I often see people who check the flop in the dark by instachecking on the flop out of position. I sometimes do this and is this a good idea at these micro levels? I do this when I call a reasonably strong hand preflop and if I'm out of position because I always check to the raiser. However I never check in the dark when I am the preflop raiser.

There's gotta be hundreds of "it depends" factors, details of which you are not providing, to offer any sort of definitive answer.

Further, I have a sneaking suspicion you're a NL player, amiright?

@Trex Is this because of his question or because we never see anyone new here?

Not the least of which being that if you're playing online "timing tells" are nearly useless.

1. Never say never. Never say always, either.

2. I've played against players that will always fold their worst hands when bet into by the preflop raiser, but will always bet their full range when checked to. I always put these players on my left and never bet my strongest flop hands into them. Do you see why?

3. If you have to have rules to play by, this probably isn't too bad a one.

I'm very confused by this.
Why would you ever want to deprive yourself of information? Could someone maybe give an example where doing this would be benificial.

Yeah it should have been posted in NL section. Can a mod move this to NL forum please? Back when I played live there were people who would check in the dark. Does checking in the dark mean gaining position in some way? The only drawback seems like if it was checked around and you flop top pair somehow your top pair might get beaten on the turn by giving a free card.

Playing finish the sentence:

People who check dark...

Are dumb.


Voluntarily putting yourself at a disadvantage is not a good idea. The only reason to ever do this is to try to level someone and LLSNL players aren't sophisticated enough to be leveled.

While I think it is obvious that checking dark is usually a silly move, I've seen it done enough so that I've wondered if there are any situations, based on opponent type, board composition, etc., which could make checking dark a reasonable strategy?

what about the check with a chip move? following scenario: your average button raises 4x to 20, you defend with KQo. flop 862. c/folding sucks a bit, c/calling sucks, c/raising isn´t optimal either etc... or we have QJhh and a flop like Th7x3x with lots of backdoors but no SDV.
now **** with his head and throw out 5 or 10 bucks

i never do it, but i wonder if this could have some advantages, especially for later streets. villain probably is used to people who play in flow and will have his own strategy for this, but against a bet he is more likely to make mistakes whatsoever...

Here's an interesting hand where Phil Helmuth gets pwned by Kid Poker.

This is why we don't check in the dark.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=58CL6B1w9f4

I do have a friend that plays quite well, he's a 2/5 grinder, and he sometimes checks in the dark when he has a monster and a low SPR out of position. He does this to induce a bet that he can then c/r shove over. A check in the dark just induces so many people to bet.

I believe checking in the light is a much better option. /thread way too many what if's and it depends... but really it's just dumb.