Game variants: Texas Hold'em, Omaha, Stud and others
Texas Hold'em. Two hole cards, five community cards, any five of seven make your hand. The default game everywhere.
Pot-Limit Omaha (PLO4, PLO5, PLO6). Four, five or six hole cards. The critical rule: you must use exactly two cards from your hand and exactly three from the board, never one, never three. Beginners routinely misread their own hands here. Average showdown hand strength is far higher than in Hold'em, and variance is considerably greater. Omaha Hi-Lo splits the pot between the best high hand and a qualifying low hand.
7-Card Stud. No community cards at all. Each player receives seven cards, three face down and four face up, and makes the best five. Success depends on remembering opponents' exposed and folded cards, a different skill set entirely. Traffic online is thin and often runs at awkward hours for Australian time zones.
6+ Hold'em (Short Deck). Covered above: shortened deck, inverted flush and full house order, far more premium hands, favoured by action-oriented players.
Fast-fold and Bomb Pot formats. Fast-fold pools reseat you instantly at a new table when you fold, which sharply increases hands per hour. Double Board Bomb Pots skip pre-flop betting entirely: everyone posts an ante and plays two boards at once. Both raise volatility per hour of play.
New players are often drawn to variants that look simple but resolve unpredictably, a pattern observed more generally in gambling research.
