What hands do you yourself raise preflop in omaha hi PL

Im just curious because I rarely raise preflop and was wondering what you other guys did.

I miniraise AA, preferably suited. If I get a reraise I push back hard if I think I can isolate them and hopfully get it AI heads up before the flop.

If I know the players are bad then I might try and do the same with something like KK or another good hand, but if I'm not sure I wont do it without AA.

Otherwise I always see the flop for cheap.

Originally Posted by lamaros

I miniraise AA, preferably suited.

I love players like that. Please keep telling me when you have AA, better yet play it strong post-flop without a set or strong draw. My guess is bad players lose money with AAxx.

Raise to build a pot with good cards and position. Stuff like JT87 double suited and QQTT is certainly worth building a pot with.

The trick with Omaha against piss poor players is to catch a great hand and bust them post-flop. Quite often stuff like bottom 2, bottom set, top pair, broadway straight (w/o re-draws) etc. are sucker hands.

With AAxx in EP, I limp then consider re-raising if I can get it in pre-flop.

Let me clarify what I put above.

I never want to get involved with a near heads up play pre-flop unless I have AA myself, which is why I never invite anyone to push back at me by raising any marginal hands. I'll only raise or re-raise if I think I have the best starting hand and I think I can fold enough players to get it heads up.

So it all depends on position, the other players in the hand, the size of the pot when it gets to you, and a lot of other factors. Unless I judge it possible to get it into a heads up position I will never raise PF.

Raising to build a pot will just backfire when the guy who holds AA bets the (now considerably bigger) pot back at you.

It depends on what your purpose to in raising. I almost never raise in EP and generally when I do raise, I raise to isolate or to build a pot. So when you want to know whether or not to raise, ask yourself what am I accomplishing with this raise? At lower limits, its almost pointless to raise for isolation. With that being said your now are only raising to build a pot.

I generally limp in, only raising occasionaly with hands that have a lot of potential to build the pot if I do hit. Normally I limp in though, because even if you end up hitting a set many times you'll need to fill up or you'll lose to a flush or straight. With high pairs you only worry about the Hi part of the pot. Limping in a multi-way pot with a hand like A2 is also a good way to make money in these ring games where a lot of players see the flop.

AA double suited is worth going all in with.
after that you have:
AA-KK/QQ/JJ
AAJT
89TJ
KK-QQ/JJ
KQJT double suited
KKAQ suited
KKAJ, KKQJ , KKJT,
AKQQ
QQJT

and anything that fits somewhere in between those hands.

AA double suited is not worth going allin. you also forget middle rundown cards.

Depends on the game I guess. I like to see a lot of flops and let my profit roll in from playing better (and tighter) post-flop than the rest of the table. I raise sometimes with position and with an assortment of interesting hands. I raise more in Omaha sit-n-goes than ring games.

The least interesting and easiest to bust players are the ones that always raise the pot with AA in Omaha, and always raise the pot AA or A2 in Omaha8. I love these players. I want to crack open their skulls and feast upon the tasty goo within. What's great about these players is that even when they miss the flop badly, which is basically all the time, they still come out firing with a pot-sized bet. Playing against these guys is a matter of calling raises with any halfway interesting hand and then hoisting them up by their hairy petards as soon as you catch something.

Originally Posted by dalecooper

Depends on the game I guess. I like to see a lot of flops and let my profit roll in from playing better (and tighter) post-flop than the rest of the table. I raise sometimes with position and with an assortment of interesting hands. I raise more in Omaha sit-n-goes than ring games.

The least interesting and easiest to bust players are the ones that always raise the pot with AA in Omaha, and always raise the pot AA or A2 in Omaha8. I love these players. I want to crack open their skulls and feast upon the tasty goo within. What's great about these players is that even when they miss the flop badly, which is basically all the time, they still come out firing with a pot-sized bet. Playing against these guys is a matter of calling raises with any halfway interesting hand and then hoisting them up by their hairy petards as soon as you catch something.

That's the best. You call a PF raiser who we all know has aces and the board comes 889 and they come out with a potsized bet. They obviously have aces and probably a low card. I love to smooth call in that situation if I hit, because they fire out again on the turn. People play aces in Omaha 8 like they're Aces in holdem. The truth its, Aces are worthless unless you hit your set. I'd personally rather have KKxx than AAxx because if you hit your set of kings it doesn't contribute to the low hand. Of course if I have AA23 that's a different story.

I like to raise aces, win a pot with them, then raise a nice wrap and catch those idiots who overbet two pair at me when I hit a nice flop thinking I have aces.

The whole point of Aces are getting the money in PF and getting heads up. Everyone knows, or should know by now, that Aces have more power the fewer people in the pot, and a nice double suited wrap has more power the more in the pot.

I'd never rather have KKxx than AAxx. Never. That's just silly.

Aces are worthless unless you hit your set

Completely incorrect.

I normally raise Q-8-5-2 rainbow.

And whenever I get a nut hand like 3339 i love to get all my money in.

For real...good thread. I am just starting to mature in omaha and it is good to see what others are doing.

I got quads the other day for the first time. Folding 9999 feels very weird.

Originally Posted by aislephive

That's the best. You call a PF raiser who we all know has aces and the board comes 889 and they come out with a potsized bet. They obviously have aces and probably a low card. I love to smooth call in that situation if I hit, because they fire out again on the turn. People play aces in Omaha 8 like they're Aces in holdem. The truth its, Aces are worthless unless you hit your set.

