Current situation:

We play weekly at a local cigar shop.
Dealer's choice with a dealer ante.
Small stakes spread limit, table stakes-ish (occasionally we let a player do a minor freeroll by choosing to borrow enough to make a call or not).
No wild cards, but lots of non-traditional games.


Most popular games called:

2-3-5 Double board 5-card Omaha h/l where you can also play 3 cards up a column or 5 cards in your hand.

2-4-5 aka Boogaloo Single (w/wo floaters) or Double board Omaha h/l where you can also play 4 or 5 cards in your hand. Floaters can be used in hand or on board, meaning sometimes you can play a single card from your hand if you are playing a floater.

California, Death Valley and Covid/Harry - 4 or 5 cards in your hand, must use exactly 2. h/l occasionally C/H has no qualifier. All variations have 3 rows of 4 cards. California plays 2 from one of the bottom rows and one from the top. Death Valley plays 1 from each row. C/H is Death Valley with an option to play 3 cards from one row.

7 and a half - 27 and a half - Dealt one up and one down. Closest to each number gets half the pot (tiebreaker 7 beats 8, 28 beats 27). Aces are 1 or 11, face cards are a half. Players can take a card or not each round. Game ends when nobody takes a card in a round.


Questions, comments, requests for more?
Thought maybe we could get some more posts/discussions going.

7 27! Brings back memories. Great game if you have some fish in the game. They draw forever trying to hit 27. They lose so much.

Tried 2-11 yet? That game is dirty action. You get 4 down cards like Omaha, but you don't have to use exactly two of them. You can use two or three (but not zero, one, or all four) of your hole cards. The flop is only two cards, and then a turn and a river, so only four community cards. You can use two or three of them as well.

Nut flush is basically always out there by the river, and quads are possible even without a pair on the board.

When we started, it was "Price is Right" rules, over didn't count.
They came "Lock and Load", where you could throw away a card (cost a bet) and not take any more cards.
Now we play that going over 27.5 doesn't foul you hand and over 7.5 can still be closest to 7.5.
All allows players who would have folded playing our original style to continue playing.

We've only got 1 player who will reliably continue to draw to 27.5, and seems to get there more often than they should. Still not profitable.
There are more chicken contests going low.
To twist the movie quote "The only way to winning move is not to play non-nutted hands"

It does generate some of the larger pots consistently.
It's also a great time to stand, stretch and kill a few minutes once you fold.






I'm sure I dealt it after hearing about it.
BTW do you call it "Two eleven" or "Two one one"?

There is definitely an adjustment from being able to play up to 2 cards and more than 2 cards. Our group is used to 'hidden' hand strength.

The gang prefers more boards and more cards.
For a game without wild cards, we see lots of quads and straight flushes.
More often than not the nut low wins.

We've flexed the number of cards you can use for games.
it's a bit more fun when more players stay in (even when maybe they shouldn't).

I've heard it both ways, but two eleven is becoming more common. At our old game, we just called it "dirty."

I think they said on the podcast the 'creator' called it "Two eleven", but I called it "Two one one" for clarity. We have a few 'dirty' games... but none named as such. We do play 'evil' and 'shopping' from time to time. As I think, we have a lot of named games that aren't quite descriptive...

A game I actually learned about in this forum and brought to a couple of home games that was well received is "Pittsburgh" or SOHE (simultaneous Omaha and Hold Em)

7 player max
Pot Limit
Deal everyone 6 cards
Hands are broken into a 4 card PLO hand and a hold em hand pre-flop and kept separate on the table. No remixing.

Game is then played as usual. Split pot. Half pot going to the Omaha High hand. Half going to the Holdem hand.

Guaranteed to be bonkers

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Thank you.

I like SOHE. We play Hold'em-Hold'em-Hold'em sometimes, which is similar.
We usually have 8 players. When we play with less, we get a different variety of games.

We play everything spread limit.
Toughest part of SOHE for us is remembering that it's not h/l like a great majority of our games.

I've never heard of HE*3...When I first brought it to my latest home game, me and the host literally split the first 8-10 pots. It was laughable.

"Oh, imagine that, you and me again."

The game is $1/1 hold em for the first 3+ hours then, when the weak hearted are gone, we start doing dealers choice (no wild card games), splash pots, etc. Short deck Holdem is another crazy one, and one I learned from the game actually.

It's a bonkers game. 3 solid players (if I may be so bold as including myself) and a bunch of young and well off rec players.

One guy called off $250 with 33 on a river jam on a K64K2 board vs a guy that always has at least a king. He had AK.

Another night a guy called $180 with Jack high.

It's a dream table. And I'm in the hole lol... Maybe I shouldn't include myself in the 3

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HEHEHE plays similar to Texas Hold'em
- Deal 6 cards to each player, split into 3 hold 'em hands.
- Pre-flop bets cover all 3 hands
- Post flop bets are per-hand, you can fold some of your 3 hands.

Our game has gone through many iterations over the years.
We've settled on the dealer's choice spread limit to mitigate losses that would lead to hard feelings and/or not returning. We're not happy when players leave early.

