Hi all,

I've found an unbelievably juicy $5/$10/$25 Omaha game. I played it last weekend and did well. However sitting down with $2500 to get in in a 60/40 matchup is very much on the borderline of what my bankroll can handle. So what I've been considering doing instead is shortstacking and buying in for the min ($500) which is a laughable 20bbs, then utilizing a classic shortstack strategy of limping premiums and backraising when opening a pot, or simply 3betting any standard opens ($75 is preflop potsize bet in this game) and then getting the money in preflop or on the flop. I realize that limp-reraising is the ultimate fish move in NLHE, but I've read that it can be very effective in short-stack PLO because you can create low SPR situations and get into spots where two or more players have called for your whole stack, and then some will bet others out of the pot, allowing you to get heads up for three or four to one on your money. It all sounds pretty plus EV and I'm interested to hear what y'all think.

Cheers

Are you limping any other hands, or only the premiums? Are you planning to rebuy when you get bounced? If so, you're better off putting both buyins on the table. Omaha's a game about the nuts, and it's going to be tough to break even when you don't have a deep stack to double when you hit.

I play with a lot of guys who do this, though most of them have a pretty loose definition of 'premium.' They're annoying. None of them do very well.

I would be limping not just premiums, but any hand that is prepared to limp-reraise or otherwise get it in preflop for 20bbs (in other words, a relatively wide range), and hands that are very happy to get it in on the flop with an overpair given the low SPR.

Yes I will have several rebuys in my pocket. In general I would agree with you that deepstacked play is more fun, skillful and profitable - I'm just exploring the idea of short-stacking for this specific game, as I believe it has the right conditions for a very profitable short-stack strategy - it's loose-aggressive and 9-handed.

Regarding making the nuts - sure, I get that. The point with short-stacking is to create low SPR situations where you can get a large range of hands in profitably on the flop. There are other advantages too, for example getting multiple callers preflop who subsequently bet each other out of the hand, meaning you get to play heads-up whilst getting 3 or 4 to 1 on your money. Also, the other players might not know how to adjust to a short-stack player being in the game, you get to pick up a lot of dead money with limp-reraises, you tailor your hand selection to hands that suit low SPRs (and other players may not know you're doing this) etc.

I've read in numerous places that it can be a very profitable strategy in PLO - for example check out this piece by JNandez:

https://plomastermind.com/short-stacking-plo/

i read on here that this book is basically the short stackers bible for PLO...give it a read maybe itll help. haven't had the chance to read it myself but when i was researching short stack play for PLO this came up a lot and i think the strategy is similar to what you described in your OP.

Secrets of Professional Pot-Limit Omaha: How To Win Big, Both Live And Online Paperback – Illustrated, September 1, 2006
by Rolf Slotboom (Author)

Thanks - I read it many moons ago but may indeed take another look.

I spent a few hours short stacking on GG today (20bb buy-in on the $100 tables) and won 100bbs - a good start at least

I don't know if it's changed, but the limp-reraise was a weapon once used in NLHE too with some level of respectability attached to it in certain circumstances, it's possibly died a long ago death even before solvers though.

It's a legit and very profitable strategy in live plo cash and you don't need to be very good at it to make it work if the players around you are bad and deep enough. A downside is that it minimizes your skill advantage. An upside is that it can be fun not just for you but for the other players to get involved in more flips than you would do when deepstacked, which can also lead to a reciprocal tilt advantage. Another upside is that you can spin that into a big win, but that comes with the downside that, say you spin your $500 into $50k in a few hours, you've now probably got way more money on the table than you feel comfortable with.

This last problem ties into the politics of the game - not something you have to worry as much about with casino games. Any private or semi-private game you may need to consider longer term factors with regards to being invited back to the game. You may only get to hitnrun once, and depending on whether you're seen as a winning player or not (losing players given 1000x more leeway, for example with regards to what actually constitutes a hitnrun), you're likely expected to stay at least a few hours or find some convincing excuse to leave early. Which can put an uncomfortable level of your bankroll at risk.

However that comes with the further upside of sometimes getting it all-in for the very last hand of the night with that $50k and spinning your original $500 into $150k. Or losing it all. Variance, amirite? The far higher effective stakes that you're now playing mean that you might have to fold some profitable but high-variance spots due to the kelly criterion. Which sucks, but it's the same as a tight ICM fold - you're gaining future EV by locking up your winnings, i.e. that $50k represents 100 buyins for where you were at the beginning of the session, and next time you can buy in deeper. Gamble with a small bankroll, preserve a larger one. Obviously if your edge is smaller when deep than it is when short, you should probably tend towards leaving earlier.