In a multi-way pot maybe, but that's why you raise with them. Don't get me wrong, I definitely raise with AA in Omaha and O8. But I raise other hands too. The mistake a lot of players make is never raising anything BUT aces, and then always raising the full pot when they have aces. It makes them very predictable, and in a loose game when they get 2 or 3 callers, they can't seem to restrain themselves from potting again on the flop. Inevitably they get torched by someone who actually hit something. Playing aces like that is best reserved for the later stages of a sit-n-go, or in a higher stakes game or tournament where people actually fold to raises. But in low stakes ring games, or the first couple orbits of a low buyin sit-n-go, you shouldn't play aces that way. You're guaranteed to get too much action, and then if you don't set you're guaranteed to get smacked in the chops.

If your calling a raise with a hand in Omaha 8 that contains a 8 or a 9 then you have issues far superior to overplaying AA.

A couple of good artictles on Bet the Pot about starting hand selection for Omaha, and Omaha-8:

http://www.bet-the-pot.com/pot-limit...09ce5e17ebcbd6

Basic pot limit Omaha strategy probably consists of raising most hands consisting of several combinations of high suited connectors and high pairs with powerful supporting cards, but preferably with position.

I suppose in a tighter game you could raise a much wider range of more speculative hands with position, including hands like 8, 9, 7, 6 and the like.

9876 is not a speculative hand.

ill raise any hand that can hit the nut flush.
Not lots but enough to build the pot. Ill big raise holding two suited aces but not for the aces for the flush.

Originally Posted by ihategnomes

9876 is not a speculative hand.

Um, why not?

For the same reason NL ring players like having implied odds hands when another player has a big pair. middlerun down cards can call more raises than random broadway hands.

In deep stacked Omaha Hi there are no real pre-flop edges you can push. Only hands with good nut-like-hand potential you want to build pots, steal buttons, etc. with and all the various flavors of hopless to not-quite-there crap. At the lower levels, you just build pots with good hands, maybe see a flop cheap with somethink like QQxx, JJxx (any position in a passive post-flop loose game) or Axs (on the Buttonish).

It's a post-flop game of the nuts and selling it to suckers who take second best too far or think they can win with aggression ala hold'em. This could be a very good fit for you.

I do very well in this game up into the 50/100 buy-in level. After that they stop paying off so easily.

Yeah... Omaha is difficult to beat with good/tight players because the edges are so thin. Luckily, there aren't many good/tight players at the 50s.

Originally Posted by dalecooper

Yeah... Omaha is difficult to beat with good/tight players because the edges are so thin. Luckily, there aren't many good/tight players at the 50s.

A lot of the money comes from people playing Omaha Hi like hold'em. Trying to muscle pots, over-valuing top 2 or bottom set and putting it all-in when we probably both have the nuts and I have a re-draw. Set over set is the best edge you'll just about ever get in Omaha and the fish love going broke with bottom set (hence I limp any QQxx or JJxx in these games.)

There may be no edges preflop, but you can't get an opponent to make big mistakes without building a pot first with a hand that holds lots of potential.

With that in mind, I frequently raise in Omaha Hi pot limit if my hand has multiple potential in almost any position. The reason is that players are HIGHLY loose passive postflop, and it's easy to draw correct to a hand no matter where you're sitting.

I make big pots with my big hands, and I let people make mistakes when I have tremendous odds to draw to the nuts, or I already have them.

Originally Posted by lamaros

I like to raise aces, win a pot with them, then raise a nice wrap and catch those idiots who overbet two pair at me when I hit a nice flop thinking I have aces.

The whole point of Aces are getting the money in PF and getting heads up. Everyone knows, or should know by now, that Aces have more power the fewer people in the pot, and a nice double suited wrap has more power the more in the pot.

I'd never rather have KKxx than AAxx. Never. That's just silly.

Aces are worthless unless you hit your set

Completely incorrect.

I was thinking of Omaha Hi-Lo when I wrote that. I hate when people call regular Omaha "Omaha Hi." In H/L Aces are completely worthless if you miss your set and don't have the nut low draw. And in Hi/Lo KKxx is worth more than AAxx unless your xx is something like 23 oe 24. With KKxx if you hit top set you don't contribute to the low half of the pot and you have a much better shot at scooping. In just regular Omaha, AAxx is extremely overvalued by weaker players. Sometimes bare aces should be folded to a PF raise if there are no flush possibilities. Even when you do hit your set of aces they often lose if the board doesn't pair. I'll take a hand like 9TJQ over AAxx any day. Even If you manage to get heads up and end up making a continuation bet what happens when it gets called? All you have is one pair with little chance of improving. Not only that but now you probably are stuck because of that. I love targeting the players who raise with only high pairs and reraising them on a board of rags when they bet out on the flop.

Had As Ac 8c 5c on the button 4 or 5 limpers (.05/.10 pot limit) and I raised 3x based on the nut flush possibility and my position, and to some degree the aces. I'm very new to Omaha and I was wondering how big of a disadvantage it is to have that third club in my hole cards? Also, was my raise reasonable?

Originally Posted by spoonitnow

Had As Ac 8c 5c on the button 4 or 5 limpers (.05/.10 pot limit) and I raised 3x based on the nut flush possibility and my position, and to some degree the aces. I'm very new to Omaha and I was wondering how big of a disadvantage it is to have that third club in my hole cards? Also, was my raise reasonable?

I'm also new to Omaha, but I would probably limp in. You have a pair of aces, which is pretty good, an ace suited in clubs, which is pretty good, but you have an extra club, and two relatively worthless side cards, so your hand has pretty low potential. At a table which is probably loose given your description, I would probably prefer to limp in since I'm going to miss the flop most of the time. Another benefit of limping in is that if you hit top set, you're probably going to get lots of action from middle set since the player will never put you on A-A.