – By: Chris “Fox” Wallace Bluffing Strategy and Tips. The basis of bluffing strategy is a simple pot odds calculation. In it’s simplest form it can be stated as: “The chances of your bluff working must be higher than the odds you are getting from the pot.”.
There are multiple ways to deceive your opponents in poker. For example, you can slowplay a strong hand and fool your opponent into thinking you’re weak. But that’s not a bluff – it’s the opposite. Bluffing is specifically when you bet or raise with a weak hand, hoping to get your opponent to fold a stronger hand. And there are many different kinds of bluffs you can run at the poker table.
What Is a Pure Bluff?
Poker is a popular card game that combines elements of chance and strategy. There are various styles of poker, all of which share an objective of presenting the least probable or highest-scoring hand. A poker hand is usually a configuration of five cards depending on the variant, either held entirely by a player or drawn partly from a number of shared, community cards. The profit you earn from playing semi-bluffing poker comes from having two ways in which you can win the pot. If your opponent folds to your bluff bet, then your bluff will work and you get paid off.
Bluffs can be categorized by their strength, much like the standard poker hand ranking list from High Card to Royal Flush. The weakest of all bluffs is the pure bluff, also known as the naked bluff. This is when you bet or raise with a hand that doesn’t have any outs, meaning it can’t draw to a made hand that can beat your opponent.
Of course, if you’re already on the river and you haven’t made your hand (like in the above example), then every bluff can be considered a pure bluff. But even then, some bluffs are stronger than others – as we’ll explain shortly.
What is a Semi-Bluff?
Once your bluffing hand actually has some equity behind it, you’re moving into semi-bluff territory. This is a hand that is probably weaker than your opponent’s, but if they don’t fold, you still have a chance of drawing to a better made hand by the river. Classic hands to semi-bluff include open-ended straight draws, where you have four consecutive cards to a straight (preferably your two hole cards, plus two on the board), and flush draws, where you have four cards of the same suit.
There’s some debate over whether weaker draws like gutshots (where you have four outs instead of eight or nine) and backdoor draws (where you only have three of the five cards you need) can be considered semi-bluffs. The same goes for combo draws like straight flush draws where you have 14 outs or more, and your hand probably has more equity than your opponent’s, even if they happen to be ahead at the moment. Don’t worry about this debate too much – it’s just words. The important thing to grasp is the concept that you have two ways to win with a semi-bluff:
- Get your opponent to fold; or failing that
- Make the better hand by the river
When Should I Bluff?
Now it’s time to employ a little strategy. If you play real money poker and you never bluff, your opponents will eventually get wise and stop paying you off when you bet or raise. Poker wizards have done the math, and they’ve proven what the old-school rounders always knew: A healthy balance of bluffs and value bets will deliver the biggest rewards.
Picking and choosing the right times to bluff is the tricky part. If you’re relatively new at this game, one of the best poker tips we can give you is to bluff sparingly. Treat this weapon with great care because bluffing can cost you dearly if you don’t do it correctly. Let’s start with pre-flop play, because that’s easy – don’t bluff. Use a linear range, opening your strongest hands from early position, then widening your range as you move around the table. Do this with your 3-bets and 4-bets as well.
Once you reach the flop, stick with the stronger semi-bluffs when you’re ready to get tricky. An open-ended straight draw gives you eight outs, and a flush draw gives you nine outs; if your opponent doesn’t fold, your chances of completing by the river with either of these hands are about 1-in-3. You won’t be playing Game-Theory Optimal (GTO) poker by any means with this strategy, but as a beginner, minimizing mistakes should be your focus.
Double-Barreling and Triple-Barreling
So let’s say you’ve got a flush draw on the flop and you decide to bluff. Your opponent calls. Now what do you do on the turn? A second bet might get your opponent to fold – this is called a double-barrel, as in the barrel of a gun. Or they might call again, or even raise you on the turn. It’s a sticky situation.
