Question is straightforward I think.

I was playing live poker the other day and I had a villain which showed 4-5 bluffs he made against me. All the same, save for the times he got called, there were another 4-5 times that when he bet, I folded and he didn't show.

Since villain is loose, I think he's overbluffing. To make the problem easier, let's assume that bluffs on the river make 50% of his river bets.

So if he's only showing me bluffs -which I guess doesn't necessarily mean that he's showing me all of his bluffs- can we estimate the odds for the percentage which is value among the hands he doesn't show?

If not, I guess we can assume that by virtue of him only showing me bluffs, the percentage of value among the hands not shown will be higher than our baseline assumption about his value-bluff frequencies correct?

Maybe villain is not showing made hands that are counted as bluffing for example the board is T82A4 and villain bets hard with pair of eights not realising that he is polarizing.

the problem is dont always win when you value bet, and thee hand doesnt end once you called when the bluff only with once exception on the river.

If he is showing you 50% of his bluffs, then he would have bluffed and not showed as many times as he showed, right? If he showed 5 times, those 5 times would be half, right? I think that would mean the 5 times he didn't show were also bluffs?

But something isn't right here because he must also bet for value sometimes on the river.

I think you could get further with this if you knew how many hands he played and how many times he bet on the river, total, not just in hands with you. But if you had numbers for only hands you played with him, you could work with that.

See, unless I missed something, all you have typed is that he bet on about ten hands on the river and 5 of those were bluffs.

My guess is that he is showing all of his bluffs.

Anyway, this villain's bluff rate is at least 50%, unless I missed something. With David Sklansky active in this forum, damn, I hate to be typing formulas, but here goes:

Pot size = 100
River bet = 20

We will assume that you win every time he bluffs and that you win 50% of the time when he is not bluffing.

This happens when he is bluffing:

Your EV = 120 (pot plus his river bet)

That happens 50% of the time.

This is what happens 25% of the time, when he wins the hands, from your point of view:

Your EV = -20 (you lose the river bet)

This is what happens the other 25% of the time:

Your EV = 120 (pot plus his river bet)

So this is the formula:

(.5*120)+(.25*-20)+(.25*-120)

=(.75*120)+(.25*-20)

= 90 - 5

= 85

Which is a lot higher than your EV for folding, which is zero. If it were like this, you'd call 100% of the time.

Don't take what I have typed as being correct until you know that it has been reviewed by people here, who I hope will confirm that I have done this correctly. If I haven't, they will pipe up.

Then the thing for you to do is play around with that pot size and bet size and bluffing percentage see what numbers are needed for you to reach an EV of zero. If the bluffing percentage is correct, he could make a pot size bet and your best strategy is still to call every time.



The reason I think that he is showing all his bluffs is that when I show bluffs, I show all of them, and I want the villains at the table to think that some of the ones I am not showing are also bluffs. My reason is that I think this increases the likelihood of their calling when I bet for value.

If you want to figure out your best strategy, if you would estimate his bluffing percentage and the pot size, somebody here could help you with that, for sure.

The way you phrased that last question--it's really cryptic--it could just be me, but I don't know exactly what you are asking.

Hey, if you keep playing in this game, let me know how it goes--because I am interested in how this works out. I don't mind helping, as I can, with some math. But I am not David Sklansky and so I would always want you to get my math checked, which should be no problem at this place.

Understand that I am not advising you to call every time. My results are based on the numbers I used, which I pulled out of the sky. I do not know the average pot size or the size of his average river bet.

I thought I had typos in that last sentence, but now I think it's just unclear typing. Basically, if he showed you only 50% of his bluffs, that would mean the other 5 hands were bluffs he did not show you. (which leaves no value bets)

If he bet on the river 10 times and showed you 5 bluffs, he is bluffing a lot.

Play with that formula, change it around so that he is making pot size bets and half pot size bets on the river.

The results might surprise you.

You should also try to pick up some kind of a tell on this guy. Ask him some question like Tom Dwan does.

Also, see if you can determine whether there is a bet sizing difference between his river value bets and river bluffs.

If this guy showed you 5 bluffs--that is enough to cause a whole lot of Heroes to tilt. Really. I would imagine he got you a little worked up.


It also sounds like he was the table captain. But with a little study and a little thought, you might be able to pull off a successful mutiny.

OP didn’t say V is showing 50% of his bluffs. He said “let's assume that bluffs on the river make 50% of his river bets.” This is the same as assuming V is bluffing ½ of the time on river bets.

Yeah, I see. But I think the way I did the math agrees with what you are saying--and with what he said.

A 50% bluffing minimum seems like its a lot but I don't think the premise of a known bluffing percentage can stand up on its own.

For example, when running card dead, I don't act like I'm running dead which is a common mistake. I act like I'm playing tight which allows me to make more bluffs that doesn't look out of line.

So in that example, I could theoretically have a tight image, with a 100% bluffing percentage that really only boiled down to variance.

I don't know that showing changes things much. I never showed bluffs. Getting caught bluffing presents a much stronger LAGGY image than showing.

I think the more important factor is keeping everything consistent with the image your presenting at the moment..