I've played all the mixed games at freeroll tournament level only, know the rules but not much strategy and I'm interested to improve my game.

Pokerstars offers their lowest cash game at limits of $0.20/$0.40 and sngs at $1.50 6 man turbo. I figured that the sngs would be the cheaper way to learn. Am I correct?

I've played one sng so far and have made notes on each game as I've gone through. These notes either come from what I've heard (commentary/podcasts), what I've experienced in freerolls and some things just invented because it seems to initially make sense.

Could you please look over my notes and let me know where I am going wrong and also add in your own tips for a beginner. (I mostly need help with stud and draw games as you might imagine).

Many Thanks.

Limit Triple Draw 2 – 7 Lowball
Only open hands that contain 2 and 7
Only defend blinds to single raise with 3 wheel cards
Position very important
Jack Low > Draw 1 (1 draw)
Queen Low > Draw 2 (1 draw)
Hands to snow with? (trip 7, trip 2?) (don't snow at low limits?)

Limit Hold’em
Never slow play big hands pre flop
Small pairs and suited connectors go down in value

Limit Omaha Hi/Lo

Limit Razz
Screenshot to see door cards
Defend bring in if 2 hole cards below opponents door card
Good situation if hole cards match folded door cards
Always raise if you have someone board locked

Limit Stud
Screenshot to see door cards
Open 3 to a flush (dead flush cards?)
Open 3 broadway cards
Open any pair/rolled up
Pocket pairs > split pairs

Limit Stud Hi/Lo
Screenshot to see door cards
Open 3 to a low
Open any low pair with 3rd card low
Open any pair QQ or greater with high card
Open any pair JJ or greater with low card
Open any pocket pair with low door card (set deception)
Dead low cards matching yours are good
Dead high cards matching yours are bad

No Limit Hold’em

Pot Limit Omaha
Don’t slow play

Depends on the table, but drawing to a reasonable 8 is fine, 852xx 843xx etc. 872xx can be kind of a trap hand though, so folding it except when unopened on the button / sb is fine.

Defending against a button open with 8w3xx etc is fine.

I wouldn't bother snowing much at these stakes, certainly from the get go, they call too much.

open draw 2 to a smooth 8
defend button open with a draw 2 to a smooth 8
do not snow at low limits

added to the list. Thank you very much

I'm terrible at most of those games. For Omaha hi/lo, I think it's fair to see that you shouldn't play many hands that don't contain an ace. You can play really nitty in that game, because nanostakes villains are pretty terrible, and they get quartered constantly because they only play one-way hands (high only or weak lows), whereas you should be playing to scoop.
Oh, avoid hands containing 9s. That's right, isn't it?

Thanks man, I think I know a lot of the basics to the flop games, but it's always nice to talk things out and confirm points.

Are there really no stud studs out there? Even if you don't know for sure, opinions on what I have said would be nice to hear

First hand of Triple Draw: Draw to a high hand. Show it down.


Profit there on out!

If you play the SCOOP - L you'll find people doing this every hand they play ...

Open 3 to a low Not necessarily. 8xx and rough 7xx are often folds depending on the action to you and what's left to act behind you. Multi way 876 can be OK, but if the 8 is in the door realize the low portion of your hand is face up. You should be able to profitably open any 3 card 6, and smooth 7s (72A, 73A, 732) but be careful with lows that don't contain an A when a live A hits the board.

Open any pair QQ or greater with high card
Open any pair JJ or greater with low card

Not at a full table. Buried with a low card up, maybe, but you need no live higher card showing AND you have to be ready to bail when a live A shows. Essentially, not playing split high pairs (other than split Aces) is never a serious error. You really want to play hands that can scoop.

Open any pocket pair with low door card (set deception) No. Avoid JJ-99 like the plague, KK, QQ - be afraid, be very afraid. These are money burners. You can play KK and QQ but you better know when to get away from them on 5th.

One place where Stud hi and Stud/8 differ is your play on 4th and 6th. general rule of thumb in Stud hi, is that staying on 3rd means don't fold 4th, and staying on 5th means don't fold 6th. Not true for Stud/8. Most times if you stay with 3 to a low on 3rd and you brick 4th you can fold unless every other low bricks. Also, 6th street in Stud/8 can fall in such a way that you're essentially drawing dead both ways. In Stud hi, if you've correctly called on 5th it is almost always a mistake to fold 6th. 3rd and 5th are your big decision points in stud hi. The river usually plays itself since in limit the bet is usually very small compared with the pot size. Obv. that is not quite true in split pot games.

If you have the original Super/System, Chip Reese's section on Stud is excellent.

Super/System2, Negreanu's section on 2-7 TD is good.

Ray Zee's book on O8/Stud/8 is pure gold.

A couple of more things. In LHE (and probably Stud hi) do not bet-fold on the river. If you don't think your hand is good enough to put in two bets, check-call.

In LHE when you bet the river and get raised, you're usually getting at least 8:1. Folding incorrectly is a much bigger mistake than calling incorrectly.

Also in LHE, almost never call a raise pre flop - your default choice should be either 3-bet or fold.

On the flop, when your opponent leads, many situations where you would call in NL, you raise in limit.

An old LHE adage says, "when they raise the flop it's a lie, when they raise the turn, it's the truth."

Thank you very much indeed. I'm sure you've saved me quite a bit of time, effort and money with all that advice.

Thank you again

They also get scooped sometimes because they're playing a naked nut low that gets counterfeited or they play a high-only hand on a low board and their opponent has a complete freeroll. And a lot of them draw at half the pot even when heads-up. I can't wrap my head around that one. That's not even a poker mistake. It's a basic math mistake.

Yeah, basically. 10s are pretty poor cards too in general, but at least you can make Broadway straights with them. The only way you should find a 9 in your hand is if you have something like A299 or A329.

Although I don't generally disagree with this, limit cash is about exploiting small edges. So raising draws builds pots big enough to be worth winning while folding out weak pair holdings, making SCs very strong if you can get a big enough pot vs an over pair that's priced in. Small/medium PPs main strength is in sets as they won't hold up a lot without improvement given how often you go to showdown. Check/raising is a play that works best when you're trying let aggressors get stuck in a hand with medium holdings. Flatting flops with strong hands and then check raising the turn when the price is bigger skews pot odds in your favor while putting more money in the pot than just bet/bet/bet.

I am super out of practice with limit these days, so that's all I remember.

For PLO, you want your gappers at the bottom and not the top. i.e. KQJ9 i/o KJT9.
Otherwise your seemingly-nutted KJT9 hand on a 678 flop is all of a sudden getting freerolled by KQJ9 when a T hits the turn.

Good tips guys, thanks a lot

micro 8-game sngs are sooooo slow to fill up. It takes ~20 minutes to fill up a 6 man