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Reading Players

The Semi Bluff Explained

Discover the meaning of the term semi-bluff and how the poker pro's use it more than a regular bluff.

Reading Players

18+ onlyWritten, edited and fact-checked by the All The Aces desk in Britain — how we work and how we correct mistakes. Some links out are paid placements; they are not reviews, and nobody pays for coverage. Gambling in the UK is licensed by the Gambling Commission, and nothing here is advice to bet.

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THE SEMI BLUFF
Peter Ware is a new poker player on DailyStarPoker.com and he posted the question: "What on earth is a semi-bluff?"

The great poker theorist David Sklansky originally came up with the term semi-bluff to describe a bet with a hand which , if called, does not figure to be the best hand at that moment, but has a reasonable chance of outdrawing those hands that initially called it. The semi-bluff, in contrast to an ordinary bluff (usually launched with a comparitively useless hand) provides a player with twice the chance of pulling off a win.

DOUBLE YOUR CHANCES
The semi-bluffer's first chance is that an opponent will believe that he is holding a premium hand and fold. If the opponent calls, the semi-bluffer's second chance requires him to draw a card that takes his current hand ahead of his opposition. Professional's will tend to use a semi-bluff much more often than an outright bluff.

SIMPLE ONLINE POKER GAMES
If racking your brains to play masterful Texas Hold'em is doing you in, you can always relax and try some of the pure fun games at DailyStarPoker.com. Poker slots, sometimes called video poker, is basically a casino game that's poker themed. Slide poker is another favourite. It's a digital tile-puzzle where you shift the cards around to create the best poker hand that you can. Poker solitaire uses poker hand rankings as an organising method. It's solitaire for poker players who are recuperating from going on severe tilt. All of the above onbline choices are good therapy and fun! 

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ALL THE ACES poker column:
Wednesday December 07, 2005: 
The Semi Bluff Explained


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