Normally when I play live I play $4/$8 LHE. My daily stoploss for $4/$8LHE is $200 (so 25 big bets). So far I've been lucky enough that I only lose the whole $200 buyin maybe 1 time every 3 sessions, it usually takes at least 4 hours and I've never lost my whole $200 buyin 2 sessions in a row. I've heard of good players going on 100BB downswings in that game so I acknowledge that I've been pretty lucky. I've also been lucky enough to have consistent access to soft games and wisdom to get up the rare times it isn't.

There's a common mentality in LHE that I'm not sure is the same for FLO8, which is "never have less than enough to cap out all 4 streets in front of you". For $4/$8LHE that's 12 big bets or $96. Unfortunately due to bankroll constraints, if my stack falls below $96 I just don't replenish it - I just keep playing, adjusting my strategy to the changing stacksize and hope to get lucky enough to get it back above $96.

The casino where I play spreads $5/$10 FLO8 with a full kill.

Here, essentially, is my question:
What would be a daily stoploss for a $5/$10 FLO8 game with a full kill that would be "equivalent" (for lack of a better word) to a $200 stoploss in a $4/$8 game? Assume, for the sake of discussion, that in both games there are 4-6 villains seeing every flop, villains will call with hopeless hand and be afraid to raise with strong ones. Assume hero's postflop skills are comparable in both (mine probably aren't but I hope to get my FLO8 skills up to the level of my LHE skills at some point).

The main reason I'm asking the question is that so far in my limited experience with live FLO8 I feel like stacks dwindle far more slowly than they do in LHE. My common sense is screaming at me that that's too good to be true, but I'm having trouble getting the math to justify it.

For one example, if in FLO8 you only play A2 and A3 hands, that's about 11.7% of all hands, and (according to PokerPro Tools Odds Oracle) you're going to win or tie either the lo or the hi about 50% of the time in a 4-way pot against 3 random hands, so you only lose your whole bet about 50% of the time. Of course, you only scoop the whole pot about 9% of the time.

Contrast that to the top 11.7% of all LHE hands (77+,A9s+,KTs+,QTs+,JTs,ATo+,KQo). Against 3 random hands you scoop the whole pot about 40% of the time, but lose your whole bet 60% of the time.

This is an oversimplification of course because many A2 and A3 hands are not in the top 11.7% of all FLO8 hands. EDIT: And, of course, I'm aware that sometimes you'll fold pre, the flop or the turn when you would have ended up with the best hand at showdown. Also, there's less difference between the best A2 or A3 hand and the worst. Take out AA and KK from the top 11.7% of all LHE hands and your scooping % drops down to -- wow, 37%, I was expecting it to be a bigger drop.

I'll stop spouting nonsense now and just ask the question - for those with more experience in both FLO8 and LHE, how do you feel like stack fluctuations compare between the two games?

Hope at least the last part made sense,
DTXCF

These are good questions. My short answer is $300.

My regular Omaha game is $6/$12 with a one-third kill (to $8/$16). Let's assume that roughly a third of hands are killed. This means the average stake in my game is $6.67/$13.33, and the average stake in your game ($5/$10 with a full kill) is the same.

So you could say $13.33 x 25 big bets = $333. But wait. If you play very tight preflop, Omaha has less variance (and therefore requires a lower bankroll) than LHE at the same stakes. And in my experience, $300 in my $6/$12 Omaha game lasts about as long as $300 in a similarly loose $6/$12 Limit Hold'em game.

Mind you, I don't play very tight preflop. I usually buy in for $300, and it's not uncommon for me to be in a game $600 or more. Yesterday afternoon I was stuck $400 after about 2 hours and didn't feel I was on tilt or had made any big mistakes. Three and a half hours later, I cashed out up $400. That gives you an idea of the swings in my game and with my playing style.

Now let me quote Steve Badger on relative bankroll requirements: "Omaha is a great game to make money if you have a small bankroll. $3/6 Omaha should require less of a bankroll for a sensible player than $3/6 Limit Hold'em, but generate a higher hourly win rate." That's from his extremely helpful introduction to the game, which you can find at http://www.stevebadger.com/poker/omaha/strategy/.

What he wrote confirms your perception that your stacks are dwindling far more slowly. Why is this happening? Because even though you're not scooping often, you're picking up some half pots and quarter pots along the way. You're not dragging as many chips per pot won as you would in LHE, but you're dragging chips more often—and just as many chips overall—which means less variance and lower bankroll requirements.

Finally, I want to recommend to you the Hutchison point count system for starting hands. Other forum members might say this is an oversimplification and a crutch and that a thinking player would never use it. But if you're new to the game and trying to play really tight preflop, it can be a helpful starting point: http://ehutchison.homestead.com/OmahaSystem.html.

Good luck!

"stack fluctuations" have two knobs. Winrate and variance. Omaha8 as a game prolly has lower variance than LHE in the games you play, heavily mw on all streets and showdown bound. My guess at which has higher possible winrates is probably o8 because there are occasional expert plays to identify and execute. But not a greatly higher winrate, tbh.

It's likely that the kill offers additional skill advantage for higher winrates in BB and $$. But that comes with likely higher variance at the higher stake and guaranteed much higher variance in terms of the lower stake. So your comparable stop loss should be significantly more lower-stake big bets than the comparable lower stake LHE game.

$300 stop loss in a full kill 5/10 game? That's just crazy talk!... I'd be ok with $1K. But at the very least $600. 300 is not enough. Assuming your BR is 300BBs, a $600 s.l. effectively would enable you to have 9 loosing sessions in a row and still have one session left.

Yes stacks dwindle quicker than LH. It's also way harder to run up a big stack playing o8.

Your $5/10 full kill game should be considered a $10/20 game. If you use 25 bb again, that would be $500. It depends a lot on texture of game and how many people push small edges. If you are in a kill pot that is capped pre-flop, there is already $50 of yours in the pot before the flop.

o8 plays slower than lhe. Fluctuations can be substantial just not as frequent.