There are many different variations of poker available and expanding your horizons on the game types that you play can be extremely fun, especially when you tire of a specific game for whatever reason. Asides from Texas Hold’em, Omaha is an extremely popular version of the game that is played by all of the best players and has many professional level events that support its format. Texas Hold’em and Omaha have quite a few similarities but there are a number of important differences in the game as well.
The play for an Omaha game goes, more or less, as it would in a Texas Hold’em game. Players are dealt their hole cards, and the action goes pre-flop, flop, turn, river, with five community cards total that players can use to make their hands. As with most different kinds of poker, the order of hand strength is the same (unless you are playing a different variant of Omaha like Omaha Hi-Lo) so there is not too much that needs to be learned in order to play Omaha.
One of the biggest differences is the fact that players are dealt 4 hole cards instead of 2. For this reason, the hands in Omaha are typically better because players have more cards from which to make their hands. As such, when playing Omaha for the first time, you may be a little uncomfortable and surprised with the frequency that some of the much better hands are showing up. In Omaha, you see flushes, straights, and two pair all the time and can have multiple really good hands in one round of play so it is a bit jarring for players who are just starting to play Omaha.
Another big difference in Omaha is the fact that you must use two cards from your hand no matter what. There are many times when you are playing Texas Hold’em when you want to use 4 of the community cards and only one card from your hand but, unfortunately, you cannot do this in Omaha. This changes a lot of what happens in hands because 4 cards to a flush on the board does not matter because you still need to have 2 of the Full Tilt suited cards in your hand in order to make a flush. Almost all players when they first start playing Omaha learn this the hard way. I know I did. You get excited that you have a really nutty flush only to realize that, in fact, you have nothing of the sort. It can be very weird to have what would be a very good hand in Texas Hold’em actually be mediocre to poor in Omaha but it happens with regularity.
Omaha is a great poker variety that is popular on Full Tilt Poker and provides a different game with different strategy when compared to Texas Hold’em. For anyone looking to take a break from grinding Hold’em, spending a little time with its sister game Omaha is a good idea.