I remember being interested in Short Deck after reading online about it, and even watching a streamed (HCL?) game.

Yeah... I gave back some of last weeks winnings last night. Frustrating when big full houses lose, but it's the nature of our games.

Lowmaha

Omaha H/L, but the board stops when there's a possible low. Could be on the flop. I think our record board was 14 cards, due to pairing and high cards coming out. For extra pain, we made low a 7 qualifier.

Tic-tac-toemaha

Board is nine cards, laid out in a square. Flop turns over 3 as such (0 is turned-over, X is still face down)

XOX
OXX
XXO

turn, leave the diagonal

OOX
OXO
XOO

then river reveals the diagonal. Play any two from your hand, along with any tic-tac-toe combination (i.e., row, column, or diagonal).

Chowaha

This is apparently a known game, not something we made up. Board put out like this:

FFF
FFF TT
FFF TT R

Flop, Turn, River. Except the turn and river cards are centered on the preceding cards. Boards are a flop, horizontally, along with any "connected" turns--so the middle flop gets two choices of turn cards. So, there's four boards, two from your hand. Of course, played high/low.

357

Some kind of ante to have a pot.

Each player gets three cards. First round of betting, threes are wild. From the button, each player in turn announces if they're in or out.

If there is more than one player in, the "in" players exchange cards, decide who had the best hand, and the losers pay the winner one bet. If only one player is in, he gets a marker; first player to three markers wins the pot.

(Straights and flushes do not count in the three-card round).

If only the button stays in, go around the table again, giving players a second option to stay. Just trying to lower the incidence of obvious steals.

Second round, button moves, two more cards to each player, now fives are wild. Same setup, only losers pay winners two bets.

Third round, buttons moves, two more cards to each player, now sevens are wild. Same procedure, only losers pay winners three bets.

After sevens, re-deal a new hand.

Each time the button hits the dealer, everyone re-antes, and the losing bets go up by one unit (i.e., from 1/2/3 per hand to 2/3/4 and so on). Optionally, some games have every "not in" player ante each round of betting. Might play this with anteing/moving up losing payments each hand, rather than each time around the table.

Probably want your antes to be low relative to the "in" loser's payments, so people don't do too much calling with a sure loss, trying to hang on for the pot.

I like this. I'm a fan of the pain.
Extra bonus will be the protected nut low draw punishing the field.


I think we played a version of this called cosmic bingo.
I like this one better.


We play this as 3 (flops) - 2 (turns) - 1 (river) and you can use any combination of FTR (6 boards). Also h/l.

I think I've played this a while ago in another game.
Interesting game and strategies, but would take too long for our crowd.

I'll see if I can work out Lowmaha and TicTacTomaha into the game and report back.

Much appreciated.

You're welcome. I forgot to mention; there's a game called Howdy Doody, (I think it's seven card stud hi/lo, can't remember for sure) in which the twist is Kings are wild for your low, threes are wild for your high. Of course, they play as what they are for high/low respectively.

Of course, we had variations of lowmadoody, tictactoemadoody, chowadoody. Pretty much every hi/lo game we played had a "doody" variation.

Also forgot to mention Elvis. While nominally a hi/lo five card stud game, it can't be explained, it has to be experienced. But, I'll try. Unsurprisingly, as you'll soon see, this was the last game of the night for us.

Ante. One down card to each player. The first card off the deck is given to UTG, who has the option to keep both cards, or pass either one to the left. If a down card is ever passed, it's turned face-up so everyone knows the cards out there. The next player can pass/keep in turn. Everyone can choose to pass a different card as well--a player might decide to switch from a low draw to a high draw (or whatever), get rid of a card they were previously holding. The dealer gets the option to trade the card with the top of the deck.

Once the dealer has taken his option to pass/keep, the players who passed are "filled in" for that round with a card, either up or down, depending what they need. Each payer will have one down card after each round.

Then the top card is turned over, with an announcement of "Elvis is....". All players with an upcard matching the rank must discard it; down card may be discarded, but the player has to pay one big bet to do so Discarders are filled in with the next card off the deck, up or down as appropriate.

Then a round of betting. When that's completed, another round of card to UTG, passing/keeping, filling in, Elvis, bet. Repeat until we have five-card stud hands.

Now, you get to buy cards. Each player who wants to, can buy a new card from the deck for one big bet. We'd have those players put a chip in their fist. Everyone puts their fist out and opens them; those who buy discard, and get a replacement card, up or down, as appropriate.

Of course there's another Elvis/discard/replacement after each round of buying. The buying/Elvising continues, with the purchase price doubling each time, until everyone quits buying.

One last round of betting, then each player declares hi/low/both ways. This declaration is made by putting one, two, or three chips in their fist, and showing. If you declare both ways, you have to win both ways--a chop on either side means that player's hand is dead.

Needless to say, with all the passing and Elvises, a player often switches from hi to low and back. Also, the discards and burns are taken up, shuffled, and make a new stub when necessary.

I think that's it.

