Manipulating bet sizes to get more $ in one round

This is something I do routinely. Likely you all do too but I thought I would throw it out there if someone has not thought of it yet.

Anytime you are in a big pot with more than one person it can pay off to carefully manipulate your bet size. If you choose carefully you can often get one or more people to commit more than they wanted to.

Eg. Lets say we are on the flop with the following amounts. We have a monster. [SS = short stack]
Hero: $100
SS1: $25
SS2: $53

Bet just enough to put SS1 almost All in. Like $24. If he calls, he is more than likely to re-raise it AI.
SS2 calls
The action comes back to us because we have to call a raise. Now we can push, putting SS2 AI. Even better, SS2 may now fold leaving us a nice pot with a good amount of dead money in it.

With more than two others in the pot you can even pull this a couple of times on the same round to get everyone AI on the flop.


You must also beware of this being used against you. It is just another reason you have to carefully consider calling when there is a big stack in the pot that is driving the action. He may force you to get it all in when you only wanted to see the next card before committing.


What are some other bet size manipulations that people use? Share them with us.

That one works well alright. I've been chaught out once or twice by that when I wasn't paying proper attention.

I HATE when people type shit like 4.57 into the bet box and bet that ammount. I don't think that works at all for whatever its intended pourpose is.

One thing I've tried before and I think it works ok is if you want to put a SS all-in bet a little bit less then their stack. I think that can get them committed even without a hand just cos it pisses them off.

Betting a funny amount like $456 or $777 is typically a tell. Sometimes they are saying they have a set of 7s or something, but usually it means they have a good hand.

However, a funny amount from a crafty FTR player probably means squat. I did run into one guy who said he liked to bet $999 because "he liked big stacks of chips"