There’s nothing wrong with having Texas Holdem as you primary game. It’s the most popular poker variant and it has the most action around the world. You can walk into almost any poker room in the world and find a few Texas Holdem tables running. Texas Holdem attracts the most money, the most fish and gives you the greatest opportunity to fatten your wallet.
However, I think there are benefits to learning new poker games. I recommend new poker players and anyone struggling with maintaining a positive win rate to avoid learning new games. But if you have been playing Texas Holdem for a while and have a positive return, it is good to branch out and see what else is out there.
So here are 5 reasons why you should learn new poker games:
1. You become a better all-around poker player
Learning new poker games is exercise for your poker brain. It’s hard to explain how this works exactly, but when you learn new poker games, you think about poker differently. You start to see things in a new light. If the only game you know is Texas Holdem, learning a new poker variant is like realizing that square you’ve been looking at all your life is actually a three dimensional cube.
When you learn new poker games, you get better at your main game as well. I don’t know if your brain builds new connections or if you just get better out of sheer experience, but it definitely helps. Learning new poker games makes you a more competent (and dangerous) poker player.
2. You get access to new markets
Learning a new poker game is like expanding your business into a new market. Instead of being stuck with Texas Holdem games everywhere you go, you can now go play in more games. This is beneficial because you can now practice greater table selection. Are the Texas Holdem games at your poker site getting dry and tight? No problem – you’re no longer stuck with Texas Holdem.
Sometimes the non-Texas Holdem games are significantly softer than the Texas Holdem games. First of all, people like to jump into new games without properly learning how those games work. That is some of the easiest money in the world. And secondly, there isn’t nearly as much poker strategy out there for other poker variants such as Omaha, Triple Card Draw, etc.
3. You can start playing mixed poker games
Mixed poker games can be both fun and profitable. They keep it mixed up so that you don’t have to play the same game all day, and the players there are not always well-prepared for the format. I’ve seen plenty of players join a mixed poker game without knowing every game in the lineup. These players incorrectly assume that they can make up for their lack of experience by playing really well in their main game.
Mixed poker games come in all different types. The most popular is HORSE, which is a combination of five different poker variants. However, there are also mixed poker games that only include two different games, such as Holdem and Omaha. As soon as you learn one additional game, you can start getting involved in the simpler mixed game formats. As you slowly add new games to your lineup, you can work your way into games like HORSE.
4. It keeps the game interesting
It can get real old grinding the Texas Holdem tables day after day. Switching it up and learning a new game completely kills the boredom I get with poker. It’s almost like your first day of poker all over again, except you now have a pretty solid base to get started. You won’t start out as a winner, but you will be able to improve your skills drastically.
It’s a lot of fun learning the new rules and seeing how the strategy changes from one game to the next. You can get so used to Texas Holdem that these new strategy implications are almost mind-blowing. Going back to the first point in this article, this also makes you a better poker player in general.
5. It’s easier to find high stakes games
High stakes poker games can be hard to find at times, but learning new games makes it a little easier. If you railbird the high stakes games online, you will see that other games run almost as often as Texas Holdem. Omaha is particularly popular at the nosebleed levels online. This point may not apply to you yet, but it never hurts to start preparing now.
How to Learn New Poker Games
You have already learned one poker game by now, so learning new poker games isn’t as difficult as starting over from scratch. What I recommend is that you get couple of books about that game, read about it online and see if anyone at the major poker discussion forums talks about that game. The first step is to study, learn and absorb everything you can.
The second step is to get experience at the tables. But make sure you move way down in stakes when you first start. Even if you are only making the switch from Holdem to Omaha, you need to take a few big steps down. No matter how good you are at your current game, you are going to be a newbie at this new game. Don’t let pride turn your new game learning experience into an expensive lesson in humility.