Again, if you’re a beginner, we recommend you keep it simple and try not to think about too many things at once. For now, focus on the turn card itself. If it’s a blank, i.e. a card that doesn’t connect well with the rest of the board (or complete your flush), go ahead and double-barrel. Remember, the whole idea behind the bluff is that you want your opponent to think that you have a made hand. If the turn card does connect with the board, abandon ship for now and check instead – unless you make your flush. Then go ahead and bet for value; you could slowplay, but that’s for more advanced players.
If you bluff both the flop and the turn and you still can’t get your opponent to fold, you could fire that third barrel on the river if you don’t make your flush, just like the scenario we brought up at the start of this guide. But we encourage you to pump the brakes and check instead if you’re a beginner. By the time you get to the river, the pot should be pretty big, and making big mistakes in big pots is a great way to drain your bankroll. Save that triple-barrel bluff for when you’ve got some more experience under your belt.
Bluffing 102
Okay, now it’s finally time to take the training wheels off. You’ve played poker for a little while, you’ve gotten comfortable with semi-bluffs, and you have some sense of what you’re getting yourself into. Let’s take a deeper dive into the art of bluffing. There are tons of good spots for intermediate players to run more speculative bluffs; the key is to target opponents who have wide ranges and are more likely to fold.
The simple check-raise bluff on the flop with a gutshot or backdoor combo draw (three cards to a straight flush) is the easiest of these to pull off. If you call a late-position open from the big blind, you can often get your opponent to fold by check-raising, since their chances of connecting with the board are relatively small. And if they do continue, a double-barrel or even a triple-barrel will have more chance of success against their weaker range. Plus, you still have outs to make a better hand.
Your bluff will have even more chance of success if you take blockers into account. In the above example, the board was King-Five-Three-Nine-Six. There are two ways your opponent could have a straight here: Eight-Seven (making 98765), or Four-Deuce (making 65432) – although they’ll be more likely to call from the big blind with Eight-Seven. But wait: You have both an Eight and a Four in your hand. You are blocking your opponent from holding some of the combinations that would have you beat. This could be a great spot to run a triple-barrel bluff.
It could be. If you’re an expert, you’re probably shaking your fist and saying something like “But the big blind has way more of those small cards in their range than the hijack. Plus, they’re more likely to hit that backdoor Club flush. And why were you opening Eight-Four suited in the first place?” Very good – you’ve been playing this game for a while, haven’t you? There’s a lot more to running a really sick bluff than what we’ve mentioned here thus far. But this is a great place to start if you want to get better at poker. Keep working on those bluffs, and we’ll see you at the tables.
Poker bluffing is a very important aspect of the game of poker.
Basic Poker Strategy
In basic terms bluffing in poker is when a player fakes a move and also fakes his face against his desired or real motives, luring his opponents to act in a desired way.
How To Bluff In Poker
To be successful in poker bluffing, the bluffer must know the thoughts of the other players so as to create a game plan for winning.
Life is not always a matter of holding good cards, but sometimes, playing a poor hand well.
The understanding and awareness of certain factors are very important in poker bluffing.
Some of which are the types of poker players at the table, the number of the opponents on the table, the ability of the bluffer to read the plays of his opponents, the cards on the board post-flop, the image already created by the bluffer for himself at the table, the size of the pot already on the table and his position in the hand.
Before I begin with my list I would like to share you my favorite bluffing video featuring Chris Moneymaker in the 2003 WSOP for some inspiration. He really shows us how to bluff in poker.
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Top 10 Poker Bluffing Tips
So there are many tips and how to guide on how to master the art of poker bluffing. Here is my very own top 10 of different ways to bluff in poker. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did writing it.
Winning with poker bluffing requires you to not play every hand, and you should always reserve your bluffing for the moments of better chances of winning.
Most people can’t skip a round even when they are given a lousy starting hand because they get bored when they fold.
They cannot stand to wait for the next hand and play anyway, leading to loss of money to them.
However, it will eventually be discovered by people if you never put any money on the table without having four of a kind first, leading to smaller pots on your winning hands because your opponents will definitely fold.
You should always bluff a maximum of 2 players at a time if you want to be successful at poker bluffing.
With many active players at the poker table, you are not likely to scare more than 2 away.
Going against this rule causes one of the unmoved players to call your bluff if he has a really good hand.
