Easy way to play PLO at home?

[bostondave]

Hello all-

For a year now, I've been hosting a low buy-in NL hold 'em game at my home. Recently I've introduced O/8 into the game, but people don't like the idea of playing limit. We tried playing a couple of hands of Pot Limit O/8 with "play money", and it was a giant hassle to figure out the pot size all the time. Is there an easy way to do this that I'm not aware of? I wouldn't mind playing PL, because I'm really the only one there with significant O/8 experience, but if every hand is going to be a pain in the ***, I'll stick to limit.

Thanks in advance,

-Dave

PS - going to cross-post this in the O/8 forum.

[Lumpy]

What are you using for chip denominations? Simplify them as much as possible to make calculations quick and easy.

[hachkc]

I've been thinking about trying this also but was concerned how well it would flow keeping tabs on the pot total. Here are a couple of ideas, I've come up with. Any thoughts?

1. Assuming you rotate the deal every hand, how about having the dealer skip the hand and have them act as a dedicated dealer. He/she can then keep track of the pot total easily. Next hand, someone else is the dealer.

2. Limit the number of chip types to 2 (3 if necessary) very distinct colors. This should make it easier to add up.

3. Make sure people post their bets right in front of themselves and not directly into the pot. Make some rule that chips are stacked 5 high or individually. This should make it easier to count the total chips out.

4. How about making the max bet equal to the pot size at the end of the previous round. Assuming .50/1 blinds, the max preflop bet/raise would be $1. Assuming 5 callers(including the SB) and no raises, the max flop bet/raise would be $5. Assuming 1 pot bet ($5) and 1 caller, the max turn bet would now be $15. This might make it a little bit easier to manage because the bet is determined at the beginning of round and doesn't change until the next round. Not true pot limit but close.

[trevorwc]

When we play home games, all of the chips have the same value, so it makes it a lot easier. You just simply stack the chips up, and match the stack. Not so easy if you use 2+ denominations, but it works very well for us.

[Hardmix]

The player dealing MUST must control the game. It should go w/o saying no splashing and no hands in the pot (making change) other than the dealers. It is he/she responsibility to pull all bets into the pot and keep a running count. This game takes twice as long to play as HE but it also creates huge action.

[Socrates]

You mean to tell me that players in the hand don't know how much is in the pot? How exactly do they get through NL games without knowing what is in the pot all the time?

[Mojo Tooth]

In NL (and other games in general) you can ESTIMATE the pot size and be fine, for pot odds purposes. In PLO there is a rule that your raise can be no more than what is in the pot. That creates the need for a precise calculation.

The two situations aren't even comparable.

[Socrates]

Yeah, I understand the rules and I play quite often actually, but I don't see how anyone can't know what's in the pot at any given time when you're in a hand. I mean it's simple math, it's not like someone bet 27.35 then raised another 42.73 and then a re-raise of 72.01. See where I'm going with this? How do you calculate pot odds or implied without knowing exactly what's in the pot? I guess you've already answered that question by saying you estimate. I may be anal about it, but I always try to know exactly what's in there if I'm in a hand.

[kers2]

Yea i guess you are anal...

[lighterjobs]

in my home game, the only game we play is omaha-hi with a cap. this had made the game a lot easier, especially since we usually only play six handed, so people don't want two bb's. but in the game we have .50/1 blinds and the max bet before the flop is 5. on the flop it's 10. turn 20. river, no cap. it makes things a lot easier. it probably sounds pretty ridiculous, but it works out well for us.