I'll add in that I'm eager to open a hand like A288 (especially if I have position and not more than 1 caller) early in a session with the hope of getting to showdown just so that thinking players can get the wrong idea about my raising range. It's especially effective when you flop a low with an 8 and scoop, LOL

And to play hands like (A4)89 and call a raise in the BB 4 ways to the flop is burning money. At least at the stakes I play. This hand will not connect well enough to earn back more than the rake. This was my leak.

Preflop matters in any form of poker.


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Really you think (A4)89 is a fold for one raise from the BB in a multiway pot? I'm way tighter than most live players, and tighter than most in this forum suggest, and I have always been happy to call with something like that.

Small stakes and small sample size (full disclosure) I have learned to fold this due to rake and position. Same hand is a raise to steal blinds with, though. You are too far behind the hands that reasonable players are raising and flatting with.

Also "high mix" with (K2)JT would be an easy call. Scoop potential.

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Hmm, I would always fold that 3 high card with a dangler hand. I would call with 4 high cards, but I really don't remember ever once winning a hand with it...

All high cards and I raise it up baby! Cap it is fine, assume the capper is on AA2x. To scoop is love. To scoop is life.


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I thought about writing a really long post on the various a2xx hands and which ones are a limp vs a raise but I will say this. Unless you are in a game with multiple world-crushers err on the side of raising. A288 and a299 are utg opens full ring.

Really love this line of thinking. HAHA "especially effective", great!

I am interested to hear, when you have the time. No world crushers, for sure. But also no sensible folders, so three of four players will show down, and the 88 or 99 will need a set to scoop, while avoiding counterfeit cards and making low.

Possibly, wouldn't open raising A288 be more about higher stakes and versus players that know to fold a gutterball on a low board? Jamming a low draw or made low hardly ever makes it through against the micro stakes.


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As a rule of thumb, if you think your biggest leak is defending too much from the BB, this is not your biggest leak. If you are losing a lot in blind defenses, it is much more likely due to postflop mistakes ( or just a lack of sample size).

Yes small sample size for sure. Not losing money either. My mission is to beat the rake at 0.50/1.00 stakes versus the playerbase of today. So far I am ahead of money but behind the rake. Ten years ago this was so easy it was boring. I started poker in FLO8 and did not know what holdem was and never heard of Chris Moneymaker for like 2 years and a million hands of FLO8.


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O8 is a game about maximizing equity on every street, giving free cards to the blinds with any strong starting hand is a disaster, you can scoop big pots with any a2 hands, and win large portions of others

Knowing how to play postflop is obviously important but being risk-adverse with these hands will cost you more than it saves

In a game where everyone is a good player or you are against very tight players with well defined ranges you can slow down with some a2 hands and situationally fold some weaker a-wheel hands (to a raise)

Also, raising a lot of a2xx hands is extremely valuable in an overall range context, so even if the bottom end of it isn't making money or is even a small loser its worth it to protect the other parts of your range, the more agressive a style you play the more valuable that becomes, the typical low-mid stakes player is just not going to be able to understand enough of your strategy to hand-read effectively

So by extension, I would often 3b a hand like qq86ss or jj43 against an early opener in an attempt to knock out the blinds, even if I am 40something% vs a reasonably tight open, that still puts me in a good spot, especially if I have position

I should also note its extremely rare for there to ever be more than 2 (really any) strong players at a table below 30/60, there are sometimes disciplined TAGs who are not bad players but they don't recognize a lot of the value spots players who have really studied the game will see.. o8 literature hasn't really caught up to the modern winning-est styles and I hope it stays that way

Ahh this make lots of sense. You have put a lot here for me to digest. I will think on this much. Thank you.


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Some of this advice is more relevant in the context of a 5-8 handed game

Thats all I can play on Merge and ACR. 6 handed.


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Ok my first observation is that proper play, short handed, is looser and more agro than I was accustomed to from back in the heyday of fishy full ring tables. This seems obvious, but I think is more nuanced than it looks. I have sensed this naturally and polarized my range of starting hands and play them more aggressive.

My line of inquiry is this. What does ideal GTO look/feel like in short handed FLO8? Given the small sample and my unwillingness to overcompensate and change based on a few thousand hands of poker.

My gut is telling me that the loose/aggro/callish players, that are obviously "bad" at FLO8 ARE NOT AS FAR OUT OF LINE AS I THOUGHT.

To be sure, they are losing money in my database, but the ones with any experience in limit poker and hi/lo games are not hemorrhaging the money I would think they should be.

There are lots of things to ask about from what you wrote, this is just where I am starting.

Thank you for your advice.


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Tell me a story about a rainbow AAT8...

The print authors haven't caught up to the game Monikrazy. But forums, like this, are patching up the swiss cheese-games hundreds or thousands of hungry and ambitous players looking to improve their game. Thank you for your contributions to this thread.

https://ibb.co/jXSXDF

Did I do this right to calculate the equity by the turn of those four hands?
If so, it looks like any hand with A88 inlcuding monotone ones, is slight favorite against any hand equity-wise. Interesting. What's more interesting is the balance of equity breakdown the other hands have. The villains of A88 are basically fading the last 8s in the deck and have a nice VARIETY of cards to draw to. Whereas the A88 draws the majority of its equity from the two 8s, which boosts it's average equity. See below.
https://ibb.co/nHJptF

Just had a losing session. Loved every hand! This is so much more interesting than holdem...

