Big, multi-street bluffs are rare in most no-limit games. But the threat of a large, multi-street bluff looms over practically every hand and influences many decisions. No-limit would be a lot simpler game if large bluffs did not exist. For example, suppose you hold top pair and are out of position.
If you know for certain that your opponent would never bluff all three streets, you can use a very easy method. Simply check, call the flop and turn, and check again on the river. If your opponent bets for value, you’re out and can fold.
But if your opponent occasionally bluffs on the river, everything changes. Now, you can’t just call the flip and turn because you might put all of your money in only to be bluffed on the river. Or you’ll occasionally pay off a better hand on the river. The mere threat of a massive bluff causes you to reconsider your approach for the entire hand.
Even while massive bluffs occur in only a small fraction of all no-limit hands, the threat of a big bluff alters optimal play in many hands. As a result, it’s vital to understand how to launch massive bluffs when they’re appropriate.
Big bluffs have a considerably higher impact on no-limit strategy than their frequency would suggest.
Two Keys To Big Bluffs
Opportunities to run big bluffs arise fairly commonly. But to run bluffs effectively, you need to figure out which opportunities are good and which ones aren’t. There are two keys to identifying good situations for big bluffs:
- Be aware of your opponent’s hand range and which hands out of that range you would expect him to call a big bet or get all- in with.
- Be aware of what your hand range looks like to your opponent, and know when you can plausibly represent a hand that would justify a big bet.
Here’s an example of using the two keys to identify a good bluffing opportunity:
You’re in the big blind for a $1-$2 6-max game with $200 effective stacks. A relatively tight player in the hijack starts at $6. A terrible player presses the button, and you respond with 8♥ 7♥. The flop is 9♣ 6♥ 2♦, resulting in an open-ended straight draw on a rainbow board. You check, and the preflop raiser adds $14 to the $19 pot. The button folds, and you make the call. The turn is the 2♥, which pairs the board but provides a flush draw to complement your straight draw. You check, and your opponent places a $30 bet in the $47 pot.
You make a call. The river is 9♠. You completely missed your draws, resulting in a double paired board. There is $107 in the pot and $150 remaining in the stacks.
What is your opponent’s hand range in this scenario? He’s a tight player who bet preflop from the hijack, so he’ll most likely start with high card hands and pocket pairs.
You checked the flip, and he bet more than two-thirds of the pot into two players on a dry, ragged board. He can hold an overpair, or only two overcards. He could have flopped a set, which is much less likely but still possible.
Would your opponent bet overcards on two players? It is feasible, depending on the player’s aggression level. Most decent players understand that continuation betting is more profitable on uncoordinated flops than coordinated ones. So your opponent may assume that he is more likely than usual to receive folds from both opponents and attempt it.
An unassuming card appears on the turn, and your opponent bets again. A second bet typically carries greater implied power than the first, as your opponent may check through the turn with some of the overcard hands in his range. So he may have an overpair. He may even have decided to fire again with overcards, hoping that you called the flip with a weak pair that you will now release to the larger show of strength. He may have elected to fire again, especially if his overcards were suited hearts, as A♥K♥ or K♥ J♥.
He might also have some less likely hands. He may possess a nine with a hand like A♦9♦ or T♦9♦. He may have 99, 66, or 22. He could hold a straight draw using a different combination of 87. It’s also possible (though highly unlikely) that he has a deuce.
Overall, the most likely hands based on the amount of available combinations and betting history are overpairs and overcards (perhaps suited hearts), with nines and sets being less common.
The river brings a second pair on board. Which hands in your opponent’s turn range would he prefer to use to go all-in? He would most likely be comfortable going all-in with only hands including a 9 (A9s, T9s, 99, etc.) and a 22. Overcards, overpairs, and even 66 are suddenly concerned that you have a 9 and so a stronger hand.
So the hands that comprised the majority of the opponent’s range on the turn—overpairs and overcards—now do not want to go all-in. Only a small portion of that turn range will now want to get it in.
Let us re-examine the hand from your opponent’s point of view. What hands can he place you in?
After a poor player entered the pot, you called a typical preflop raise from the large blind. You might hold a wide variety of hands. Your opponent will most likely ignore the strongest hands, as you may have raised with pocket aces, kings, queens, or ace-king.
You checked and went with a raggedy, rainbow flop. With so few draws available on the flip, your opponent will correctly infer that the majority of your range consists of made hands rather than draws: largely pairs with the occasional set or two pair thrown in. If he believes you’re loose, he may include unimproved overcards like A♦J♥ in your range.
After you check and call the innocuous-looking turn, your opponent will reduce your range even further. If you had called the flop with overcards or a weak pocket pair, like as fours, you would have likely lost them to the turn bet. So, given that you checked and called the turn, your most likely hand in your opponent’s perspective is a 9. You could also have a deuce or a pocket pair, such as tens or eights, that you did not raise preflop but may still be the best hand now. You may also be holding 99, 66, or 22.
On the river, if your opponent has an overpair, he is probably cursing his fate. After checking and calling the turn, you were marked with a likely nine, which meant you had two or five outs versus an overpair. While your opponent was well ahead of you on the turn, he’s far behind on the river because to the high probability that you have nines full.
