Tournament Floating

In this two-part series I’ll be  looking at floating to see how it can be used effectively in no-limit hold’em tournaments. I’ll be talking through the strategy and identify the key conditions we need to look out for before we attempt the play. I’ll finish this analysis in part two and consider some effective counter strategies.

So what is a float? The float is often described as an ‘advanced play’ that is used to make a move at a pot and bluff someone off a potentially better hand. In reality, there is nothing complex about this play and the only real difficulty lies in establishing the right and wrong times to attempt it.

A float involves calling a pre-flop raise in position, and then when the play is heads-up to the flop, you call your opponent’s continuation bet with a marginal holding with a plan to win the pot on the turn when your opponent checks to you. Obviously, there are several assumptions built into this play, namely that your opponent will indeed check and give up on the turn, but this is where our ability to identify the correct situation for the play will come in.

The whole play is based on the principle that, a lot of the time in heads-up situations, neither you nor your opponent will connect well with the flop. It is not only the player who gets the best of these marginal hand stand-offs that will come out ahead, but also the player who can recognise these situations and take advantage. When I am considering making this play, there are several key factors that I will consider.

Floating Factors

1 Players to the flop

The first thing I’m looking for is a spot where I am heads-up against a single opponent. Obviously, unless you are in the big blind and facing a single raise to which all other players have folded, you cannot guarantee from the outset that no one else will join in the fun. But this shouldn’t concern us. We are not calling a pre-flop raise with the sole intention of floating the flop, we are calling with a hand with significant potential in the hope of connecting with the flop. It is only after the flop that thoughts of floating come into your mind.

Post-flop, the existence of additional players in the pot serves several purposes. Firstly, you cannot profitably float the pre-flop raiser if you have one or more other opponents left to act behind you. In the long run the extra money you lose in spots where you call and then someone behind you raises, forcing you to fold, is going to severely hurt the profitability of this play.

There are some exceptions to this, for example where you have a reliable physical tell that your opponent behind you is folding, in which case you could possibly use his presence in the pot to disguise your float play. Having said this, the presence of other opponents in the pot adds another dynamic that you must consider and that is, how likely the pre-flop raiser is to bet into multiple opponents with his marginal hands that have not connected well with the flop?

While some players will still make a continuation bet in this spot, the presence of additional opponents strengthens the range of the pre-flop raiser when he makes a bet on the flop. For this reason, specifically for less experienced players, you would not be making much of a mistake if you decided never to attempt this move when play is not heads-up to the flop.

Key point
Be very wary of floating in multi-way pots except for in very specific conditions where you have a reliable tell that an opponent behind will fold, but in most circumstances calling a continuation bet in a multi-way pot is a long term loser

2 Opponent type

A lot of thought should go into the specific opponent that you are going to try this move on. This thought doesn’t take place during the hand, but during the play prior to it. You should be looking at hands that you have both played in, and ones that you have just observed. You are looking for players who don’t fire the second barrel – players who make a continuation bet on the flop, as that’s what they’ve learnt they’re supposed to do, but then get lost on the turn and give up if they don’t have a strong hand.

As well as looking for the way people play their hands, there are verbal triggers that should help you identify the players who are good floating targets. Phrases such as ‘why does the Ace come every time’ and ‘I never hit with A-K’ all point to players who don’t see much beyond their own cards. Try to find players who are looking to hit the flop in order to continue with the hand. These types of weak-tight players are going to be highly profitable to float.

In theory, very aggressive players can be good targets to float, as they will fire at a lot of flops without a hand. After you have shown a willingness to call them down, it should also slow them up in future hands, making your task of playing against them that much easier. I say in theory, because not all aggressive players are the same. I like to categorise them into good aggressive and bad aggressive.

The good aggressive types are good thinking poker players. Their aggression has logic behind it. They are experienced and understand the various counter strategies that people will employ against them, and in turn have developed ways to counteract this. On the other side are the bad aggressive players. These are players who are aggressive because they’ve heard that’s the way to play. They are aggressive against players and in certain spots where they really shouldn’t be. They are not intelligent thinking players and are less likely to understand what is going on, whereas the good aggressive players will be expecting you to make certain moves.

I disagree with the theory that you should be making these plays against good thinking players. In practice these thinking players are able to identify the players capable of making these moves and will be giving them less credit in spots where other players might think you ‘must have it’.
It’s happening more often that when I call a player’s continuation bet and decide to fold on the turn, I will get met with a ‘I knew you were floating me’ comment. I prefer to target the lesser thinking player. The one that operates on a level of thinking that is a bit more basic, and will tend to give you more credit when making this play.

Key point
Do not try to float habitually against good-aggressive players who will be anticipating the move. Aim to find players who operate on a more basic level and who will give you credit for having a hand

3 Your table image

Like any other attempted bluff, before we try to execute this move, we need to consider our image, as perceived through the eyes of the person we are trying to bluff. Has he seen us bluffing on this table? Do we have significant history with this person from previous tournaments? If the answer to these questions is yes then it is probably worth waiting for a hand against this opponent, and setting your sights on somebody else.

Be flexible at the table, rather than going into the tournament with a set plan. If you pick up some nice hands and play them slow and are able to ‘represent a float’ in a hand that eventually gets shown down, then seize this opportunity to add credibility to your actual floats. If your opponents see that you are able to just smooth call the flop with your top pair type hands, they are less likely to dismiss your flop float.

Another point to bear in mind with regards to your image is the starting hands you have shown down. By this I don’t mean any bluffs that have been shown, but your actual holdings. If your opponents know that you are the type of player who will make pre-flop calls with a wide variety of speculative holdings, you can credibly try to represent hands when you’ve called an early position raise on the button and the flop comes 3c-6s-7h. Not something to be attempting if you’ve otherwise been playing very tight pre-flop, especially against good thinking opponents.