Of all the popular games that get play at the WSOP, which has the largest skill gap?

LHE
NLHE
PL Omaha
Omaha Hi/Lo
7 Card Stud
Stud 8OB
Razz
NL 2-7 Single Draw
2-7 Triple Draw

I haven't played nearly enough to have a strong opinion, but I'm curious to hear what others think.

Related question:

Do you think the skill gap increases as the # of players at the table drops? In other words, is the skill gap in heads up NLHE > 6 max > full ring?

I think all big bet type of poker are way more simple than pot limit and no limit poker, so the question is between nlhe and plo.

Imo 9-max is way more complex than 6-max and HU, because there are more players, pre-flop ranges and preflop spots(if utg rfi, utg+2 3-bets and SB 4-bets, all gto ranges, it's likely that you should fold KK pre in the BB, something that can't happen at a 6-max table) , but if you look at the average complexity of the decisions given a time frame(or hands played), HU is more complex. So the skill gap per orbit should be higher at 9-max and skill gap per hand at HU.

PLO8 is pretty damn complex. And yes short handed will expose skill differences more radically.

What's a skill gap?

What takes the most skill? I'd say NLHE just cuz so many people are good at it next to any other poker type. If I could I'd play 100% PLO cuz I guess the skill gap between good player's and bad players are so pronounced. NLHE a person can have solid looking stats and still be a massive fish in the game.

I'm definitely not a pro, but I feel like full ring NLHE is simpler than short-handed. The opening ranges are a lot narrower, so it's generally easier to put your opponent on a range of hands. Also, since you are playing a lot fewer hands, you have fewer decisions. Occasionally you will have a tough decision, but a lot of it just comes down to patience and picking spots.

On the other hand, in a HU game you are playing almost every hand and it's harder to put your opponent on a range of hands since the ranges are maybe going to be a bit murkier. You know that in a full ring a UTG raise usually (not always) means some type of pair or two big cards. OTOH, a raise in HU could be any two cards in the deck. I think it's harder to know where you are in a particular spot because you're facing a much wider range of possibilities. It would seem like the ability to read betting patterns and tendencies would be stressed a little more.

Also, if you think about poker as basically being a game of decisions, there are more decisions per hand in a HU or short-handed game since you're going to be involved in a much higher % of the hands.

For both questions, I would say it all comes down to the number of decisions a player has to make, both from a per-hand and overall standpoint.

To your first question, I would probably go with a game like PLO8. Three streets of decisions plus preflop. It's pot-limit rather than limit, so your bet-sizing also adds an additional dimension to the decision-making "tree." And then there's the whole split pot element, which increases the number of considerations a player has to make.

To your second, I'd say the more short-handed NLHE gets, the tougher it is, if for no other reason than players have to play more hands. In turn, this means more decisions and a higher number of more marginal situations.

stud hi/lo.... with a declare

+1. In stud, you have to observe all the cards and recalculate the odds with each street of hitting your draws. Let's say you pick up a straight draw on 5th street. You need to remember how outs got folded on 3rd and 4th street.

It seems like, from what I've been told, PLO has the most variance and its the one that people go broke the quickest in

That sounds about right to me. I can barely cope with anything more than one hole card, so Stud would be the most taxing for me.

PLO or PLO8 if that's an option.

I don't have my own opinion on this matter as I don't play so many games, aniway:

1 when it comes to LIMIT O/8, Ray Zee, on his book "High-Low-Split Poker", says it is a relatively simple game.

2 stud hi seems to be even more complex than stud/8, or at least this is what stud players say, even if I wouldn't even know why as I never played it

And when it comes to the simplest, I have the impressione they are limit TD and razz, don't know about badugi

It's always going to be a tournament variant due to the changing stack size.

From a pure complexity standpoint full ring NL tournaments would be the hardest to play optimally, although it's likely that optimal play in that variant wouldn't generate that much extra ev compared to a "good enough" strategy.

My guess is that the format were optimal play would generate the biggest edge is deepstack (let's say 250bb starting) HU NL tournaments.

