During Season 1 of High Stakes Poker, Doyle Brunson ran a failed bluff against his friend, Ted Forrest. After he was caught, Brunson was heard mumbling to himself “I know better than to bluff an idiot.”
Brunson obviously doesn't believe that Forrest is bad at poker — rather, he was just humorously lamenting his bluff getting called. Regardless of this, many of us took his words completely out of context. They use them as a mantra to remind themselves to not attempt to bluff players in small stakes games which they view as a sea of idiocy teeming with schools of fish incapable of folding.
The truth of the problem is, if you’re not bluffing, then you’re not playing poker. You’re fidgeting with one hand tied behind your back. This was an enormous mistake I made once I began playing live cash games. After I realized this, my results started to improve dramatically.
Why Bluff?
In my first live cash game, I quickly noticed players limp-called with much weaker hands than they do online. Then in the event that they made a couple or had a draw, they’d call all the way down to the river. They simply desired to see if the hand they made was better than the hand I USED TO BE betting. Usually, it wasn’t. This allowed me to print money by just betting big hands. I BELIEVED to myself, “if they’re going to name my value hands, why should I ever bluff?”
There were two big issues of this sticking with this strategy. For one, I didn’t make big hands often enough. Once one in all them got cracked, I gave back the little bit of money I’d made. The larger problem, though, was within the stereotyping of players as “idiots.” They weren't idiots. They simply found joy in making big hands and winning. Eventually, they realized that I USED TO BE a nit and that the hands they made weren't sufficiently big to overcome me.
Occasionally, I’d find that one guy who would announce “Oh, Carlos is betting? I DO KNOW you’ve got the nuts... sigh, I call... nice hand.” I loved that guy, but he’s one in one million nowadays. Most of my opponents soon realized that once I bet, I had it. In the event that they could crack my big hands, they’d call. If not, they’d fold. I, the learned poker scholar who’d mastered tight-aggression and not bluffed the river, had become the “idiot.”
The “never bluff and print money” game I’d found had become the “never bluff and not make money” game. After engaged on the neglected bluffing 1/2 my betting range, I learned learn how to do it correctly and started playing a fully new game called... poker.
What is Poker?
Poker is a game of adjustments. Your job is to regulate until you locate an even mixture of value bets and bluffs that best exploits your opponent’s mixture of value bets and bluffs. In the event that they truly never fold, then never bluffing is the proper strategy. Just look forward to aces, shove, and collect the opposite stacks at the table often enough to shop for yourself a couple of islands.
In reality, we all know that they do fold sometimes. So now, we will be able to improve on that strategy by finding the days once they fold after which bluffing. Even I knew this back once I “never” bluffed. That’s why I MIGHT continuation bet on ace-high flops once I didn’t have an ace. The play had become so automatic in my game that I’d completely forgotten that continuation betting with no pair is, in fact, a bluff.
The problem I bumped into is that there are some players in small stakes games who will call that bluff without an ace. Most times, I DIDN'T double-barrel the turn. The days I did, I rarely triple-barreled because I ASSUMED they’d never fold the river. Now I DO KNOW I USED TO BE just fooling myself. That is just a legitimate concern in games where people consistently play with small stacks.
Bluffing requires the power to position significant pressure for your opponent. So as to do this, it's important to remember to have enough chips within the effective starting stacks to size bets large enough to get the job done. In my game, the stacks were deep. My problem was not that I shouldn’t bluff — it was that I didn’t continue my bluffs often enough against players who called the flop bet with weak ranges.
An Example Bluff
Preflop
A lot of well-intentioned aggressive players make their first mistake once they attempt to bluff small stakes players with bad hands preflop. Very rarely do these players fold before the flop. The entire reason they're playing is to look in the event that they could make a hand. Of their minds, in the event that they are going to fold on your preflop raises, then they are going to besides stay home.
A bad preflop bluffing hand is person who has little or no potential to become the most efficient hand postflop. This usually means hands which can be unpaired, unsuited, unconnected, and never very big. Raising hands like these in small stakes games, then not being willing to bluff on multiple streets when called, is a recipe for disaster. Should you aren’t a professional on postflop bluffing, it's important to tighten up your preflop range.
Flop
Once you do get a hand with that you can raise preflop, you’re going to be stronger on average going into the flop than the players who limp-call before the flop. Because of this you might be likely to have the most productive hand. More importantly, you are going to have a powerful drawing hand that you could use as a semi-bluff when you find yourself behind. Let’s take a look at an example of a hand where I choose to bluff my loose friend postflop.