Right now I am working on how ranges change when it goes from heads up to three players then four players. At 5 players it seems to level off at normal ranges...


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Ok back to this massive chunk of wisdom. At this point I am just jumping off with a few of the more basic tenets and how I have changed my play.

A lot of the principles of fixed limit poker I had overlooked, since I moved to NLHE for years and never really spent the time to learn fixed limit.

Also, the observation about there being almost zero strong players at micro FLO8 is very true. The number of players is small for starters and they are from the subset if players that:

Play small stakes...
Play Omaha...
Play split games....
Play short handed....
Play fixed limit (knowing the rake is tough)...
AND ARE GOOD AT ALL THESE THINGS...

With the small playerbase on US sites this has to be a very small group and those players will be easy to keep track of.

Anyway the point is to exploit the weak players and for me that will mean beat the rake over a decent sample size.

Heads up with the small blind and the button, the range to raise with is so freaking wide, and gets wider the worse the opponent is. If they are tight, they will need a run of good cards and be aggressive and fight back. This can happen of course, but the odds are they will get run over. If they are loose and play any four cards heads up, then they will likely be aggressive and fight back, which actually makes them a better player than the overtight player. All it takes is to quickly review the hand and see why they played a certain way and they are quite predictable. Lots of chips get pushed around and lots of rake gets paid. Heads up does not last for long though, there is a group of about a dozen players that are always willing to play so one or two of them will come and join.

Three handed becomes more about proper blind defense, since 2/3 of all hands will have this decision to make. As monikrazy pointed out, to give the blinds a free flop is absolutely the worst. One limp to open on the button, and you know that player is awful at poker in general. On the other hand, to receive infinite odds to see a free flop in the big blind can be tempting to misplay. Flop a second best double draw, and check fold. The pot is tiny, you had infinite odds to flop quads, and missed.

Four handed and now there is the decision of the two players not in the blinds, who will go after the blinds? Now ranges are becoming more sensible. If im on the button, and the UG player raises, i would suggest there is virtually no flat call range. There may be one, but to raise those few hands anyway cant be losing much EV. So button play becomes pretty simple, based on the reads of the other players, either raise it up or fold.

Five and six handed should have a few hands that are raised against 5 opponents but would be folded versus 8 opponents. Have not gathered enough data for this, other than to say I dislike the middle strength "sorta low and sorta high" hands because they lead to more difficult decisions postflop. And FLO8 tends to have easier decisions at least on the flop than holdem, and therefore easier to exploit the bad decisions of the other players rather than put myself in tough spots that I am nor practiced with enough to be +EV.


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Keeping a raising range that disguises your AA2x versus your A35K is essential. When the "regs" play basically 65/5 you will know when they have it. They have no clue when you have it. This leads them to hero down with all kinds of weak stuff. And, when they make a decent 2nd nut plus junk low, dont miss out on the potential profit in reraising them with a possible freeroll to the river card. Its short handed and swingy, but I have learned to get that extra bet in, for long term profit. None of this works if you only raise A2xx.


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Regarding the previous discussion of A288 or A299 etc. the simulations show these to play very well against the range a 50/5 player will call with. So raising UTG in fixed limit would be profit regardless of any other consideration. There would have to be a unicorn in position behind you to exploit you long term. They would reraise an all high hand and force out the blinds. The extra blind money plus position and easy postflop decision would make the all high raiser the "best" hand, imo.


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Lets say you raise UTG with A299 and a 50/5 player reraises. You are 43 percent to 57 percent equity against the top 5 percent of hands. Same as if you had AK in holdem versus QQ. To call the raise is immediately +EV due to fixed limit. So, you have navigated the preflop with positive EV and that is the street you see, every hand. Any loss of EV in the hand can only happen post flop. And the other hands in your pfr range play just as well. So the only skill involved preflop is what your range is versus the number of players dealt into the hand and your position and wether you raise in position or fold in position (avoid flatting in position)


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Agreed, after a few more thousand hands. Although I would add that I was loose passive in the BB and that is pretty awful. To see a flop while slightly behind is not a huge leak, by itself, but if it is a symptom of a cascade of poor decisions then it is just the tip of the iceberg leak.


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Legit question. How to play the BB correctly 3 handed? It is the only seat giving me trouble, and when 3-4 handed. Im fine HU or 5-6 handed. Thanks for any help with this scenario.


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Ok this will round out my meanderings of this thread. My problem 3 handed is not the BB but the button. The button range is basically "what few hands not to play" and everything else is a raise. The button is where i get an edge to reclaim the previous turn when i was BB. Or, another way to look at it is to forget the blinds and work from position alone. The blinds are just overhead and that overhead is expensive if you are not wide and aggro and dont earn it back. I have got some advice about trying to see at least the turn also, its hard to totally miss a flop, but if you fear domination, maybe fold flop but any lively table will almost never be checked to you in position unless they want to checkraise.


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