How to discount outs in Omaha
Introduction
This article explains
- Discounting odds
- Strong and weak draws
As said previously, it is very important to only draw to the nuts in Pot Limit Omaha. To do so, you must also discount outs depending on the texture of the board.
The following assumes that the notions of Outs, Odds, Pot Odds, Implied Odds and Reverse Implied Odds are known. In case they are not, please refer to the No Limit Hold'em articles on Outs and Odds, and Implied Odds.
Nevertheless, lets recap briefly:
An Out is a card that can complete your hand in order to improve it. The more outs you have, the better your draw. This is the first and foremost aspect to evaluating a drawing hand. Knowing how many outs you have makes it very easy to caluculate your Odds, i.e the chance of hitting the cards that you need to improve. Pot Odds are the ratio of pot size to investment. Implied odds are the difference between the size of the pot at a given time and the size of the pot one stands to win on later streets when one's hand improves, or in other words how much you will win when you hit your draw. Reverse implied odds are the opposite of implied odds. When you have a made hand and an opponent is drawing, the amount you will pay off to your opponent when he hits his draw is descriped as reverse implied odds.
The following pages will show some example situations explaining how to discount outs. Having examples will help you evaluate the strength of your draw at the first glance. This article will not explain optimal lines and bet sizes, as these are covered in the Flop, turn and river play articles. Although the concept of outs is explained in the No-Limit Hold'em article linked above, evaluating your exact outs is much more difficult in Omaha, mainly because of your opponents' much larger hand ranges. In this article you will learn how to approximate these ranges through a few example hands.
Draws on paired boards
Playing draws on paired boards is often unprofitable in Hold'em, but this is even more true for Pot Limit Omaha. There are however some situations that can be very tempting. Since a paired board only offers three possible hands that have you drawing dead, making it sometimes hard to lay down a big draw easily, especially if the pot is 3-handed or heads-up.
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The only hands that have you drawing dead at this point are 99**, 77** and 97**.
Lets have a look at what hands your opponent is likely to invest money with:
a. Opponent has Trips
Opposing hand:
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Your opponent has trips with top kicker. This hand is played a lot and is by far not the worst in this scenario. He is blocking a few of your outs with the 8 and 5, as they would make him a full house.
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Hand Pot Equity Wins Ties
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Even though you have a wrap+flush draw, with which you would be favourite on a non-paired board even against a set, you only have 43% equity against an opponent's marginal hand.
b. Opponent has an overpair with flush draw
Opposing hand:
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Let's assume that you raised his continuation bet, and that he pushes his overpair with flush draw not believing you have trips.
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Hand Pot Equity Wins Ties
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In this scenario you are also way behind, since your opponent already has two pair, leaving you only with a backdoor trip draw next to your straight draw, as long as he hits neither the flush nor the full house (for which he has 4 outs; 7 and A).
Even in both of the above scenarios, where your opponent only has marginal hands which he is overplaying on paired boards, you are way behind. Against a range including full houses as well as hands mentioned above, playing even a very strong draw on a paired board is very unprofitable.
Summary
Remember the following points about draws on paired boards:
- Every hand, except a bluff, that your opponent invests money with is a favorite against you.
- If you play your hand aggressively on the flop, you will turn it into a pure bluff that will only be called by better hands.
- If you play your hand passively, you have strong reverse implied odds, which means you will only get action from hands that beat you; a flush or straight will abandon the hand while a full house will call or raise you.
Straight draws on boards with possible flush draws
In Omaha one hits strong draws much more often than in other poker variants. This means that in most cases, only draws to the nuts should be played on. A very common case is a wrap on a 2-suited board.
Example:
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This hand has 9 clean outs:
Q
Q
Q
7 7 7
6 6 6
The three hearts also bring a possible backdoor flush draw on the turn, making re-draws possible.
Other straight outs for this hand are:
Q
, 6 which give you the nut straight, but also bring a potential flush.
J, J, 9, 9 give you non-nut straights
J, 9 give you non-nut straights, as well as making a flush possible.
Other outs:
8, 8 for trips.
You must discount outs for every hand that your opponent could have.
