What is the strongest starting hand in 6 card PLO?

If you know your 6 card PLO strategy, then your immediate response should be, “it depends on the context”, so I’ll ask you a more precise question: We 3bet from the button after a competent player has opened from early position in a 6-handed game, our opponent 4-bets, what is the strongest hand we can hold at this point in the game tree?

To help you out, I have given you the table of 4 hands below, one of which is the correct answer. The table shows the equity of each hand against a top 10%vr range. Which hand is the strongest, and why?

The answer is A♣A♦A♥Q♣J♦T♥, because this is the only hand from the selection which prevents your opponent from also holding AA. In fact, it is a 60% favourite against a ‘top 5%’ range, which is naturally cut to a very small width in practice due to card removal. The strongest hand in an Aces vs Aces matchup is A♣A♦T♣T♥9♦9♥, which only reaches the lofty heights of 59% all-in preflop if your opponent is weak enough to 4bet all of his Aces, and is closer to 56% against a 4bet range consisting of only strong Aces.

For those readers who are convinced that Aces are usually automatic 4bets, consider this: K♣K♦T♥9♦7♥6♣ has 46% equity vs the top 2% of starting hands, and is a 57% – 43% equity favourite against A♠A♥Q♣7♣4♠2♦ preflop. Evidently, preflop equities in this game are not deducible using the same heuristics that served you so well in the 4 card variant.

It is a basic fact of 6 card PLO that starting hand equities run closer together than in the 4 card or 5 card Omaha variants. Whilst mainstream poker trainers would inaccurately infer from this some banality such as, “This means that variance will be much higher in 6c PLO…” we’re instead going to look a little deeper. The graph below shows the preflop equity distribution for every starting hand against a linearly constructed top 25% range for each of the three Omaha high variants.

What we observe is that, whilst the bulk of the 6c PLO curve is flatter than the 5c PLO and 4c PLO curves, the region of greatest divergence between the three lines is found in the top 10% of starting hands. Put simply- it is rare to hold a hand with an equity edge preflop greater than 60% against your opponent’s constrained 25% range in 6cPLO. There are a number of strategic implications derivable from such an equity structure, but I will focus on one here (to learn the others you’ll need to become a Cardquant client) – the optimal 3bet width out of position is much tighter in 6cPLO than in the other games.

If starting hand equities run closer together preflop in 6 card PLO, and they necessarily fall into the same strict hierarchy by the river as in other Omaha variants (any given hand either wins, loses, or ties with any other by the river), then what about the flop equity distribution? Are 6c PLO flop equity distributions significantly compressed?

Let’s take an example, and consider this flop:

K♠7♦2♣

I have graphed below the Hand vs Range equity curves for two 100% ranges facing each other on this flop for each of 4c PLO, 5c PLO, and 6c PLO. Whilst there are small differences in the curves for each game, the general distribution of hand strengths on this flop is very similar for all games. We don’t see the postflop equities bunched between 40% and 60% for 6c PLO, nor are they bunched in this region on this flop for either of the other games.

Whilst this is just an example, and not a proof of what follows, I can state generally that “flop equity is less strongly coupled to preflop equity in 6c PLO than in the other two Omaha game variants.” This means that a strategy designed around consistently building pots preflop with a range of hands that has an equity advantage is insufficient to show a profit. Instead, optimal preflop strategy consists of evaluating the features of a hand given the context in which it is played. The heuristics to recognize those features are more subtle in 6c PLO, and more strongly contingent upon context than in the other game variants. The remainder of this article will serve as an introductory guide to the relative significance of some key hand features.

“How much does it drop?” you may ask… so I have put together a helpful table showing you the frequency with which a given rank of flush draw is dominated in a heads-up pot against a 100% range in each of the three main Omaha high game variants.

Whilst a more sophisticated analysis is necessary to parse the vagaries of flush value in 6 card PLO, it is clear from this table that, in the best case scenario, a Queen-high flush in 6c PLO is as valuable as a low flush in 4cPLO. The only saving grace is that, if your opponent heavily biases his action frequencies with discrete hand categories, such as ‘nut flush’ and/or ‘second nut flush’, then you will have opportunities to bet Queen-high flushes for value exploitatively in 6c PLO. Nevertheless, it is chastening to realize quite how weak those Queen-high flushes are preflop in a heads-up game. Extending this insight to the 6-handed game leads to a first-order heuristic that only treats Ace and King-high flushes as contributing features in multiway pots. In fact, 9.8% of starting hands have a suit structure which belongs to the set {AxxKyy,AxxAyy,KxxKyy}, information which gives the reader a useful starting point for building his preflop ranges.

Now that we recognize the weakness inherent in 3rd nut and lower flush draws, it seems natural that other hand features must increase in importance. And indeed they do- our final analysis for today will demonstrate the power of straight draws.

83% of Omaha boards allow the possibility of either a straight or a flush by the river. On 28% of all boards a straight is the nut hand by the river (i.e. they are unpaired and do not contain at least three cards of any one suit). The difference between 6 card PLO and the other variants is that, whenever the nut hand is a straight, the nuts is almost always relevant, as suggested by the table below.

It’s not just that the frequency of a random hand making the straight is higher in 6 card PLO, there is also the strength of combination straight draws by the turn consider. In the right circumstances, {wrap + flush draw}, {wrap + two pair}, and even {pure wrap} can frequently contest the pot against a set with a redraw! Our final table (pun very much intended) of this article illustrates a trio of hand matchups that will become staples of your 6 card PLO sessions.

I covered a lot of ground in this introductory article, but there are three key takeaways that you can apply immediately at the tables:

1. Flop equity is less strongly coupled to preflop equity in 6c PLO than in the other two Omaha game variants.
2. A Queen-high flush in 6c PLO is as valuable as a low flush in 4cPLO.
3. Whenever the nut hand is a straight, the nuts is almost always relevant.

There is a lot more to learn about this fascinating, complex game, and an elite cadre of high stakes players are currently training every day using my 6 Card PLO Strategy and Software. I especially extend a welcome to driven, successful businessmen who want to be a force at the tables as well as in the boardroom.

Good luck at the tables.