It’s not the porosity that is the issue, the matrix porosity in the woodford is almost always greater than the porosity in the clean intervals of the Sycamore that have become horizontal targets of late. What is different is the magnitude and intensity of natural fracturing present in the Sycamore (mississippian age rock) vs Woodford (devonian age rock). Remember the Miss Lime play in northern Oklahoma? Sometimes the initial wells in the section would have huge IP’s and look great, but infill wells would always greatly under perform the initial well. Same issue in the Sycamore, not surprising given that we are talking about Miss age rock in both cases.
Operators are not clueless when it comes to this fact and that’s why you see well density for the Sycamore of 2-4/unit vs. 5+/unit for the Woodford despite the fact they are of comparable gross thickness.