I mean sure it's better to have 2s 4s and 7s all completely live but in general that's just almost always going to be a playable hand.

Joe Tall's list is a very good.

Could someone elaborate a little on the two items above?

basically not all high hands are auto folds, a sentiment i was stuck with as i began learning the game because it was easier to stay out of troublesome spots.

high hands can be really profitable in s8 if you correctly select your spots. they're tough to play and marginal with a lot of players preflop but if you can get into a 3-way or HU situation with you believe is the best high hand you're in a much better shape.

^^Yup, nicely put.

Another note about this point, depending on the dead cards/board texture, your opponents, the ante structure, your up card, it can be perfectly OK to limp preflop. This is a massively dynamic situation but there are times hands that would get weaker holdings to fold, dont need to come in for a completion.

I've seen way more players play too many high-only hands than too few.

thanks! honestly reading some of these things helped me sort a few things out when i returned to poker over the last few months. just thinking on the list you made helped my play significantly. i also went back in time and found a post of yours on remembering upcards and that's really upped my gameplay as well.

on point 2, that is kind of how i see it also. it's just so incredibly different each time it'd take me way too long to get all my thoughts down.

A critical tenet of split pot games in general is there are some players you want to call and some you want to fold. But also split pot hands are usually played multiway and often you don't get a chance to bet a high enough amount that a complete or a raise would make anyone fold. If you get 4 calls in front of you, raising is not going to accomplish anything except making the pot bigger - they're all going to call. If you don't want that, limp.

If there are scary doors behind you and you'd rather play this hand for the BI or one bet, then don't complete - even if you are quite sure someone after you will complete. If you complete, then they can raise. (sometimes you want this, see above, if you can complete and get the guy behind you to raise, then you can make people either call 2 cold or fold.

Split pot games take a certain amount of implicit cooperation between players to play effectively. Some players will work with you, or some are predictable enough to help you out whether they know they are or not. Some are dumb enough that they'll push out the dead money and just keep in the people who are going to split.

As hard as it is to do, probably the most valuable mixed game skill is being able to guess what someone is going to do.\\
ETA: there is a very important corollary to this...

True, but the biggest over-adjustment that tight players make is auto-folding most high hands. The best high hand is always good for half the pot, sometimes good for all the pot, and sometimes can get a fold on 5th if it breaks bad for the low looking hands.

good post. i think better understanding this idea of "playing for the amount of bets you actually want to put in" really helped smooth out my game.

sometimes you wanna play for a complete, and sometimes you wanna ratchet up the bets. but if you just blindly complete every single hand, you're taking away your own ability to set the table.

Yeah that is a really good way to think about it. How many bets do I want to get in, and who do I want to include/exclude from the hand.

And with thinking players, more than in low or high only poker, their actions will betray what they want. If you bet the next guy could raise to make the field face 2 bets or he could call and let them face 1. If he raises and he's not an idiot, then you have to assume he wanted the field to face 2, and vice versa.

Getting people to fold, or getting people to stay, is super important in hilo poker. In a split pot, the winners really really need people to stay and pax the max, because otherwise they don't get paid. People going one way need other people going the same way to fold and mostly shouldn't give a **** if people going the other way call.

not four-betting the river w/ queens full