Let’s return to the two keys and recap the debate so far:
Your opponent is most likely holding an overpair or overcards, and he’s unlikely to go all-in with either hand.
From your opponent’s perspective, you’re more likely to have nines full. Other viable hands for you are deuces full or a pocket pair of tens or eights.
This is an excellent opportunity for a big bluff. Your opponent is unlikely to go all-in, and you have a solid, obvious hand to represent. If you go all-in for $150, you have a decent chance of winning the $107 pot.
But, before you put the money in, consider two more considerations.
Even if your opponent dislikes going all-in with an overpair, would he fold it or make a sobbing call? This is a crucial question that will be different for each opponent. Some people will lay the pair down instantly without thinking about it. Some will hesitate and haw, saying something like, “Aces get cracked every time,” before calling. Some people will ponder about it for a long time and then act unexpectedly. Obviously, the bluff will be more effective against players who lay down the pair.
If you decide to bluff, how much should you bet? When bluffing, especially on the river, you usually want to make the smallest bet that is likely to succeed. To “get the job done,” your opponent should fold their hands like pocket queens. A tiny bet could raise suspicions and may not be sufficient. In this case, an all-in overbet is likely your greatest chance of selling the tale that you have a nine and convincing an overpair to fold. However, going all-in isn’t always the greatest decision.
Before proceeding, consider how your opponent perceives your hand range based on the hand you are now holding. You have the lone hand that made a genuine draw on the flop. And you are the only one of the 16 potential combinations of eight-seven to have a flush draw on the turn. Your opponent sees your hand as an abnormality. You’d be more likely to have quads on the river (two hand combinations—99 and 22) than your current hand. Indeed, you ended up playing the flip and turn fairly passively, which may have made quads appear more possible to him.
In other words, the hand you are currently holding is by far the weakest of any hand in your range on the river. And it accounts for only a small portion of your total range. When that occurs, and the hand you really have is both unlikely and significantly weaker than your other conceivable hands, you will frequently have a successful bluffing opportunity.
Big Bluff Practice
The above-mentioned cognitive process is all you need to begin bluffing with power and precision. We’ll now repeat the process with some additional example hands to determine which bluffs make sense and which do not.
Hand 1
Your score is 9♥ 8♥. In a $1-$2 6-max game with $200 stacks, an aggressive player starts under the gun with $6. You make a call, and the blinds fold. The flop is Q ♦7♥6♦, giving you an
Open-ended straight draw. Your opponent bets $10 on the $15 pot, and you call.
The turn is 3♣. Your opponent bets $24 on the $35 pot, and you call.
The river card is the J♣, and your opponent checks. Should you bluff, and how much should you bet?
First, what is your opponent’s range? He raised preflop and then bet twice on the queen-high flop. Because he is an aggressive player, he can use a variety of hands. Most clearly, he may hold either a queen or an overpair. He may also have a hand that resembled an unimproved pocket pair. Higher pairs, such as tens, are most likely (if he bet jacks on the river), although some aggressive players will go all in with a lot of pocket pairs.
Another possibility is a hand that contains a jack, such as ace-jack or king-jack. He bets the flop and turn as a bluff, but then checks the river since he has showdown value.
He may possibly have flopped a flush or straight draw and bet on both streets in a semi-bluff. His river check could symbolize giving up on his bluff.
Possible hands include a flopped medium pair, such as 8♠ 7♠ or K♦7♦, a flopped monster (set or two pair), or entire air.
That’s a rather broad range, but the majority of it consists of hands with some showdown value. Only missed draws and total air hands do not have any showdown value.
Second, how does your range appear to your opponent? You called preflop on the button, then twice on a queen-high, draw-heavy board. Your most obvious options are a queen with a minimal kicker, a flush, or a straight draw. With a powerful hand like ace-queen, two pair, or a set, you would most likely have raised the flop or turn. You might potentially hold a pocket pair, such as jacks or tens, and call this aggressive player’s situation, refusing to give him credit for top pair or better.
Which of those hands would you reasonably bet for value on the river? Except for pocket jacks, you would probably check the pocket pairings. You might bet a queen.
As a result, a river bet here represents a relatively small number of legitimate hands, typically queens with a decent kicker and pocket jacks.
On the other hand, every draw has failed, and the majority of the drawing hands in your range are possible bluffing targets. So, if you bet the river, you represent a relatively small range of genuine value betting hands while also including a large number of busted draws. A river bet is likely to be a bluff from your opponent’s perspective, making this an unfavorable bluffing chance.
Indeed, if your opponent is a savvy player, he may check a fairly decent hand on this river in the hopes of inducing a bluff. He understands that broken draws make up a substantial portion of your range. You’ll fold those hands to a bet, but if checked, you might bluff. Your overall range appears to be very limited, and you have a weak hand. Please check back.
If the river had been a diamond, completing a probable flush, the situation would have shifted dramatically. Because flush draws make up a major amount of your turn calling range, your overall range has improved significantly. Consider the river the A♦. A almost pot-sized river bet would be an effective bluff against many players (except calling stations, of course). The bet is large enough to discourage a crying call from a weak one-pair hand, and you are representing a very plausible holding given your play thus far.