I don't see why limp-reraising with a short stack in NLHE couldn't be effective too, although as with PLO I almost have to puke in my mouth a bit to limp into any pot as it's been drilled into me so many times from so many different sources that it's the ultimate noob move (and obviously I certainly agree with that when deepstacked).

In PLO it does indeed seem to be both a very profitable strategy and one that is very straightforward to execute in comparison to the minefield of complexities of deepstacked PLO play (which for the record I actually really enjoy, but it's certainly not simple).

The players in the game I'm talking about are evidently loaded and lacking in any kind of nuanced PLO theory. Of course they know the basics, but I saw some unbelievable mistakes being made (for example one lady calling a potsize $2000 bet on the river and expecting to be good with an AA overpair on a super wet board, and two players playing for stacks with straight vs straight on a board with three spades). They also play pretty deep; there was over $30k on the table and several $5k+ stacks - and of course the amount of money on the table and the stack sizes usually get deeper as the session goes on. I'm 100% confident that the vast majority of these players would not be adjusting at all to having a short-stacker in the game - most of them would probably just dismiss it as a "broke min-buyer" that they can largely ignore and focus on the other big stacks instead.

For sure it would minimize any skill advantage I'd have against these players when playing deep-stacked instead, that's true. But as indicated buying in for multiple $2500 bullets and getting into regular 60/40 confrontations (though clearly very profitable on paper) is probably more than my bankroll can tolerate at the moment. But that said my first impulse, before considering short-stacking, was to return to this game with $5k (two 100bb bullets) - I've subsequently realized that short-stacking is a better option, all things considered; less variance, simpler game, less money invested, etc. It also gives the impression of being a weak player who has no clue what they're doing (with all the limping etc) and is playing with scared money (min-buying) - which again are factors that definitely work in your favor.

It definitely sounds like a super-fun experiment, if nothing more. And as you say it means the other players can get involved in 40bb flips, which they should enjoy too - and the short-stacker is ostensibly "giving them action" and creating deeper action in the game, which I'm sure they will appreciate. Definitely it's possible to spin 20bb up, but I would probably set a limit - for example getting the $500 up to $2000 - at which I'd fold for a half hour and then leave the game. This is something I'd never do in NLHE - I love playing deepstacked in that game, and when the game is good it's obviously massively plus EV - but in PLO with a short-stacker strategy it is of course the right move.

It's a casino game, so I wouldn't be worried about not getting invited back. I wouldn't even be that worried about getting labelled as a hit 'n' runner. I'd have no qualms folding some profitable but high-variance spots in situations where I've built a big stack from 20bbs. Of course it's necessary to keep the short-stack mentality/approach in mind at all time.

My next chance to test all this out at the casino will be the weekend of 16th-17 November. So I'm going to train with 20bb stacks on the $100 buy-in tables on GG Poker between now and then and get a better feel for everything. Will post updates along the way

love the rest of your post, would suggest that if $500 is a buy-in you see as sustainable (do not compare br requirements to online 100bb buyins, when you shortstack your variance is higher) you can have a bunch more tolerance for risk than leaving @ $2k. Tilt control could be a factor here - if you're liable to tilt, including life tilt, if you lose that $2k, you can make a better argument for leaving early.

Sure, $500 buy-ins are absolutely sustainable with my bankroll.

I actually read that variance is lower when short-stacked (in the JNandez article linked above). You're right though that I could probably push the $2k limit a little higher; it's just convenient in that it's two double-ups from the initial 20bb buy-in.

I'm not susceptible to tilt at all, so that wouldn't be a problem. But it would obviously suck to spin $500 up to $2000 and then lose it in an unnecessary high-variance spot if my whole strategy is to short-stack and hit and run after two doubles. I'd have no problem with switching to the $2/$5 NLHE tables for the rest of the night after successfully turning a $500 buy-in into $2000 at the PLO tables, and that way could avoid getting labelled as a ratholer - as it would obviously be pushing it a little to cash out from those tables, play NLHE for an hour, and then return to the PLO tables with a fresh $500 min-buy. I do intend to play at this casino a lot, so it's important to have a good reputation too.

