Calling to bluff flush

On 1 on 1 situation, I enjoy this bluff. Let say someone doubles the blinds and you decide to call him to see the flop. Two suited cards come with another high card (king or ace). If the raiser preflop, bets, obviously he has something you call him. If your "flush" comes on the turn or river, then you bet massive and if the other play is clever he should fold.

But then a good player like myself will think.

"Why did he bet so much if he hit his flush? Why didn't he check it and try to play it tricky or at least put in a smaller bet to gain some value."

And call you down and win the pot....

lol, every time I try that I find they have the flush... I find it's much more fun making my flushes look like a bluff

Allsopp said:

But then a good player like myself will think.

"Why did he bet so much if he hit his flush? Why didn't he check it and try to play it tricky or at least put in a smaller bet to gain some value."

And call you down and win the pot....

Click to expand...

Exactly. Why would you bet "massive" when your flush comes, just begging the other guy to fold? However, if done right, this sort of play can be effective. Just gotta know your opponent is willing to lay down, and since there's so many calling stations online, I try to do most of my bluffs when I think they have a very marginal holding or nothing as opposed to trying to get them off a pretty good hand by attempting to convince them I have something better. A lot of online players just won't fold top pair. If you know your opponent will, it can work.

Yeah you got to know your opponent. Obviously before trying to bluff, you should study the table you playing at first.

Now if your flush bluff worked. Is it worth showing your cards?

I wouldn't make an overbet here, but I actually think the timing of calling, calling, calling until you make your flush and then betting out when playing heads up is a great strategy. I wouldn't overuse it, I wouldn't show my cards, and I wouldn't bluff anything again for a little while after that, but yeah, nice one.

Allsopp said:

But then a good player like myself will think.

"Why did he bet so much if he hit his flush? Why didn't he check it and try to play it tricky or at least put in a smaller bet to gain some value."

And call you down and win the pot....

Click to expand...

I guess you also have to consider how you have been playing. IE, if you've been the aggressor and your opponent puts a massive bet on a flush scare card, then that seems weird because you'd expect him to check it since you've been the aggressor.

On the other hand, if you've been fairly passive lately, I would expect a bet.

Finally, if you're playing very low stakes, I might expect an all-in here from a person who'd made their flush.