If you are a Sky poker player that has been playing the game since the Poker Boom between 2003 and 2006, then it is likely that you will have learned to play the most popular and commonly 
played version of the game; Texas Hold’em.
However, it is wrong to think that this is the only version of the game that you can enjoy, especially on a site like Sky Poker (remember, if you have not yet joined Sky Poker, you can join today by following the link to qualify for the Sky Poker no deposit bonus when you sign up).
In fact, Sky Poker offers its customers the chance to play any of three different variations of the game of poker and in this article, we’ll examine each of these games, how they are played and what the key differences are between each.
Another issue we will look at is whether the skills you learn playing at the Hold’em tables translate well into the other versions of poker, or whether it is an entirely different skill set you need to learn in order to become proficient at the other forms of the game. Certainly that is a key question that any poker player considering expanding their poker gaming repertoire needs to know the answer to.
Let’s now take a look at the three different types of poker you can find on the Sky Poker website and mobile app.
Texas Hold’em on Sky Poker
This is the game that most people on the Sky Poker site tend to play and it is likely the game that most online poker players of the modern era have the most direct experience of. Not only is it hugely popular as an online poker game, it is also the predominant game when it comes to major poker tournaments and live televised games.
To begin a hand, the two players to the left of the dealer button pay into the pot a small blind and a big blind (twice the value of the small blind) to start the betting off and to ensure there is always something to be won from a hand. After this, each player is dealt two cards. These are known as the players ‘hole’ or sometimes the ‘pocket’ cards.
What follows is several rounds of betting, interspersed with the five community cards being revealed which players can use in any combination with their two pocket cards to make the best possible poker hand.
During a betting round, if no bet has been made previously, a player can ‘check’ which means to remain in the hand but not yet place a bet. However once a bet has been made (including the two blinds in the first round of betting) checking is not an option.
At this point a player can either fold, which means to hand their cards back to the dealer and play no further part in the hand. They can also either call, which is to match the best value bet to remain in the hand, or raise which is to increase the biggest value bet with a larger bet which other players then at least need to match to remain in the hand.
In between the betting rounds, the five community cards are revealed in order of the flop, the first three community cards, the turn is the fourth and finally the river is the fifth.
If at any point all bar one player folds their hand, the player remaining is declared the winner. If after the river card more than one player remains in having been called, the remaining players then reveal their cards at the showdown to decide who has the strongest hand and is therefore the winner.
If at any point a player has all their chips in the middle, this is called “All in” and their bet value is matched by other players and a secondary pot may be created for players with more chips who remain in the hand and can continue to bet against each other. When a player is “All in” they automatically get to see the showdown to see if their cards win or lose.
Omaha Poker on Sky Poker
Omaha Poker uses the same cards and the same hand rankings that Texas Hold’em does, but there is one key difference between the two games that changes the dynamics of the game and the 
relative strength of your hand completely.
On Sky Poker, you can play Omaha Hold’em as either No Limit or Pot Limit and there are Cash Table Games as well as Sit & Go and Multi Table Tournaments available at times. However, it is not as popular on the site as Texas Hold’em and there is not the choice of game available as you have when playing Texas Hold’em.
The key difference between the two games is that in Omaha Poker you receive four pocket cards, rather than two. Other than that, the process of the game, with the rounds of betting, the bets you can make and the systematic revealing of the community cards is essentially the same as in Texas Hold’em.
The other difference is that in Omaha Poker you can only make up your best hand using two cards from your four pocket cards and three from the community cards. There is no flexibility in this unlike in Texas Hold’em, where you can use any of the seven visible cards to you (your two pocket cards and five community cards) in any order and combination to make the best hand.
Of course, the dynamics of the game change when each player has four pocket cards and as such, higher value hands tend to win Omaha pots compared to Texas Hold’em pots and the odds of you winning with a certain hand are also very different in this game compared to Texas Hold’em.
Omaha Hi Lo on Sky Poker
The final version of poker you can play at Sky Poker is Omaha Hi Lo Hold’em and once again, this takes the game of Omaha Poker and adds to it a further twist and complication, which means that it is a yet more complicated version of the game.
In Omaha Hi Lo, players have to make two hands from their four community cards. A High Hand and a Low Hand.
As with Omaha Poker, the betting rounds and community cards are revealed in the same order and hand values are all the same as in Texas Hold’em poker.
However, in Omaha Hi Lo, the pot is split with the player who wins the High Hand receiving a percentage of the pot and the player with the lowest value hand receiving the other percentage of the pot.
To complicate matters further, a Low Hand has to qualify in order to be eligible to win the pot. A qualifying hand is a hand that does not contain a card better than a stated value (eight) and in Sky Poker’s Omaha Hi Lo, a player is dealt a qualifying hand on average around 60% of the time, which means that 40% of low hands will not qualify for the pot, even if that hand was to win.
At the end of a hand, the player with the highest and lowest ranked hands receive their share of the pot, although this may not be the same player as different players can have the winning hands for each pot.
Do the key skills transfer over from one version of poker to the other?
In truth, the key skills of knowing when to bet, fold and the type and size of bet to make does transfer well across the different versions of the game on Sky Poker, but to utilise them fully you need to have a full appreciation of the different statistics involved with each game and the effect that having four pocket cards has on what constitutes a ‘strong’ hand.
