Bluffing is one of the key elements of poker and what makes it such a great
game. If in every game of poker, every player knew every other players’ cards,
the best hand would always win. What fun is that? But the fact that poker is a
game of imperfect, incomplete information makes it possible to win just by
representing that you have the best hand -- and getting the other players to
believe you. That’s what it means to bluff.
In it’s simplest terms, to
bluff means to bet or raise with an inferior or weak hand. Bluffing is an
essential skill for a good poker player, and it’s important to understand how
and when to bluff if you want to be a winning player.
It’s easy to win
when you get dealt aces every hand, but the odds are against that. In order to
be a profitable player, you’ll need to be able to win even with inferior cards.
On the other hand, if you bluff too much and in the wrong situations,
you’ll also be a losing player, so balance is important.
There are 2 major kinds of bluffs:
Pure bluff -- When a player
makes a pure bluff, he bets or raises with a bad hand that has little to no
chance of improving. For example, if in five-card draw, a player has nothing but
a king-high and raises, hoping everyone will fold.
Semi-bluff --
When a player bets on a hand that is probably not the best hand at the moment,
but has a chance of improving later in the hand, it is called a semi-bluff. For
example, if a player has 4 cards to a straight or flush in Texas Hold’em on the
flop and bets, that’s a semi-bluff.
Many players make the mistake of thinking that bluffing
means that every X number of hands, you must pretend you have a big hand, no
matter what he/she has or what other players appear to have. That technically
may be bluffing, since that player is trying to represent a bigger hand than
they have -- but if you don’t pay attention to the other players and pick your
spots, bluffing can be a costly part of poker.
Remember: While bluffing
is an essential skill to learn, it is not a mandate or rule of poker. Poker does
not care how much or how often you bet. You will not be measured by how often
you bluff, but by how often it works.
The Best Times to Bluff are
when you can meet at least one of the following conditions:
- You are in late position and no one before you is representing a strong hand
- The board cards or cards you have showing make it possible for you to
represent a strong hand
- You have a table image of a rock
- You have read other players' tells and sense they are weak and will fold to
a bet or raise
- You are facing only one opponent
The Worst Times to Bluff
are:
- When you know a player still in the hand is the kind who never folds
- When a player has so much money in the pot that your raise or bet will not
be enough to force him to fold
- There are still many players in the hand