Spread limit holdem is the highest skill but only if the structure is as follows...

1-2 relationship between the small and big blinds

spread is 1-4-8-8

bet or raise between 2 to 4 before the flop and on the flop

bet or raise between 2 to 8 on the turn and the river

By making it spread limit, players have to make bet size decisions like they do in pot an NL. In pure fixed limit you can't make blocking bets but you can do so in PL and NL. By making it spread limit you can also make blocking bets in limit.

By making it limit, players have to make limit plays that are useful in limit but aren't used in big bet. Example: In no limit, all you have to do to "protect" your hand from first position is use the appropriate bet size. In traditional limit you can't do so because you are limited in your betsize. To achieve "protection" you have to use the check raise for protection. That is, you check in first or early position, the person in last position bets, then you raise forcing the other players to pay double. This isn't necessary in NL and PL because of bet sizing.

In short, in spread limit holdem you can use both blocking bets and protection check raises. You can also make free card raises from limit that don't make sense in no limit because doing so would make the pot too big.

p.s. hi lo split poker is too easy. The only way it could be difficult is to play it with the "declare" option.

I remember some players suggesting that 2-7 triple draw would be insanely complicated if played pot limit/no limit. The game (nl 2-7 TD) actually run for while right after FTP reopened, it was super deep (multiple million dollar stacks on 150/300 blinds) and Dwan crushed it for like 2 milly. Never really run again after that.

Stud8, PLO8 and PLO would be my picks although you can be 'good' at Stud8 without playing optimally pretty easily since most people are terrible at it

The best 'overall' player is the player who can crush mixed games obviously no matter what game is offered, but high-low and big bet games tend to have more decisions so super deep stacked PLO8 shorthanded might be a good answer, since full ring play is super nitty in that game. Honestly deep stacked PLO is a fine answer too and in Stud8 is very complex to play 'gto' although at the same time it's very easy to play very close to optimally in Stud8, so edges will be smaller for the best players against simply good players than in big bet games.

Draw is probably the least complex. You could create a GTO bot quite easily for any single draw variation.

Generally the more variables the more complex a game is but that doesn’t mean it’s the most skill dominant format. Ie: 8 card plo would be more difficult to define optimal ranges or calculate weighted equity for than for normal plo but the equities for hands converge on 50% the more cards you add.

What does "with a declare" mean?

You have to declare whether you are going for hi, lo, or both (by secretly placing a chip in your hand). If you choose both you have to win both to get anything. If you choose lo you forfeit the hi pot and vice versa.

It might be POT LIMIT STUD/8 ...requires observation of dead cards, range analysis, and with being pot limit, also math (which somewhat becomes irrelevant in a limit situation) ... you can also argue NO LIMIT STUD/8

Cap holdem

Poker variants can generally be classified from complex to simple based on how difficult it is to make the nuts.

So, high-only games (nuts: royal flush) rank among the most complex and lowball games (nuts: wheel) rank among the most simple. Split pot games are in the middle.

In addition, flop and stud games are generally regarded as more complex than draw games.

Among regularly played fixed limit games, a reasonable list would be.

1a. Seven card stud
1b. Hold 'em
3. Seven card stud hi-low, 8 or better
4. Omaha hi-low, 8 or better
5. Razz
6. 2-7 Triple draw
7. badugi

Maybe O/8 is ranked too high. Playing an A2 hand (or any nut low/low draw) is probably the most common nut hand to play.

#4 through #7 above are very close.


Big bet games like no-limit hold 'em and pot-limit Omaha aren't automatically more complex because of the larger betting sizes. However, you'll sometimes have to make decisions for your entire stack which are disproportionately more important than all other decisions you have to make.

So, does making those few decisions correctly make NLHE or PLO more complex than any fixed limit game? Or, is it more complex to correctly make a larger % of small edge decisions inherit in fixed limit poker? I think its about equal.

Pot-limit stud 8 with declare and an additional rule where in order to raise you need to dunk a basketball.