Alright, so I have been thinking a lot lately about the game of H.O.R.S.E. and variations of it, like H.O.S.E. a.k.a. S.H.O.E. and H.O.E. and I was thinking about ways the game could be better. For those of you who do not know what H.O.R.S.E. how long have you been under that rock? lol Seriously, it is an acronym with each of the letters representing a different game...
- H: Hold 'em
- O: Omaha H/L
- R: Razz
- S: Stud
- E: Stud H/L (Eight or Better)
...that are played in that order. Now, all of the games are played as a fixed limit game meaning there are limits on how much can be bet in a betting round. H.O.R.S.E. is said by some to be the most skillful of all of the poker games because it takes a certain amount of skill to learn how to play all of the games and to be able to play them all at once. However, the weakness of the game I believe is that all of the games are as I said played in a fixed limit form.
The World Series of Poker has a $50,000 buy-in H.O.R.S.E. world championship event that is played every year and attracts the biggest names in all of poker for a chance to win a lot of money and be known as the best all-around player in poker. But when Chip Reese won the first H.O.R.S.E. title in 2006, the final table was all NL Hold 'em. While others thought it was wrong. I thought they were on the right track. This year, they introduced a brand new mixed games world championship which was they played just about all of the games in various limits. Another thing the WSOP has and also one that
Full Tilt Poker recently added was mixed limit Hold 'em games which is half NL and half fixed limit.
With all that said, my question is would the game of H.O.R.S.E. be better if both the WSOP and online sites made it a mixed limit game? I would have it played like this...
- No Limit Hold 'em (w/ no antes)
- Pot Limit Omaha (personally I don't think we need the H/L part)
- Limit Razz
- Limit Seven Card Stud
- Limit Seven Card Stud Eight or Better
What do you fellow peeps think of this? Would this make H.O.R.S.E. a better and more skillful game? Would this put the $50k H.O.R.S.E. closer to being the WSOP's new Main Event?
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20 comments
i think pot limit hold em, and everythingelse fixed would be sweet. although a no limit razz game would be fun as hell lol
i realy like your formate, i recond its a winner
Playing for High Only Games: NLHE, PLO
Limit Split Pot games: Stud H/L, Omaha H/L
LowBall Games: Razz, 2-7 Triple Draw
That would be ok but i don;t think the HORSE main event would happen because its too expensive. I mean this year 16 people got paid
Frog
I like horse just as it is, NL would change it into a crapshoot, someone gets rolled up aces in stud hi and goes all in,.. A23 in razz, all in,.. and eliminating the h/l in omaha, no way, sorry, not gonna happen,..
But I think you may be onto something with your innovations, just call it something else,.. gl to all on and of the felts,..
I like HORSE just the way it is as far the format is concerned.
I would like to see the buy-in raised so that it keeps the 'no card' chasers to a minimum.
Overall I like the existing format. I wouldn't change the limit format for hold'em in the early rounds as this will just allow the NLHE donkeys to last longer and may be achieve an undeserved advantage, and I definitely wouldn't change Omaha H/L to Omaha.
I might consider pot limit for some of the games.
My improvement would be to include limit 2-7 Triple draw in the game if necessary at the exclusion of one of the stud levels as we have 2 different stud games currently (albeit with completely different strategies).
i think the stud games should be mixed up with the community card games. eg:
so this of course would change the acronym, or not cause the games are the same.
and i like the fixed limit.