This is from a hand I played tonight in which I lost about 70% of my chips due to a bluff gone wrong.
### Situation
First level. The villain has been playing a lot of hands, most limped, i.e. J8 from UTG.
He seems to stab at a lot of pots as well, but may just have had a good run.
He has not bought the $10 addon yet.
The rebuy period will last for another hour.
### Hand
Blinds are 25/50 I have about 7900 chips so about 160BB. Villain as about 5500 chips (the addon would buy him 3000).
#### Preflop
I get dealt Q♠J♠ in the LJ, 3 people limped in front of me and I call.
Villain in the BU raises to 125 and all 3 call so I get good odds and call as well.
Pot: 625
#### Flop K♠ T♠ 4♦
I have a flush draw paired with an open ended straight draw.
All check, so do I and villain bets 225. All fold, I call.
Pot: 1075
#### Turn Q♥
I check, villain bets 500 and I raise to 2000. I'm not thinking my pair of Q is good, but am putting him on something like AK and
am hoping I can get him off it or make one of my draws and can get a big river bet paid off.
Basically I'm repping AJ here which makes sense from the action so far.
He thinks for a bit and very reluctantly calls, clearly he isn't happy with it.
Pot: 5075
#### River 8♣
So a total brick. He checks to me and I know that if I check here I'm loosing this pot.
However I've been representing a straight draw on the Flop (actually had one) and represented a made straight on the
Turn. So I decide to continue the story. I figure that if he's got AK it is really hard for him to call a large bet.
I think that he'll call if I bet 1/2 pot or below, but figure if I put him for his tournament life he'll let it go. I go allin for my remaining 5550 chips, however since the villain only has 3150 chips in front of him that is the actual bet.
The main reason I did this is because I figured the line made perfect sense.
Of course he could put me on a busted flush draw, but at the moment I found this move was good.
He tanked for a very long time and called to show TT for a set.
### Numbers
I risk 3150 to win 5075. I know if I get called I'm dead.
So how many times does this need to work to break even?
Code:
(1 - x) * 3150 = x * 5075
(1 - x) / x = 5075 / 3150
(1 / x) - 1 = 1.62
1 / x = 2.62
x = 1 / 2.62
x = 0.38
~38%
If he calls me about 62% of the time but folds 38% of the time I'm break even.
Therefore if this bluff works about half the time then it should be positive EV.
But does it?
### Good Bluff Situation?
Well first of all he was a loose player, so he's also more likely to call a bluff.
On top of that he could just rebuy if he busts, making him more likely to call and on top of that he still as a 3K chips
addon chip in front of him that he could easily use to get him back in the game for $10.
Additionally I put him on a worse hand than he had, AK I might have gotten to fold, but not a set.
So overall probably not a good play especially since we were playing with pretty big stacks and there were most likely
better opportunities coming up.
Wondering what others think about this ...