Without the ability to bluff some scary river cards, calling the turn with your straight draw is no better than a roughly break-even proposition. Calling $24 in a $37 pot yields just shy of 2.5-to-1 direct odds. You’re about 4.75–to–1 to hit your straight. If you catch a non-diamond straight card, you’ll hold the nuts, and you’ll likely win a river bet a good percentage of the time. So your implied odds are probably enough to just about break-even on the call, but really no more than that.
Fortunately, you also have some good bluffing outs, which add extra value to your hand. When deciding whether to call the turn with a draw, consider in advance which river cards will present good bluffing opportunities and which ones won’t. Also consider a turn raise.
Hand 2
You open for $7 in a $1-$2 game, with $200 stacks from two off the button with A♦Q♦. The button is a firm, aggressive regular call. The blinds fold.
The flop shows T♣ 9♦4♦, resulting in two overcards and the nut flush draw. You stake the pot ($17), and your opponent responds. This player prefers to call the flop with a variety of hands in order to either make a hand or steal the pot on the turn when he sees weakness.
The turn is the 4♥. Because your opponent frequently attempts to steal against turn weakness, you check with the purpose of triggering a bluff and checkraising. Your opponent also checks, which disappoints you.
The river is 6♣. Is this a suitable time for a bluff?
What is your opponent’s range? So far, he has called preflop on the button, a draw-heavy flop with medium-sized cards, and checked back the turn when the bottom card paired. His scope for these activities is fairly broad.
Preflop, he could call with little and medium pocket pairs (most likely reraising the huge ones). He might also call with two huge cards, suited aces, suited connectors, and possibly some inferior hands as well.
On the flop, he called from position on a draw-heavy board, making it unlikely that he struck a preflop raiser too hard. He could do this almost every time he called preflop. He may fold cards that missed the flop, such 7♠ 5♠, but most of his range will have a pair or draw on the flop. He may raise one of his stronger hands, such as ace-ten, ten-nine, a massive combination draw, or a set. However, he may occasionally flat call with those hands. So his flop call doesn’t significantly reduce his range.
The turn almost completely misses his target range. If he called the flop with a low-value hand like 6♣ 5♣ to exploit turn weakness, he would most likely bet on the turn. And if he had called the turn with a strong hand, he would most likely have bet. So his turn check indicates that his hand has some value, but he wishes to avoid getting checkraised. He may have either a straight or flush draw. He may also have some showdown value with a modest one-pair hand or perhaps a good ace-high.
The river card again misses the range nearly totally. Except for eighty-seven, all of the draws were unsuccessful. Pocket sixes are also within his range. Aside from those hands, the river is likely to disappoint him. So, at this stage, his hands are most certainly busted draws or weak one-pairs. Only a small part of that range will desire to place a large river bet.
What does your range look like to your opponent?
You raised the preflop from two off the button. As an aggressive player, you could hold a variety of hands, including pocket pairs, two huge cards, and suited connectors. You place a bet on a draw-heavy flop when out of position. Your opponent would have to consider the possibility that you could bet the flop with whatever hand you raised preflop. However, this flop hits your opponent’s range quite hard by giving him multiple one-pairs and drawing hands, so you should expect to be called more frequently than usual. As a result, your opponent may deduce that you would check some of your weakest hands, and that your bet implies that you linked with the flop in some way.
The turn card almost certainly did not benefit you. Your turn check might clearly indicate unimproved overcards. If you had an overpair or top pair, offering a free card on this board would be a bit risky. So your check indicates that your opponent can discount such assets slightly. However, if he knows that you are aware that he prefers to call flops light, he may expect that you will check some of your good hands on the turn in order to cause a semibluff.
In other words, your turn check demonstrates some vulnerability, but large hands such as full houses and overpairs are still potentially within your checking range.
The river is also unlikely to have benefited you. So you probably have the hand you checked on the turn. This range has medium strength. You most likely examined several of your unpaired hands, but you may also have checked pairs and whole houses.
Because your range is rather limited, the stars do not align for an ideal bluffing opportunity. However, the opportunity does not have to be flawless to be profitable. Your opponent’s range is often relatively limited. He rarely holds a hand stronger than top pair with a marginal kicker, and most of the time he holds a busted draw or a tiny pair. A pot-sized stake forces your opponent to make a difficult decision, and most opponents will simply fold rather than call the enormous bet with a poor hand, hoping to catch a bluff. You should acquire enough folds for the bluff to be profitable.
Of course, you hold ace-high, so your hand would outstrip some of your opponent’s range in a showdown. The issue with checking for a showdown is that your opponent may value bet the top of his range (top pairs and the odd bigger hand) while also bluffing with some busted draws for balance. If your opponent balances well here, you can’t call economically with ace-high, and enabling him to bluff gives him a big amount of your equity.
In this case, a pot-sized bluff will almost always cause your opponent to fold a superior hand, as well as prevent him from bluffing you off the best hand.
