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How to Win a Stud Eight or Better Tournament
Poker devotees are in for a treat this month. Stud Eight or Better is fantastically complex and rewards players who can read their opponents’ hands well more than almost any other game.
As in all split-pot games, in Stud 8 your goal is to win the entire pot. Therefore, you should try to start with the type of hand that will allow you to do this. In Stud 8, there are a couple of hand categories you’re looking for. The first is rolled up trips, which is such a strong high hand that you couldn’t throw it away. Next, a pair of aces with a low card. This gives you a great start for high, with the chance to develop a low hand later on. After that, you’re looking for cards eight or lower that are connected and/or suited. For example 6♠5♥4♦ is a good starting hand, as is 8♥4♥A♥. A hand like 4♠3♠2♠ is the holy grail, as you’ve started with draws to an excellent low, a straight, and a flush.
Starting hands to avoid are pretty razz hands like 7♠6♥A♦, which don’t have much potential for high, and big pairs such as K♠K♥10♣, which have no chance to make a low. In the early stages of the tournament, there will be lots of multiway pots, and playing a vulnerable one-way hand is suicidal.
When evaluating your starting hand, you should be watching the upcards. If you have 4♠3♠2♠ and the upcards are K♥K♣Q♥J♣9♥4♦2♥, you would want to get as much money into the pot as possible, as all the cards you need to make your flush, straight, and low are available. However, if the upcards were A♠A♥5♠6♠6♥K♠J♦, you would play much more defensively as many of those same cards are gone. You can also make guesses about your opponents’ hands – if a 2♦ raises on third street, chances are he has a good low draw. If a K♣ raises, it’s more likely that she has a big pair like kings.
Many Stud 8 players are reluctant to play aggressively when they have not yet completed their hands – for example, when they are drawing to a low and their opponent obviously has a pair. However, it’s important to realise that you may have by far the most equity in the pot with the worst hand at the time. To take an extreme example, your opponent has 9♣9♠K♣4♠, and you have 7♥6♥5♥4♦. The 5♣6♦9♦10♣Q♠K♦ are dead. You have seven high and no low yet, but you should be betting and raising as much as possible – your equity in the pot is over 77%!
Likewise, if you have a made low and your opponent has an obvious high hand with no low draw, you can bet and raise indiscriminately, knowing you can’t possibly lose the entire pot, but might back into a lucky two pair or straight to scoop (this delightful scenario is called ‘freerolling’). Don’t be tempted to play passively and just call in these situations – pump the pot and maximise your winnings. Your opponent might even fold under the pressure, allowing you to win the entire pot straight away!
Two concepts that you must understand in Stud 8 are pot building and squeeze play. These are both techniques that come into play in multiway pots.
You pot build when you have a hand that is guaranteed to win one half of the pot, but has no chance to win the other, and you’re up against two opponents. For example, let’s assume you have (A♣2♣)4♠3♥6♠. You know all the fives are gone, so you know that you can’t lose the low pot, and you also know you can’t make a straight to win high. Your opponents are showing 7♥6♣K♠ and J♣K♥Q♥, and based on their upcards and actions, you put the first player on a low draw and the second on a good high hand –perhaps two pair or a straight.
You should try to make this pot as big as possible without knocking out the low draw. If you act first, you might bet, hoping that the low draw will call and the high hand will raise. You’ll then call, enticing the low draw to call behind you. If you act last, you’d hope that the high hand bet then the low draw called, so you could raise. If the high hand recognises what you’re doing, he’ll flat call and allow the low draw in. In both cases you’ve extracted an extra bet by trapping the player in the middle, which you and the high hand will share at the end. Don’t be tempted to play overly aggressively and eliminate the player in the middle – build the pot in one bet increments which will be easy for him to call.
On the other hand, you should be alert to opportunities to eliminate an opponent when doing so would give you a bigger chance to scoop. For example, if you have A♥7♦6♠3♣ on fourth street, and you’re up against one opponent with what you think is just a pair of kings, and another opponent with what looks like a worse low draw, you should do your best to knock out the pair of kings. This will increase your chances of winning the entire pot by hitting a pair or even winning the high unimproved. You do this by forcing the kings to call two bets at once – so if the low bets and you act next, you raise, giving the kings a difficult decision.
In the middle stages of the tournament, you’ll be forced to steal some antes to keep your stack alive. However, this is more difficult in Stud 8 than any other stud game, as the bring-in has a playable hand relatively often. You should rarely try to steal with a high card showing, instead opting to complete with your best low cards and especially aces. An ace is such a powerful card in Stud 8 that it’s almost an automatic completion if it’s folded to you in late position.
As the tournament pares down and the table gets shorthanded, some hands change in value. Big pairs and high only hands become more playable. After all, with the qualifier in place, it’s possible to scoop the pot with just a high hand, assuming your opponent misses their low. Therefore, you might play a pair of kings (which you would fold without much thought in the early stages) if you were up against just one opponent and especially if a few low cards were already gone.
Heads up, think about what your opponent has, and what he thinks you have, rather than the strength of your own hand. Most pots will be won before a showdown, so concentrate on exploiting the apparent strength of your board, and be aware that a mediocre low plus a mediocre high is often enough to win the entire pot. If you play aggressively and are lucky enough to scoop a couple of pots, you’re almost sure to win. Good luck!
