[benfranklin]

[ QUOTE ]
I found that somehow my PL holdem game was better than it ever was.

Now PLHE is far and away my best game even though I have played fewer hands of that game than either PLO or NLHE.

I guess my point is that I think by learning other games you may stumble upon skills that can sharpen your ability in all games... and you may find that you excel particularly in one game.

Irieguy

[/ QUOTE ]

I played nothing but O8 for several months, becoming a small but consistent winner at the low limit games. When I started playing some HE again, my HE game was definitely improved.

The key is that while learning O8, you are also learning poker. When you go back to HE, you don't know more about HE than you did before, but you do know more about poker. Knowing how to play poker is more important in the long run than knowing how to play HE.

Learning O8 (or any other game) gives you a different slant on, and a different approach to, poker. And you aren't focussed on the poker, you are focussed on the O8. The poker knowledge just kind of sneaks in.

It's like when you are studying some technical issue in a book, and then you read a different book or see a video or hear a lecture. In your mind, often subconsciously, you sort and merge the commonality of the various inputs into a unified set of skills.