What is pokerbot101 doing lately? Omaha Poker!

Until yesterday, when I wanted to play poker I, would usually find my way into some PartyPoker.com 100NL or 200NL Texas holdem action playing anywhere from 1 to 5 tables depending on what else I was doing. At the suggestion of a couple of people though, I have decided to spread out and try some Omaha poker. I borrowed one book and bought another from Amazon.

Why read poker books? Certainly experience can teach you all things if you play long enough and have a critical eye and reflect on hands, but books can give you that info much more quickly. You have the benefit of learning through someone elses mistakes rather than your own which is normally much less costly. Don't discount experience and practice though. You can't be a good player if you dont play! Reading some books can get you in the mode of thinking that you should have memorized what to do in every situation (guidelines with engineered responses). Certainly this is not possible so the sooner you start to think about poker conceptually at the table where you are asking questions while playing your hands, deducing the answers, and adjusting play accordingly, the better.

Back to Omaha... There are basically 4 "types" of this game that you can play. Omaha Hi Limit, Omaha Hi Pot Limit, Omaha Hi-Lo Limit and Omaha Hi-Lo Pot Limit. I started learning the ropes by playing some 50c/$1 limit Omaha Hi. At this point I was in the middle of my books just trying to get some early experience to better grasp some of the concepts I was reading. Omaha is definitely harder to read the board and decide what hand or draw you have and whether or not it is correct to continue since you have 4 cards instead of just 2. There are some instances where it is correct to even fold the current nuts! (because of so many bad cards or redraws that can come if you have no further prospects) Well at Omaha Hi Limit (low limits) there are so many people contesting the pot and seeing it to the river that I kept getting sucked out on, even alot by 2 outers. I recall this similar thing happened to me back when I first started playing Limit Texas holdem. That is mainly what got me to change to No Limit Texas holdem at the time. So what did I do this time? Yep, I moved on over to some Pot Limit Omaha Hi. There are "cheap" $25 buy in tables which I opened up a few and let her rip. I made back the 50 bucks I lost at limit and definitely have found my home at least short term. People make some pretty big mistakes at Pot Limit Omaha Hi and you can punish them for those mistakes a helluva lot more. I'll fill you in on my further adventures in Omaha land soon enough!