1. Look for games where the top bet is not disproportional compared to overall pot. If pot is 120k and top bet is 100k, the most in bonus you can get is 1.2% of your wager, which will not likely cover the house edge since you contribute 1% of that bonus.
I'm not sure.
Are you including your own bet with that?
If the top bet is 100k, you should bet 100k too, meaning you get a little over 2% of the pot if you cash out just after the other 100k player.
I think it's optimal to match the highest bet.
If pot is 120k and top bet is 100k, that means my own bet is included. "Pot" is entire bet pool.
I agree that if bankroll is not an issue, matching largest bet is optimal or at least close to it. In some situations it might be the difference between max bet and sum of remaining wagers, but I'm not sure. e.g., whale bets 1M, 5 other players bet total of 700K, a bet of 300K might be better than 1M, since you only have to beat the whale to "cash" in the bonus.
More than often that is not the case, and for those smaller bankrolls playing against whales it is important to know that in many situations it simply cannot be +ev.