My friend, let’s call him Sticky, limps in from middle position. I raise from the button and get called by the massive blind and Sticky. The flop comes 
. It is a good flop for my range which has a large number of 
hands. It checks to me and that i make a continuation bet, the large blind folds, and Sticky calls. Great.
Sticky is the fellow about whom I used to have nightmares. He's the foundation for the “I should move as much as where they respect my raises” fallacy. When he calls my c-bet, he may have a set, two pair, an , a 
, a 
, any small-to-medium pocket pair, or any of the available gutshots.
If he has any pair, he’s happy because he’s made a hand. This was his purpose in calling preflop. He’s not only going to fold it to a single continuation bet. When I fire the flop, I DO KNOW I’m going to need to fire the turn nearly all of the time to convince him to fold his weakest pairs.
Turn
The turn is the 
(completing the rainbow). That is where I used to move wrong. I wouldn’t fire the second one barrel because I knew he wouldn’t fold. If he didn’t believe me at the flop, why would he believe me at the turn?
I’d needless to say one time I barreled the turn and got my self-righteous suited-Broadway cards beaten by some guy with a trashy bottom pair when the river went check-check. I’d say to myself “This time, I’m unlikely to throw good money after bad.” I’d silently chant Brunson’s sage advice to myself and judge to test it down. Sometimes, should you were sitting close enough, it is advisable sniff a whiff of defeatism within the sigh I’d undoubtedly exhale.
But that was yesterday. Today, I barrel the turn. I now know that this bet adds credibility to the tale that I'VE a large ace. Regardless of my selective memory, a lot of my opponents will fold to a large turn barrel (that is, if the turn doesn’t improve their hand). Unfortunately for me, ol’ Sticky McCallingston can have anything, so I don’t know if this card improves his hand or not.
He calls the turn bet. This is able to mean he has the ace, but because he's Sticky, he may also have every other pair or draw. I used to take the pessimistic view that he’s calling with every possible pair and that i couldn't beat any of them. Now, I instead notice the great news, that's that he didn't raise. This permits me to take away the strongest hands from his range, like a fair two-pair hand or better, because he would have likely raised the turn with these.
The bad news is this turn card improves his range significantly. NUMEROUS his pairs picked up draws and many his draws picked up pairs. But even this has a bright side — I now have a good suggestion of which river cards are good for me and which might be bad for me.
River
Finally, we get to the... river. Just the sound of the word used to conjure up bad feelings for me. Previously, by this point I'D have already mentally looked at of the hand. This was an enormous mistake since the river is the spot within the hand where you've gotten probably the most information and where people play the worst. Now in preference to being fearful, I’ve come to appreciate that that is where I WILL have my biggest edges and win my biggest pots.
I know that Sticky isn't prone to have a powerful hand for the reason that he didn't raise the turn. If he were drawing to a robust hand, I DO KNOW which cards he’s on the lookout for. The board is , so the cards right across the middle of the pack may help his pair-plus-a-draw hands. They may give him a straight or two pair. Chances are, he’ll let me know in the event that they do by betting.
I is not going to reveal the river card, but I CAN say that he checks to me again. Within the past, I’d check back and get ready to muck. Now I see his check as a green light to make my move. IT'S NOT THAT I AM expecting to make him fold the days he has an ace or better. I just need to get him off of his weakest pairs that didn't improve to 2 pair or a straight. For this, I WILL BE ABLE TO size my bluff smaller. This has the added benefits of needing to work less often and probably being successful more really because it looks as if a skinny value bet.
Even for ol’ Sticky it’s going to be very difficult to make this call with a hand like or 
, especially if the river is another overcard and the entire draws miss.
But What In the event that they Call?
If you bluff and get called, don’t worry. It’s not presupposed to work on every occasion. Don’t be ashamed to turn your hand. This may increasingly lead your opponents to name you down more lightly within the future.
Meanwhile after they show the winner, pay particular attention to the hand that called you. If he shows you top pair or better, don’t worry since you weren’t seeking to make him fold that hand, anyway. If he shows you bottom pair, then you definitely really are coping with a maniac and you'll return to never bluffing, but only against him specifically.
Conclusion
If the folk for your small stakes game don't surrender easily with their wide ranges early within the hand, then you definately should discover where they do surrender and bluff them there in preference to not bluffing them in any respect. To be able to do this, you’re going to need to play hands that let you get to those spots with decent equity so that you can use as a Plan B in case they do hero-call you.
Those who live and die by Brunson’s often misunderstood words either face players they don’t have enough history with to take advantage of their nittiness, or they're fortunate enough to have truly found the last game of standard idiots in existence. Luckily for them, they may be able to continue to play No-Bluff-It Stack’em.
But the remainder of us had better discover ways to box with both hands if we wish to play No-Limit Hold’em.
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