[jim]

Good Gravy Above what the heck did I miss last night? Sounds like a craaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaazy game!

[jonlutsey]

Adam Friedman was stressing the importance of patience and quality of starting hands in limit game tourneys. I got the feeling he would not suggest playing either of those kind of hands. 1 piece of advice from him for people new to the games is start by learning what starting hands to play, which is what you are doing here. I didn’t play with him until much later in the tournament and he definitely was not playing a lot of hands.

[ih82lose]

[AA]K is a horrible hand. Having the blockers is of little value when you need 4 more cards to have a competitive showdown hand. The cant even appear strong before 6th street. On 5th street other players know a K432A is the best you could have and that is with a perfect run out. I would absolutely fold to a raise or any future bet.

I would usually fold [Q2]7, if I was in late position and it was the lowest card left I would attempt to steel. [Q7]2 (with the deuce showing) is a much stronger holding. But I am still thinking my best chance to win is with a bluff if my board looks superior on 5th street when the bet size doubles.

Stud games have an extra betting round compared to hold’em. As the levels go up it become very important to consider your starting hand. The limit structure makes bluffing hard. Many player that call/bet/raise on 5th street will get to showdown.

[jasperjr]

I agree with William. Best starting hands gonna be 3 cards 8 or lower. Hard to bluff when you have face cards face up. Similarly, its hard to defend when you have pairs exposed or face cards.

[fivebyfive]

This is super helpful. Having never played the game, I could only really tell what a complete trash starting hand was (say [KK]J). It was fun to try to flex some new muscles in figuring it out. I didn’t even last until the stud eight round, which I’m sure is even more complex. I’m still intimidated by all these varieties, but I’m starting to pick up on some of the basic strategies which is great.

[jasperjr]

Omaha Hi Lo was difficult. Need to study that because so many options and potential. Seems every card can make a huge impact on quality of hand. I personally didn’t like it as much as the Stud Hi Lo

[taylormaas]

Yeah, [AA]K is terrible for Razz. one, you have a paired hand and two, you’re showing a King. There’s a big component of strategy in Raz around what is the opponents board showing and playing against that. Blockers come into play when you have played a few streets and see that your opponents needs either a 2,3, or 5 to have a made hande that beats you. Then if you have a [35] hidden you can use that to inform your decisions/actions.

For omaha H/L, there’s a huge component of having multi-pot playability, so the ability to win both the high and low hand. Making a hand like {A2xx} super powerful and wheel draws the nuts.

Also, in those split pot games, 9’s/T’s/J’s become really ugly because they limit your ability to win the low, and don’t have that great of equity in high only scenarios. So in Stud H/L if I have a hand like [T8]T, I have no interest in playing for maybe half of the pot.

[fivebyfive]

I really want to play more HORSE now. It was always such an alien game to me, but after trying it, I can see it has some strategic differences from hold em that makes for really interesting play. I don’t think I like the split pot games as much as Stud and Razz. Just too much going on. But still all very interesting.