OTB how should I be thinking of hands like Qh Th 4c 2s when co limps. Junk?

Q,T,4,2 is not "junk." It's a slightly above average hand. And you have position. Position is more important in pot-limit Omaha-8 than in fixed-limit Omaha-8, but position is important in any poker game. Assuming you're talking about a full nine or ten player game, or even in a six max game, as a beginner, you'll be safer if you fold that hand. However, someone with more experience might want to see the flop with it.

Buzz

So in a 6max game are we best limping?

It depends. What do you think your opponents want you to do? If you think they'd rather you limped, maybe you'd be better off raising.

But first note that Q,T,4,2, although not "junk." is, in my humble opinion, a hand beginners would do better to fold.

As a beginner, you'll like the game better if you show a small profit while you learn the game. I think you can do that, assuming you have decent card sense, by playing squeaky clean tightly. Somewhere, in an earlier post in this thread, I gave a squeaky clean tight short list of starting hands for beginners. I recommend you stick to that list in a six max game until you can eke out a small but steady and sure profit by playing that way. Maybe you'll improve your self discipline by playing very tightly. Sometimes, even when you know the game well, it's necessary to play very tightly.

Then as you learn the game, my idea is you gradually expand your list of starting hands, and though in my humble opinion it always should be somewhat variable, it might eventually include sometimes hands like
Q,T,4,2.

That's just my opinion in terms of general advice for newbs. I recommend you find a good coach if you're interested in expanding your horizons. And then, if you do, you'll do better to follow your coach's advice than mine. (I'm not interested in coaching).

Meanwhile you can continue to ask questions in this forum. When you do that you'll probably get different opinions. And different opinions are welcome on this forum. It's up to the reader to decide who offers the best advice.

But your questions seem to be more advanced than were intended for the newb's thread. Accordingly, I'm moving this one and the posts leading to it, out of this newb's thread and into a separate thread.

Buzz

in my experience its not a hand you want to limp with due to its lacking nut potential. its better to thin the field out with these lesser hands so your non nut hands can win at least half the pot postflop. you want to be able to hit top pair queens ten kicker and that be good for high, or be able to use your live deuce on a A348Q board and get lucky and scoop with queens up and 8432A. that stuff just wont really happen in multiway pots.

therefore its best to play in position because then you know how many people are in the pot already and can decide whether to fold or not. if someone limps then you dump your hand and don't even bother because you're probably gonna get at least them and the big blind calling and taking the flop 4 ways is not gonna work out well for you unless you get quite lucky with the flop. so the best and (IMO) only spot you wanna come in with these lesser hands is when you can limit the field to 1 opponent or just the blinds at most, ie, everyone folds to you on the button and you raise it up.

if you can work that strategy into your game when you gain experience for all your hands not containing an ace and ability to make low (or ace with middle cards like A69Qds or A78Js which are kinda bad hands) you're well on your way to developing strong preflop steals.

like buzz said you wanna work on nailing the fundamentals first. stuff i've said above is something to consider when you've done that and truly not before. you're pretty likely to end up drowning if you chuck yourself in the deep end straight away. during your adventures you discover stuff like what i've said on your own. it took me more than a year of playing the game to see beyond what Super System II and AdamTheExpert taught me. perhaps you too will hold that to be true one day.

I understand that in a pot limit game we absolutely should try and iso to get the pot heads up. My question was referring to fixed limit. I have little experience in limit games.

So on the button co limps and we have a playable hand, but given that there is a decent chance that the blinds come in too for a great price, should I consider my hand not nutty enough to play? Or should I still try and iso with a raise if I were to deem a hand such as this as palyable?

i was talking entirely about limit.

Ah ok ty. Seems like solid advice just wanted to make sure we are on the same page. Who is Adamtheexpert?

I don't think that is necessarily correct. I think "it depends."

Hard to answer.

Your hand lacks an ace, by far the most important card in high low split games (where an ace can count as the best high card and also the best low card).

And you don't have one of these most powerful cards (aces). Does your opponent, CO have an ace? If so, you're probably the underdog:

ProPokerTools Omaha Hi/Lo Simulation

600,000 trials (Randomized)

Hand	Pot equity	Scoops	Wins Hi	Ties Hi	Wins Lo	Ties Lo
QhTh4c2s	43.65%	170,583	256,976	4,616	127,831	6,978
A***	56.35%	244,508	338,408	4,616	182,040	6,978

You're behind by about 5:4.

But if you also let the blinds in,

ProPokerTools Omaha Hi/Lo Simulation

600,000 trials (Randomized)

Hand	Pot equity	Scoops	Wins Hi	Ties Hi	Wins Lo	Ties Lo
QhTh4c2s	24.39%	75,808	129,213	12,327	85,862	19,020
A***	30.87%	92,006	164,417	11,527	124,017	20,415
****	22.36%	67,132	140,516	13,272	54,724	18,569
****	22.38%	67,421	141,150	13,201	54,226	18,341

then you almost have a fourth equity. You won't win as often, only 24.39% as compared to 43.65%, but when you do win, if some of your opponents continue with poor hands, there will be more money in the pot at the showdown than there is when you get heads-up. This is in spite of there obviously being dead money in the pot from the blinds if they concede. (They would have contributed more if they continued after the flop with poor hands). Thus although you won't win as often with more players continuing, when you do win, you'll win more.

At the end of the playing session, the winner is not the one who has won the most often. The winner is the one who has won the most money.

You might think you'd win bigger pots by raising, and against some poor card playing opponents you do, but in general it doesn't necessarily work that way, because you tend to push some opponents, even poor card playing opponents, out of the pot when you raise.

Sometimes you want to do that, to push your opponents out of the pot, but other times you want to keep your opponents paying to see the showdown.

The art of poker is mixing up your game, knowing when to pull and when to push, and knowing when to continue and when to fold.

So should you raise or not with this hand after CO has limped?

"It depends." A major part of "it depends" is whether CO needs at least an ace to limp. You're the one sitting in the game with CO. You tell us if CO probably has an ace or not. Hopefully if I were the one playing, I'd have that feel for whether CO needed at least an ace to limp with me behind him yet to act and with the blinds yet to act.

Buzz