NL 6-Max poker has really taken off in popularity in recent years. Full ring games (9 or 10 players) used to be the norm, and actually still are if you play live, but 6-Max now dominates the world of online poker. You can log on to PokerStars for instance (the biggest online poker room in the world) at any time of the day and look at any stakes from the micros to the nosebleeds. You will typically see twice as many 6max tables running as full ring these days. Just 5 years ago it was much closer to an even 50/50 split. And 10 years ago full ring dominated online. The times have changed though and people clearly prefer the more action orientated game of 6-max over full-ring.
NL 6-MAX vs OTHER VARIANTS
The general idea is that the more shorthanded the format, the wider the ranges it is considered correct to play. So, a decent tight-aggressive 6-max regular might play 23% of all hands dealt, while a decent tight-aggressive full-ring regular only plays about 16%, or even tighter in some cases.
In HU games, it can be considered correct to play 100% range when we are first to act in the BTN/SB. Our overall playable range would be well above 50% when we take into consideration both positions. 6-max does share some similarities with other variants. Position is important. So typically the later our position, the more hands it can be correct to play.
It’s also a general trend that the more shorthanded we play, the wider postflop ranges will get on average. So, assuming we face a flop raise we should give a full-ring regular a large amount of credit, while we give a 6-max regular less credit.
By the time we consider HU games, flop raises are typically a lot more commonplace and are not necessarily representative of an especially strong range. A decent 6max player will be raising around 15% of flop-cbets. The average player raises a lot less than this, however.