In most cases, pots with more than 2 players are not profitable for bluffing because the more the opponents you are betting into, the less willing a player would be to call.
You should not bluff when playing against bad or newbie players, as these people frequently call bets regardless of the strength of their hand.
They do this because they still don’t know what the game is all about, and are thus happy to call down bets with mediocre hands.
Inexperienced or bad players do not have the ability to fold, while a good player first tries to understand the strength represented by you.
This rule should be followed even if you feel you have a stronger hand.
Your bluffing should always be based on the pot odds, which means you should always display the attitude of a person with a winning hand each time you bluff.
In most cases, a player anticipates folding of a minimum of one hand when he bluffs.
But, you will be exposed if your bluff fails because there is no fold.
A player is not likely to fold if there is more money in the pot because he has more to gain by playing while your bluff will fold more hands with a small pot.
Therefore, a bluff should not be wasted on a large pot.
Bluffing is a good strategy which can be done when you actually hold aces full of kings.
It could even be done if you had low bets and a good hand, as that is a tactic which engages your opponents, forcing them to add to the pot for you to end up with a bigger pot when the hope of winning is lost.
You should also pay attention to the opponents who have folded already, because a player who is out of a hand tends to register more emotion on his face.
If a person folds an eight, it is easier for you to know before two eights are on the board.
In addition, if you notice that a player is upset, there are more chances of you being able to bluff the remaining opponents in the hand and take the pot.
Though bluffing is a common poker strategy, a long time is needed to really be good at it.
You should know when to bluff, making it a strategy that should be launched by experienced players.
Most inexperienced players think that to really become a winning poker player, they need to bluff.
This is not true, because it is possible to be a winning poker player without even bluffing once.
Thus, your bluffs should be limited as much as possible.
They are to be used only in situations where you are sure your opponent will be forced to fold.
You should never be compelled to bluff because you have not done that for a long time.
If all signs indicate that your opponent has a strong hand, you should not bluff.
If you cannot just sit without doing anything, using a semi-bluff is a good idea. This is the type of bluff backed up by a decent poker hand.
The semi-bluff works if you are both having the same hand, and though it is an aggressive move, it is not as risky as a true bluff.
It is a large bet that is being made by you to avoid a showdown, but you would not be helpless even if the showdown were to still occur.
If your betting shows a consistent trend, you should bluff.
For instance, if you had a pre-flop raised in a game holding 6-6, and the flop produced A Q 5 after getting a caller, it would be an indication of the best time to bluff because of the consistent trend.
At the same time, this should be done carefully and not too frequently during the course of the entire game, or you would be caught by the other players that you were just bluffing.
The secret of an effective bluff here is not making the others to be aware that you are following a specific trend or that you are bluffing or not during the game.
If you completely missed the flop after pre-flopping with a good hand, it could be a good idea to repeat that bet.
In some cases, this is a good time to bluff because a better hand could still be made with subsequent cards.
Now, many of the other players are aware that your bet pre-flopped the last time, and don’t know that you missed it.
If you represent your bet, pressure will be put on the other players because they will have the suspicion that you now have something better than you have actually.
Bluffing also works when there is a pair on the board.
The reason is that the chances of a person hitting a hand are reduced.
When you have 2 cards, and they are the same cards on the board, it means they are less of a flush possibility (not the same suit), less of a straight possibility (not ordered), and that out there, there are only 2 other cards which could match them to make a set.
It could be that those 2 cards had not yet come, or were either buried (especially in a low pair, would people often fold lower cards pre-flop).
In this situation, it is like having 2 cards coming on the flop, and statistically, this means only a few people would have a drawing hand or have hit their hand.
Therefore, you have a good opportunity for bluffing.
final thoughts
Poker bluffing is an art because the player needs to consider a lot of factors.
At the same time, the paradox of bluffing is that if nobody has ever caught you bluffing, you are either not bluffing enough or you are one of the best bluffers.
You would be bluffing too frequently if you were caught almost every time you bluff.
Late positioning and sensing weaknesses should form part of your bluffing strategies and though they do not usually win a pot, they narrow it down to a few people.
Now you should go and practice your newly learned poker bluffing skills by playing some real poker.