Calculating Fold [Steal] Equity On The Fly

[DeltaNeutral2]

I am a very +EV oriented player, who plays live $1/$2 no-limit holdem games at my local B&M Casino. I'm profitable, with a combination of fairly tight play and lethal trapping plays. I find this to be the easiest way to extract the most equity from the other players.

My next foray in developing my game is to develop my bluffing technique. Up to now, I considered bluffing in the way most players seem to approach it a fools errand. I don't see the point in a big uncalculated bet on the turn or river, which is usually a blatantly obvious attempt to buy the pot - it fails more often than it succeeds, especially to trap players like myself who are waiting for this type of bet to call.

To go back to first principles for a moment, in poker one can win either by having the cards, or getting the other fellow to lay down his.

My current quest is to find the most mathematically rigorous and elegant formula that one can use "on-the-fly" to determine optimum bet size on the turn, or river when bluffing at a pot such that a positive EV is arrived at.

When I bluff, I presume certain criteria will be present:

- I will be in the BB, SB or Button
- The players involved in the hand will be either Very Tight or Tight players
- The board will show either a 1) flush draw 2) straight draw 4) AA, KK, JJ, TT, 99
- All the other players will either have checked to me, or a small 1BB bet will be in play.

My initial nature would be to raise exactly as I would if I held the cards I needed in the pocket:

If a flush draw, bet a total of 36% of the pot
If a straight draw, bet a total of 32% of the pot
if any pair showing, bet a total of 24% of the pot.

These are all standard draw equities giving +EV for the respective hands. I feel this is incorrect due to the fact that I must base my bet size on the probability of the other players to fold, not the draw equity - but I suppose this is a place to start.

I wonder of any of you learned folks, or perhaps Mr. Sklansky himself, would be gracious enough to shed some light on the best way to proceed in calculating the appropriate percentages based on if a player is very tight/tight/loose and what is showing on the board so that we end up with +EV, even if the bluff is called the appropriate percentage of times.

[johnc]

Chapters 18,19, & 20 in TOP provide alot of insight into bluffing. Game Theory and Bluffing is particularly interesting.