C-betting a whiffed flop as PRF in position when checked to is EXTREMELY profitable. If you're not doing it, start. Like right now. Especially if you have AK because if you get called you still have 6 outs to improve to top-pair-top-kicker.
You want to be the pre-flop aggressor and you want to have position post flop. C-betting doesn't work nearly as well when you are out of position. This is one of the main reasons why we can open quite wide from the CO and BT pre-flop but stay tight in middle and early positions.
You want to have only 1 or 2 Villains in the hand and you want them both to check to you. C-bet
bluffing gets dangerous when there are too many opponents that might fluke hit something. When players check the flop out of position, roughly 90% of the time they have nothing and roughly 10% of the time they are slow playing a strong hand, so 90% of the time, they are ready to fold to aggression.
You want to check back sometimes too to keep them guessing. If you c-bet flops with 100% frequency,after the 3rd or 4th or 5th time, a lot of players will get suspicious and start to call or raise you to test you out, or they will check to trap you when they flop 2-pair knowing that you will bet into them. Minimum you should be c-bet bluffing 50% of the time. I do it with 60-80% frequency depending on stacks and opponents' tendencies. The smaller their stacks and the more nitty/foldy they are I will c-bet more.
You want to check back on very wet boards. Say 789 with 2 hearts or K68 monotone clubs. These are not good flops and the risk is too high for bluffing so just stay away.
However, very few flops are truly dry so mildly wet boards are still okay. If you
bluff a wet flop and get called, often the best thing to do is CONTINUE AGAIN on the turn. Why? Because Villain is chasing a draw. If he's chasing a draw he has nothing (until it completes). So watch the board. If the flop is KJ4 with 2 diamonds, he checks, we bet 40%, he calls. The turn is 5 hearts. He still has a draw, so he checks, we bet 40% and he calls. The river is the 4 of spades. He doesn't have trips because he's not calling these barrels with a 4. There is no 3rd diamond and there is no 3rd card to connect the K and J (no Q, no T, no A, not even a 9). So he has busted. He checks. We bet half-pot. He folds. We get 2 streets of value out of him and neither of us had anything! <-- We make a LOT of money doing this.
If we open J9s - flops with an A or a K on them make great bluffs. Villain limp-called our strong late position open and checked because he's afraid that we have an A or a K on this flop. He's usually ready to fold. As the PFR we have more A and K in our range than a limp-caller or a defender on the blinds.
Paired flops are the best! Nothing makes people fold more than a pair on the board. When I first learned this I could not believe it. Really? You bet and they all just run away? YES!! You see, on a flop like T73 there are 9 outs to hit it: three Ts + three 7s + three 3s = 9. On a T77 flop, there are only FIVE outs to hit it: three Ts + two 7s = 5, so the chances that anyone has hit this paired flop is almost only HALF of normal. And what do people usually do when they have nothing? They usually fold to aggression. ; )
Be careful bluffing a paired flop against a good player because a good player KNOWS that this is the most common bluff in hold'em and he can call us with any marginal made or high
equity holding. He might even check-raise us.
I have found that the sizing that works for me is 40-45% of pot heads-up and 60-70% in 3-way. 4-way I rarely bother to try, just check back (although I have bluffed off 5 opponents a couple of times - I don't recommend this). 40% is the minimum to price out draws, and making 2 people fold often requires a bigger bet. That is the reasoning.