- Against a bare set you have 17 outs to various straights.
- Against a set with flush draw you have only 12 outs.
- Against an overpair with flush draw you have 12 outs to the straights
and the only non-spade out to trips, for a total of 13 outs.
Taking into account our opponent's redraws, we have the following equities:
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The huge number of possible starting hands in Omaha makes it impossible to have an exact representation of our opponents' range. Reads on your opponents, the number of players at the flop and how aggressively they play draws, should all be used to evaluate what hands you could be up against in order to judge whether playing a straight draw on a 2-suited board could be profitable. If the pot is heads-up then it is still often profitable to play wrap draws on 2-suited boards, however in multiway pots, you will almost always be against sets, flush draws or straight draws against which you can only split. Here is a relatively common situation:
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Hand Pot Equity Wins Ties
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As you can see, while playing a flush draw all-in 3-way can be profitable when there is dead money in the pot, your equity is severely reduced.
Summary:
You should pay attention to the following points when playing strong straight draws on 2-suited boards:
- The number of opponents at the flop
- Your opponents' way of playing draws and made hands
- How many outs you have to the nut straight, second best straight or split pots
Non-Nut flush draw
This point is also explained briefly in the Drawing Hands in Omaha article. Flush draws in Pot Limit Omaha should almost always be to the nuts in order to be played profitably, although the second nut flush draw can sometimes be played profitably, e.g when there are only two or three players to the flop or when the pot was re-raised, meaning there is a lot of dead money in the pot.
When you hit a non-nut flush draw, you have no outs for a re-draw and will often be up against the nut flush in case you face action on a 3-suited board. Hence you should always try to draw to the nut flush in order to get in a flush-over-flush spot, which is one of the most profitable situations in Pot Limit Omaha. Nevertheless, there are situations in which you can play a non-nut flush draw.
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This hand is even at first glance extremely strong and a fold is out of the question. Even against a hand like top set with blocking cards, you are a favorite:
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Hand Pot Equity Wins Ties
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Even in this rather bad case, where villain has top set as well as the J blocking one of your outs as well as a backdoor draw to a sraight to split the pot, and a backdoor flush draw, you are a favorite. Let's count our outs and nut outs:
These outs give you the nut straight : Q, 7, 6, 4
These outs give you non-nut straights: J, 9
On top of that are 9 non-nut flush outs.
This makes a total of 9 (flush) + 6 (straight, not counting flush outs) + 12 (nut straights, not counting flush outs) = 27 Outs. By playing the hand all-in on the flop, you spare any tough decisions on later streets. Let's suppose, however, that your opponent just calls your flop bet, which often means a weak draw, and you hit one of your outs: when can you continue profitably?
The 12 outs to the nut straight are no problem - these are the non-heart Q, 7, 6 and 4. You should play them aggressively on the turn.
The 6 outs to non-nut straights - non-heart J and 9 - will give you a straight with a flush draw re-draw on the turn. This means that you should play the hand aggressively almost every time, since you will usually still have the best hand, or in the case of a split, a re-draw to a flush.
The 9 flush outs are a problem however. The 5 of hearts makes a possible full house, and every other heart gives you a low flush. Weak made hands like top two pair or straights will rarely call another bet, and smaller flushes are very unlikely, since your opponent will almost never draw to such a low hand. On top of that, you have no re-draw to a better hand - contrary to the small straight explained above - and will often be drawing dead against any hand that gives you action.
Thus there are 18 outs on the turn that will allow you to play on without a worry and 9 outs that require a careful turn play, meaning you will have to fold often.
While the above hand should be played all-in directly on the flop, there are some stronger monster draws. Aside from a set+flush draw-type hand, one of the hands that beat you is the nut flush draw with a straight draw:
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Hand Pot Equity Wins Ties
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Summary:
- Flush draws should almost always be to the nuts or second nuts, in order to minimize reverse implied odds.
- Small flush draws should be seen mainly as re-draws to go with straight draws, or as blockers against higher flush draws.
- In case you hit a non-nut flush you must act very carefully on the turn or river, and value pot control over protection.
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