To see why that's not true, consider that every big blind is 5% of your stack when buying in 20bbs deep, and you have to fight for that higher blind cost more aggressively. equities also run close enough for you to get it in more frequently than at 100bbs because of the dead money. At higher stack depths you will fold earlier in the hand more frequently, because your hand doesn't play well deep, but at shorter stacks, you don't mind that, say, it doesn't have as much connectivity (i.e. you can freely whack 20 bigs in pre with a KKJ9ss in many live games and therefore you get to showdown, but you're less likely to when you're 100 bigs deep), meaning that you lower variance further. You have a higher chance of running up a big stack when you buy in deep, but you have a correspondingly higher chance of running up a big hole, so that's a wash.

This is what Jnandez says:

"Even though you will probably be all-in more often, the variance when playing short-stack is much lower. Variance at 50BB is roughly half of that of 100BB, and the most you will lose is the stack size that you have.

When people are playing deeper stacks, they are also used to deeper stack strategy. They are going to open raise the ranges that a normal 100BB player should open, but in reality, they shouldn’t. They are going to play the way they usually play, even though that is a mistake."

He goes on to say:

"(Short stacking) is easier to learn and execute, you can overrealize your equity, and you have a huge advantage when it comes to multi-way pots. Variance goes down when playing short-stack, especially if your opponents are not making the right adjustments".

Variance is defined as "The sum of the squares of the differences between each data point in a set and the mean" - and the most frequent results lie within one standard deviation of the mean. I think what Jnandez is getting at is the fact that as you are playing with a 20bb stack instead of a 100bb stack your deviation from the mean is going to be a lot less on average as a result. For one thing, you avoid the gigantic 200bb coinflip confrontations on the flop etc, which always come with massive variance. If you instead break each of those down into five 40bb coinflips, for example, then the variance would again be lower.

You’re going to go through long downswings with that tiny buy in.

That said, short stacking can create lots of profitable spots, like you point out with limp jamming pre and hopefully someone isos. It also creates a perception that you like to flip for stacks which can help if you keep playing after doubling or tripling.

I vary my buy in to the game condition and you might want to consider slightly deeper buyins if some fun players are ready to blast off.

If you’re not happy getting in 100bb as
60-40 favorite then this game is probably too big and swingy for you.

I've played short-stack in live games that sound similar to yours. The prospect of over-realizing your equity, as Nandez suggests, is real. Also the strategy is relatively straightforward; it doesn't matter that you're playing face-up because you're short and whales love stacking AAxx, etc., with their 743Q etc, so you'll still get action.

In respect of variance, while your standard deviation will be lower, keep in mind that if you back-raise preflop you're not guaranteed of being heads-up to the flop. So, rather than 60:40's you'll be looking at 50:25:25's and 35:25:20:20's and so on. In this respect, the variance can still hurt and you might play the correct short-stack strategy and still lose 5 AIs in a session if the multiway vibe is predominant.

Also consider the option of short-stacking and then playing a little deeper (keeping in mind the Kelly Criterion, of course, and being a diligent bankroll citizen). Can you shift gears, strategy-wise, in a session? You might avoid some political fallout if you can. Such an approach gives more flexibility, too, of buying-in short in certain game conditions and buying-in for 70bb+ in other games, where it might be more advantageous to play turns and rivers, so as to better utilize fold equity or stack the 2nd nuts/overvalued draws, etc.

Sure, I'm prepared for some swings as long as the general premise is +EV. If the game is super good then I would buy in deeper, sure.

Normally I would of course have no issue getting in 100bb as a 60-40 favorite, and actively seek out such spots in $1/$2 PLO games, where I can comfortably take for example a 5-buy-in hit for $2,500 total if I have a bad run. My bankroll would have a much harder time taking a 5-buy-in hit for $12,500, which is one of the reasons why I've decided to short stack this game instead (at least for now) - so it's essentially a matter of bankroll management.

Yeah I've been practicing the strategy on GG and I'm very happy with both how simple it is to execute and how much action you get from the larger stacks.

Point noted about not always guaranteed of getting heads-up postflop; I guess that's just something that comes with the short stack territory - but on the plus side I guess it means we're getting better odds on our money too. In this specific game I would expect a lot of multiway action, and I guess one of the benefits of having a limp-reraise strategy from EP is that is there is sick action after we limp then we always have the option of folding and losing a mere one big blind. But I'm totally prepared for and accepting of that fact that I can easily lose multiple buy-ins in a row; and if that happens, it happens - it's all good.

I can definitely shift gears and switch to regular ~100bb strategy if I get a couple of doubles or whatever from my original buy-in, and indeed I will if the game is good.

