When to bluff

We have already said that bluffing is a very overrated concept in poker and generally you should stick to some good solid value betting if you want to make the most money. There is a time and place for bluffing and the skill is not in being brave enough to do it, but knowing when to do it. Here are some of the most favourable times to bluff.

When you are in position – When you are last to act it is significantly more favourable to bluff than when you are not. Assuming your opponent has checked to you, it’s more likely that they have missed the flop because they would surely have bet otherwise. This only really works in pots with just one opponent and make sure you make a note if it turns out they were trap checking to you.

With a draw – When you hold a strong draw, like four cards to a straight or flush, this can be a profitable time to bluff. This move is known as a ‘semi bluff’ and as the name suggests, its part bluff and actually part value bet. The benefit of this move is that you can often win the pot right there, but even if you don’t, there is a good chance you will hit your draw and win a much bigger pot by all of a sudden turning your bluff into a value bet.

On the bubble – When it’s the last place before people get paid in a STT or MTT you can often throw a lot of conventional poker wisdom out of the window and steal a lot of pots. As long as you have the opponent covered (ie. you have more chips than them) they will often fold almost all their hands until they get over the line and into the money.

On a paired board – When there is a pair on the flop, for example a flop of JJ6, this is a good time to bluff for a number of reasons. It’s less likely that anyone else has a strong hand because the number of hands that hit such a flop is small and with only two cards remaining in the deck of the same rank of that pair, it’s unlikely anyone has made trips. The other reason to go for it is because everyone will be scared of you possibly making trips; the board has some very obvious scare cards. If you end up running into trips yourself you were just unlucky.

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