Rushpoker - explanations, ideas, winning tactics

Advanced concepts applied to rush poker


Playing very deeply

In rushpoker it quit can regularly happen that you play with a stack being several times higher than the maximum buy-in. In other words: You have a stack being worth a couple of hundred blinds deep.
If you play with such a stack against someone with a comparable stack size you need to consider a couple of things.

With pocket kings it is fine to move all-in pre-flop when you are about 100 blinds deep. But being 200+ blinds deep it is a no-go. No serious player would risk such an amount of money without holding at least pocket kings, he would rather do it with pocket aces only. So if your opponent can only have kings or aces, what can you win by moving all-in with your kings?

Let’s look at an example illustrating a 1-2 USD blinds table where you are 200 blinds deep and hold KK. You raise by 7 USD and your opponent re-raises by 20 USD. If you are in position a fine move could be a call now. Otherwise, if you decide for another re-raise by 50 USD to counter the one of your opponent you must be prepared to fold your hand to an all-in from him.

Losing with a set against a higher set or with a flush against a higher one is inescapable 100 blinds deep. In fact, you usually would have made a mistake if you did not lose your money in such a scenario. However, being 200+ deep things are different. Here is another instance to illustrate this:

You are at a 1-2 USD table again being 250 USD deep. Someone places a 7 USD bet in early position and you call on the bottom holding 55. The rainbow flop shows 5 8 K.

Your opponent makes a pot-size bet, 10 USD, you re-raise to 40 USD, he re-raises once more to 100 USD and you move all-in with your 250 USD. He calls with KK and takes your whole stack.

What went wrong? When he made his “re-re-raise” to 100 USD all alarm bells should have rang. This 3rd raise showed immense strength. Only a big fish would play AA or AK this way while risking so much money. KK and 88 are the way more likely hands for your opponent.

A smarter move from your side would have been to just call his 10 USD bet. If he bets on the turn you would call again, likewise on the river. This way you would invest about 100 USD (2/3 pot bets: 10 USD on the flop, 25 USD on the turn and 65 USD on the river) instead of risking your whole 250 USD stack. Putting in one bet with bottom set every betting around is fine – if it is getting more than this one bet the big question remains with which hand your opponent could call.

In the just depicted betting sequence your opponent would bet about 65 USD on the river into a 85 USD pot. If you had not only called this bet but had moved all-in for further 150 USD with which hand should he have called you? You showed immense strength with your all-in, you basically declared that you have a “big monster”. With a hand like AA or AK he just can’t call you there. The only hands with which your adversary can call you are KK and 99. If a bet can’t be called by a worse hand, but only by a better one than yours, betting is as wise as throwing money out of the window.

The same applies for flush vs higher flush situations. If you have the nuts flush bet out. But with a small flush you better try to keep the pot relatively small with just one bet at every betting opportunity



free cards in rushpoker

I am no fan of giving free cards when you hold a big hand. Neither in normal poker nor in rushpoker.
Your aim is to put your opponent allin. The way to reach this is betting, betting, betting. If you checked one street you usually couldn’t reach this aim without weird looking overbets or with the help of an opponent betting/reraising himself.

There are exceptions though. On a board like A55 with you holding aces it often is the best move to check the flop, maybe even the turn.
If your opponent would hold an ace he hardly could call more than one, maybe two bets. Chances for him holding this ace are quite low though considering three of the four aces already are in play.
If you opponent had a 5 he would bet himself and also call a reraise. It likely would end in an all-in no matter if one street is checked or not.
If you opponent had something like 78 he wouldn’t call any bet at all. In fact your check might even motivate him to make one bluff.
If he had a pocket pair the fun would start. You give him the chance to make a monster on the turn. If he turned a fullhouse that would guarantee an allin.

But keep in mind this is one rare example. If you held A5 instead of AA slow playing has little use. If your opponent would catch up with a pocket pair now YOU would loose your whole money vs the higher fullhouse!

In regular poker where some opponents have a very detailed read on you the sense of giving free cards often is to conceal your hand. Rushpoker tactics say there is no table image, people have no big read on you. So the right rushpoker tactics is to make the theoretically correct move which usually means betting out with big hands!



bluffing in rushpoker

In regular poker you are forced to bluff, at least at the higher limits. Otherwise you are very easy to read. People will know whenever you bet big you have something close to the nuts. They easily can fold, also bigger hands like two pair. Bluffing varies your game.
In rushpoker this argument is void. You have no table image, people have no big reads on you.

To make a successful bluff you need to have a read on your opponent. You know he always bets pot-size with a big hand and suddenly doesn’t bet pot. You know he tends to check a missed draw at the river. Stuff like this. These are reasons to play a successful bluff.

It is a fine rushpoker tactics to never bluff!



floating in rushpoker

Floating means you call in position a bet (usually a continuation bet on the flop) with an itself too weak hand (either nothing or preferable something like a gutshot) but with the intention to bluff the turn.
This is similar to immediately reraise as a bluff. The difference is with floating you saw your opponent checking the turn and thereby showing additional weakness. If your opponent would bet the turn you would fold and give up – but in comparison to a reraise bluff you would have invested less money.

An example at 1/2usd:
Someone opens for 6usd. You call with 67hearts. Everyone else fold. The flop is 34K rainbow. Your opponent bets 10usd in the 15usd flop. You call (float!). The turn is a 9 and your opponent checks. You bet, the opponent folds.

Floating is a very powerful tactic shorthanded. It usually doesn’t belong in your arsenal of rushpoker tactics though.
To use floating successfully you need to have an opponent opening the flop with many hands and continuation-betting most of them. You cant use it against an opponent who might only play high pocket pairs and AK. Such opponent hits the flop most of the time.

If you have notes about your opponent that rate him as someone who plays many hands and opens the flop very often, then floating is a fine rushpoker tactics. If that isn’t the case don’t float in rushpoker!



continuation betting in rushpoker

This means when you were the aggressor preflop either by opening the betting or by reraising you bet the flop no matter if you hit or not.

This is a fine tactic in regular poker and even more so in rushpoker. People expect you to play tight and therefore sometimes given you some extra respect. They also don’t know you continuation betted every flop so far (what I propose to do!) like they would at a regular poker table.
Another argument is the opponents hand range. People play less low quality hands. So the first hand coming in mind when seeing a preflop call is a pocket pair. These pocket pairs obviously miss most flops. You just need to be a bit careful about the player tendencies. Some guys always call one bet with a missed pocket pair (like 44 on a 28K flop). You sometimes need to follow with another turn bet to win the pot against these players.



This section will be updated with further rushpoker tactics soon!

In the meantime continue reading in
- Specific 9 player table tactics
- Specific 6 player table tactics
- General ideas
Rushpoker - explanations, ideas, winning tactics