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Omaha and NLH differences
jimmy528
Member Posts: 8
Have been on here a month or just over now. Have played a few omaha games in the last few days and i was just wondering what the major differences are regards to strategy.
any answeres will be great.
any answeres will be great.
Comments
Wud love to be able to give a reply, but I dunno ....
I'd like the same question to be answered, but in terms of MTT/STT srategy.....
The main difference between Hold'em and Omaha is the number of hands that you have and are up against. Think about a six-max Hold'em game - you have one hand, your opponents have one each, so you're up against 5 hands.
Now do the same with a six-max Omaha. You have six 'hold'em' combinations in your hand (although I much prefer to think of them as one Omaha hand - more on that later), while your 5 opponents have six each, so you're up against 30 hold'em hands!
Conclusion: if the players around you are betting like they have a huge hand, they more than often do because you're up against so many more of them!
So, how does that adjust your play? Well, you need to play closer to the nuts. Having the fifth nuts in Hold'em might be good, but in Omaha it's normally a way for you pay off those who have the nuts or second nuts. It can get expensive, so be cautious with hands like small flushes and the bottom end of a straight (so 3-4 on a 5-6-7 flop, for instance).
Coming back to the comment about six-hold'em hands, that's actually a dangerous way to think about your cards, in my opinion. Yes, it's nice to think of so you can tie Omaha and Hold'em together, but it does make you more prone to accepting a poor Omaha hand because 'it makes some nice Hold'em hands'. Look at this example:
As-Ks-6s-7c.
A Hold'em player might look at this and recognize the dreaded Big Slick (A-K), a nut flush draw with the suited Ace of spades, as well as quite a cute looking 7-6o; that's one of those deceptive hands that flops well on a x-6-7 board, right?
An Omaha player will look at this hand and wish his Ks was actually the Kc. He'd notice he has three spades in his hand, meaning there's one less in the deck for him to make that nut flush with, and also realise that 6-7 needs to flop perfectly (7-7-6 or 3-4-5) before it has any real value. In the case of 7-7-6 it's still vulnerable too, especially against overpairs that hit a dreaded two outer for a bigger full house. It's all a tale of woe, which is why an Omaha player looks at their four cards in a different way to just six hold'em hands. They might try to see the flop cleaply with this hand, but it's certainly not one you'd catch Tikay going crazy with.
If the Ks was the Kc, that's a different story to the Omaha player's mind. Now you have a nut flush draw in spades, second nut flush draw in clubs as well as the AK and 67 combination. Even then the Omaha player would prefer the four cards were all closer in rank so that they can flop straight draws with 'wrap draws' to even better straights (so Q-J-T-8 on a J-9-7 board would be the nuts with the player getting an even bigger straight if the turn comes a King!). The Kc improves the hand significantly, but we're still not completely in love with this hand. Tikay would be seen playing this one though
There are all sorts of other differences too; Omaha being a hand defined by the flop, not the pre-flop action as well as bankroll considerations, but I'd like some of the other posters here to dig into those and other topics too. Like I said, I do think this post has some serious potential, so even if you have your own observations with how Omaha is played differently to Hold'em please do post them. You never know, you might even win the seat into the Open
Good luck at the tables all,
Dave
1) top pair top kicker is virtually worthless in omaha as is an over pair to the board.
2)fourth or fifth nut flush draws are not worth chasing because you are more than likely going to stack off if you hit.
3) DO NOT overrate pocket pairs. They play very badly in multiway pots and in omaha you are always multiway because even if you have only 1 opponent he has 6 hands.
4) The hands are much bigger in omaha, 2pair or a set is unlikely to be ahead.
5) Try to play cards that work together well. for example 8 9 T J double suited gives you 6 nut drawing hands, whereas A A 7 2 rainbow only has 1.
6) big preflop raising and c-betting in omaha is the quickest way to the porrhouse when playing against experienced players. You may well take down a few smallish pots but you will be easily trapped and will lose the big ones.
7) The true skill at omaha is the ability to lay down second,third or fourth nuts. At times folding the nuts is the correct move to make as well if your hand is dead and has no extensions.
8) bet sizing is more critical in omaha. Things that you should not be looking at doing are, min betting(this gives all the draws the odds to call) and check-raising(you need to build the pot yourself and not look at others to do it). All betting should be around 3/4pot to pot sized.
9) Learn to fold. Fold bad hands preflop(dont call and hope to get lucky), if you miss the flop then fold,if you only have a bad draw then fold.
10) The game is played from the flop onwards so you should not be committing a large proportion of your stack preflop.
and most importantly of all be lucky and hit good flops and get paid off by people chasing bad draws.
Hope this is of some use.