Lowmaha was met with a little skepticism, but open minded.
Boards were (surprising to us) generally 7+ before making the possible low.
Pots were fairly large (we play spread limit).
I won a couple low ends when going for high (no declare).

Last hand of the night was the double-board version I teased but didn't deal.
When one board made a possible low, only that board stopped getting cards.
Best overall low and high split (like all our multiple board games).
Absent players are going to be behind the learning curve when they return.

Thanks again,

BB

Introduced HEHEHE at my semi-regular home game tonight.

Not sure we did it right, something felt off.

Felt 6 to each (4 handed)

Pre-flop betting as usual.

Simet our hands into 3 HE hands

Split pot into 3 equal pots

Flop

Round of betting for hand 1
Round of betting for hand 2
Round of betting for hand 3

Turn

Round of betting for hand 1
Round of betting for hand 2
Round of betting for hand 3

River
Round of betting for hand 1
Round of betting for hand 2
Round of betting for hand 3

coinciding pot for each hand

Is that right?

Or is it one pot chopped 3 ways?

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We do it this way:

Deal 6 to each player, set into 3 hands.

Preflop action - Each bet covers all 3 hands.

Flop, Turn and river action - Bet per hand, discarding hands you no longer want to play.

One pot at end. Best hand wins it all.

We play some similar games to those listed above, plus here is a twist on Omaha.

Double Omaha (H/L 8 or better)
- each player dealt 6 cards
- separate cards into 2 piles of 3 cards (you can discard one stack)
- bet (one bet per stack)
- flop
- discard 1 from each stack you have left
- bet (one bet per stack)
- turn
- bet (one bet per stack)
- river
- bet (one bet per stack)

cards talk, no declare

Sounds interesting. Double Pineapple Double Board Omaha 8 ?

Just remembered another Omaha variant from the old days. Don't recall the name, but it was pretty simple: double-board Omaha hi/lo, but one board is used for high, and one for low.
The boards themselves determine which one goes for low, and which one goes for high. The lowest board plays for low, and the highest board plays for high. Obviously no qualifier for low.

IOW, the lowest board is matched with two cards from each players' hand to determine the low half of the pot. The other board is used for high.

Not frequently, but enough to be interesting, the initially-low-looking board will pair up or whatever on the turn or river, thus switching it to the high board. I believe we said straights and flushes counted for purposes of determining the low or high board, so the wheel very likely would become the high side.

Also can't remember if we bothered thinking up a rule in the unlikely event of tied boards, or just figured we'd deal with it at that time.

I do like things that change / cause pain.
Playing a nutted hand one way only to find the board changes (or disappears), makes me happy.

You're right in that your group must have the right kind of temperament to play our games.

We played a $20 buy-in, $0.10-$0.50 spread limit (except on the last round of betting, where you could go a whole dollar). Much more of a social game than anything, so we were always up for "hey, I had an idea, let's try it."

Another idea I had, but think it's only the germ of an actual good idea is rollback. The hook shouldn't come into play too often, but might be fun when it does. Base NLHE.

When a person goes all-in, the board is frozen at that point to determine their pot (main or side). Play continues on with other players with the same stipulation.

So, let's say A is all-in post flop. B and C continue on, and make a side. Let's further say that C rivers a straight or whatever to overcome B's PP. They determine the side based on the entire board (assuming that it went that far, ofc).

But, B's cards are not folded; now, all three compete for the main with the board as it was at the time of A's all-in. IOW, who's got the best hand with the flop? C's straight isn't there any more, and maybe B's PP beats whatever A went in with.

Of course, this would be more fun with multiple all-ins and several sides.

P.S. Enjoyed your TR, thanks for posting that too.

Interesting, but I think it's hard to call a flop shove without a very strong hand. I suppose if I'm B on a nut draw and think C will chase, I can call a small shove that I know I'm losing to A with, in hopes of a larger side with C?


Thanks.
We always have a great time in Vegas.
I'm always looking for more info, 'upgrades' to some of the things we do.
This trip the 'upgrade' was the Baccarat Lounge at Aria for cigars and bourbon (rye).
Happy to actually get to an AYCE Sushi place.
Dispensary prices were much cheaper than in NJ, but that's a limited value as I won't fly with anything and did not even finish what I wanted Lightweight in some regards.

So if you are a shortstack and go all-in with the nuts (say top set) on the flop other players cannot outdraw you for the main pot even if their straight or flush ultimately gets there? Am I understanding this correctly? If yes, does not make a whole lot of sense to play drawing hands for any kind of significant money.

Yeah, that's the idea. Like I said, it's the germ of an idea. Maybe the rollback should only come into play when there is an actual side pot?

Not sure how you can defend against nutted hands jamming on flops.
I suppose there is some game theory about jamming non-nutted for value or as a bluff.

We play lowmaha where the board runs out until a 7 low is possible. The board can be 3 or more cards, but you know when the last board card appears.

Also Oklahoma, where 3 boards are dealt, and low river card (2 low, A high) wipes out the board. Paired low cards wipe out 2 boards. All the same river, and they all stay. * Maybe an addendum to wipe them all and run a new 5 card board could be suggested?