I agree with the bolded, especially. While realising your equity is crucial to the strategy, folding flops, especially multiway, with one-pair hands/non-nutted draws, is important. It's not too difficult to see how the other ranges interact with the board and just give-up, even though the SPR might seem kind of low. There might be some postflop spots where you can isolate a draw-heavy range and get heads-up to better realise your equity, but these spots might not necessarily be worth the risk, especially as you might think that extraneous players who check flop or just call a bet are capped, when in fact they're not.

Uh, hold on, are we talking pre or postflop? I would suggest that if you're playing an open-limp strategy with a 20bb shortstack, we shouldn't be finding many limp-folds

Absolutely, getting away from bad spots despite the low SPR is crucial to the strategy. But in general I've found practicing on GG that this is pretty easy to judge (but definitely an area I will put more study into if it goes well at the casino). What I really like about the strategy is the amount of dead money you can pick up, and your fold equity when jamming flops out of position as the preflop raiser.

Thus far it's going well. I'm up 5 buy-ins on GG after perhaps 1000 hands. I went up 5 buy ins right away, then back down to even, then back up to 5 buy-ins up. There's been some teething issues and I'm still getting fully familiar with how to execute the strategy - when I lost the 5 buy-ins it was in marginal spots that I would now avoid quite easily. As with most of poker, it's predominantly about patience and discipline.

I was talking about preflop. I.e. limping from EP off a 20bb stack, and then seeing three subsequent players pot it - of course then I can get away from a lot of my range.

But definitely after limp reraising and creating a pot of say 20bbs with 10bbs behind, of course I'm committed with the vast majority of my range.

In an active game with lots of money flying around preflop, you should in general be prepared to call if off with your limping range. Otherwise it gets too expensive. In these sorts of games you might even be best off only having a limp / notfoldingpre range. Investing 5% of your stack and then folding is just asking for death by a thousand cuts. Or only 20 in this case

With a 20bb stack my limping range is relatively wide and for sure I will be folding the bottom of it if there is for example a cold 4bet after I limp from EP. Surely the preflop range vs range EV would support that approach? In any case I will have a pocket full of chips and will be able to top up my stack as necessary.

I believe Telemakus has clarified (1) folding preflop when limping bottom of range and faced with pot/repot action (2) not folding postflop after limp raising preflop and the flop SPR is around 0.5.

I was alluding to scenarios where you limp EP preflop and other players just call. In this scenario, say 4way, the SPR is going to be around 3-4, so you can just x/f without significant equity (e.g. fold AAJT to a bet-call on 567r).

There might be other situations where you RFI in LP and the blinds call (which can happen frequently as your RFI range is face-up AAxx/KKxx, so players aren't 3betting you). The SPR would be around 1.5, the flop again for example 567r. The SB pots flop and BB calls and you have AAxx or KKxx without board interaction/no bdfd etc. Since this is 3way you can fold here. If HU it's trickier, since you have decent equity against two-pair/pair OESD etc, but you're still going to need around 35% equity versus your opponent's range (i.e. after you shove your remaining 16bb and the SB calls the final pot will be 44bb).

100%

For sure, agree with all the points here too.

I'd actually be interested to hear the ranges that you guys would be playing from EP here. My strategy practicing online on the 7-handed tables on GG has been to limp my entire range from the Hijack, Lojack and UTG+2, and to open for pot in C/O, BTN and SB. If there's been a raise before it gets to be then I'm simply 3betting a linear range. I am still working on the nitty-gritty of the opening ranges, but they are approximately as follows:

- AAxx, KKxx, AQQx

- All unpaired hands that contain cards of rank 9 or higher.

- All double-suited rundowns and bottom/middle gappers with all cards 8 or higher.

- All hands that contain three broadways and a suited ace (note that this can include danglers and is the only hand category that can).

- All double-paired hands where the lowest pair is 77 or higher.

- All double-suited hands that include an ace and have all cards 8 or higher.

Am I missing anything/is this too wide? I read online that hands should be high-card heavy when playing a short stack, hence the above.

A limping strategy - perfectly viable at 100bbs in a multitude of game conditions - is significantly different in that we're investing 1% of our stack rather than 5%. Investing 5% of our stack and then folding frequently is pretty disastrous. If you find yourself limp-folding a lot, you should either find the first fold more often or the second call. The fact you have a pocket full of chips isn't what matters, it's the relative haemhorraghing of chips that comes with limp-folding off a shortstack more than once or twice an hour or something.