[frappeboy]

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Originally it came as an, How to minimize variance in stud ... but I more wonder, which game to play to minimize Variance Hold'em or Stud ?? (And yes there is the good old stud8 answer to this as well, which brings us to the next question. Most tend to agree that hi/lo games are harder on Fish, do they move on quickly and just leave the regulars or ?? (I haven't played that much stud8 as you know, but am considering giving the 2/4$ games on party a shot)

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Ok I think I can answer this question. Omaha 8/b and Stud 8/b have the lowest variance of limit games. I also think that limit hold'em has less variance than stud unless the game is really aggressive with lots of bets going into the pot preflop, in which case it has about the same variance as stud.

The game that has the least variance of all is NL hold'em, simply because you can control the odds you give your opponent and charge a weak player huge amounts when hes on a draw, this increase your win rate by a huge margin and the larger your win rate the smaller your variance.

You can control, to some degree, how much variance you have when playing stud. You do this by folding in marginal situations. You may lose a little bit off your win rate by playing this way, but your standard deviation will be much lower. But if you're the type of player who will go on major tilt when losing, than you actually SAVE money in the long run even though you lose money right now. This is because you'll have less swings and therefore go on tilt LESS. Also, if you have any doubts about how well you can play in marginal situations, you will save money by playing this way.