Hi/Low
simply means that half of the total pot goes to the winner
but now the other half goes to the player with the Low.
However it's not just that easy. The "low" can only be
specific cards and has no poker hand rules except that
it must be five cards total. The low is ONLY NUMBERS (1-8).
This means the Ace is counted as a (1) and is the best
low card, and the (8) is the worst low. So the best low
hand possible also happens to be a straight which is A,
2, 3, 4, 5. Now the Ace becomes even more powerful than
before since it's high AND low. How do you know which
low is better than which? Well it's counted from the 8
downwards. Whoever has the highest low card has the WORST
low hand. I know you need examples at this point so here
they are. The hand marked in BLUE is lower and is the
best low hand of the two.
(A6384) vs.
(25634). Here the 2-5-6-3-4
which is also a straight is lower than the other hand
even though the other hand has an ACE because the Highest
Low Card in the 2nd hand is a 6 but in the
first hand it's an 8. So in poker terms it would be an
8-6 low against a 6-5 low, so 6-5 is the winner.
Here
are some more examples. The Hand in Blue is the best low:
[(24678) vs. (A2468)]
, [ (34567) vs. (A2348)]
,
[(A2347)
vs. (23456)]
What
if there is more than one low and it's the same?
If there are 3 people in a hand and one has the high like
(AA774) and the other two have the SAME low of (A2347)
then the high still get half of the pot but the low players
split the other half and receive only 1/4th of the pot
and therefore actually lose money if there were only three
people in to begin with . Now there could even be three
or FOUR people with the low in the same hand or even two
or three of the same HIGH hand or even a MIXTURE! So as
you see this is much more difficult than straight forward
poker so you must be very careful and know exactly what
you are doing. Since the most widely played Hi/Low game
is Omaha Hi/Low I will focus mainly on that. In fact Omaha
Hi/Low is much more played than Omaha Hi. In
Omaha Hi/Low you still must use two cards of the four
to make your hi hand but you can also use the two others,
the same two, or a mixture to make your low hand. After
Omaha Hi/Low the most common Hi/Low game is 7 Card Stud
Hi/Low and after that is Pineapple Hi/Low. The others
are very rarely played in a Hi/Low form but I will still
provide examples of each type.
Below are examples of some winning low's
and high's and how much of the pot they would each receive.
Almost all the pots in stud hi/low have
just ONE low and or One high hand.
In 7 card stud you start with three cards
and the 3rd one is face up. So the first player was going
for the high since he started with two queens and an Ace
while the second player started with 3 low cards, a two-six-seven.
The
fourth card, also called '4th street' in Stud, didn't
really effect the high player however the Ace of Spades
greatly helped the low player. Now
he only need one more low cards out of the next three
cards, plus he could get another Ace to ALSO take the
high.
After
the 5th and 6th cards the left player still had a higher
pair, however the right seat player was in MUCH better
shape. Since he already had his low made (Ace, 2, 6, 7,
4) AND had a pair of sevens, he was already about to win
half the pot for sure but if he made two pair on the 7th
card or get a 3rd seven he would have received 100% of
the pot. Low cards are much more important in Stud
Hi/Low than high cards. When the other player improved
on the last card and made two pair (Ace, Q, Q, J, J) it
didn't matter, he still received only half the pot. So
as you can see ...half or ALL is a much better position
than half or NOTHING.
Very rarely will you see two of the same
exact low's in stud hi/low.
However, this is what it would look like.
In this hand all 3 players came in with
good Stud Hi/Low hands. (3, 4, 2), (6, 5, 3) and (Ace,
5, 6).
On
4th street the 1st player got a pair, the 2nd player had
4 diamonds and the 3rd player did not improve with that
king but since no one bet at all in that round so the
3rd player never folded or thought about folding. However
the 5th card gave the 1st player a 2-3-4-5 which is great
for taking the low and the high with a possible straight.
The center player did not improve but the 3rd player now
had an Ace-3-5-6.
The
sixth card for each player was HUGE and the bet piled
up. A straight and a perfect low was made by the left
player (Ace, 2, 3, 4, 5). The center player got the best
card in the deck for his hand, the Ace of diamond gave
him 4 lows and 4 diamonds. A low of Ace-2-3-5-6 was made
by the right player who didn't know was beat. On the last
and 7th card the right ASLO made a perfect low and straight
of Ace through five, but it was a nightmare since the
center player made an Ace high flush and took half the
pot while the other 2 players split the rest and got quartered.
Once you play Hi/Low Stud you will see how rare this is.
