Any of you guys read Annie Duke and John Vorhous’ new book “Decide to Play Great Poker”?

I bought an electronic version the other day for a long trans-pacific flight. I never really thought Duke was a brilliant poker mind, but I’ve been impressed with Vorhous in the past, so I gave it a shot.

There’s a lot of strange/wrong advice in the book. For instance, they write that the number one reason for betting/raising is to gain information. Really? I thought it was to build a pot, or get worse hands to fold.

They also write that when playing *any* hand in poker (AA, 87s, or 72o), you want to avoid multiway pots, as it increases your chances of winning the hand. Seriously? Have they ever heard of the concept of EV? The point isn't to win the most hands, it's to win the most money.

There arelots of this kind of bizarre thinking that permeates the book, in my humble opinion. Anyone else have this same reaction, or am I missing something fundamental here…

Correct, with hands like AA it is theoretically +EV to get the most callers, but for the most part, isolating increases your chances of winning the pot.

The book is based on making good decisions, and having hands heads up makes it so your decisions are simplified and you'll make fewer mistakes.

When you raise with AA, do you want 6 callers who are all looking to outflop you? I don't think so. You'd want 2 or 3 callers so that someone can pay you off with a hand like top pair. You really think one pair will be good by the river in a huge multi-way pot?

When you have 87s, you usually don't hit the flop too hard. A lot of value in this type of hand is semi-bluffing when you flop a draw, which is a lot easier to do against a single opponent.
In a multi-way situation, if you flop a pair, you're pretty much done with the hand if you have several people. If you flop a non-nut draw, you could be drawing dead to a higher straight or higher flush. When you make your hand and someone's still betting and raising, you have to wonder if your hand is good.

Yeah, I suppose you're right. This book is indeed about making simplified decisions. It's not, however, about learning how to play maximum EV poker. It's kind of a dumbed-down everyman's poker book. It's OK, but it's got a lot of holes in it.

This is classic results-oriented thinking, me thinks. The goal in poker is not to win a specific poker hand, or to try to ensure your "one pair will be good by the river." The goal is to make the best decisions that maximize your EV, and do so over and over again. When you shove with aces, you actually want a lot of callers, as this maximizes your expected value. In contrast, if you simply want to maximize your chances of winning the hand (which the book seems to promote as the goal), then you indeed want one or two callers. But that's not maximum EV poker. A lot of beginners (myself included) fall into the trap of thinking only about equity and showing down the best hand. It's not about equity. It's about EV.

Here's an explanation of what I'm talking about: http://pokerbug.blogspot.com/2009/04...-is-wrong.html

Already a thread.

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/33...-book-1047982/

Well, first you are talking about an all in bet vs playing in a hand multiway. When there is no action possible after your first bet the scenario is different.
Also you are looking at ACEs only as oppossed to other hands you play.
As well a better test of ev is not against random hands but rather a range of hands that players would possibly play against an all in bet.
So in a very small window you have a point, but i wouldnt discount and say what is said in that book as wrong.
Without doing any calculating you can pretty much surmise that in an active hand(other than aces and an all-in bet) there is more ev for you against one opponent rather than several opponents , especially where they are talking about, which is preflop, although you might want to drive opponents out after the flop in certain situations also.

Just one more thing. If the goal is to maximize ev, you clearly have the most ev against one player not 7. Even though i dont like the example you linked to, it clearly shows the EV is highest against 1 player, not 7. But you might make more money in that test against RANDOM hands and more players, which would be the results oriented thinking your speaking against rather than maximizing ev. There might be problems in that book, but you havent made your point.

I disagree. I'm the author of that blog, and as stated in that blog post, I ran the numbers both with random hands and with better than average hands. The results between the two cases were essentially the same. It's been a few years since I ran the analysis, but if I recall I ran it with top 15% hands. The bottom line is that the highest EV is in fact against 7 or 8 players, NOT against one. The numbers don't lie.

I like the feedback and push-back, statictheory. Good questions always lead to good discussions. Cheers.

BTW, here are some of the charts me and a buddy worked out for all-in EV of different hands against top 20% villain hands (per pokerstove) as a function of opponents. For a math geek like me, this is pretty cool stuff.

First up are pairs:


Suited aces:


Unsuited aces:


Suited connectors:


And unsuited connectors:

Your argument doesnt match with what they are talking about in the book.
I cant make it any simpler than that. i have no alliance with John vorhaus or Annie Duke, but you are twisting their argument to fit your idea about an all in situation with aces.

Sigh. I guess I’m going to have to resort to quoting directly from the book. In the second chapter, Duke and Vorhous write: “Against one opponent, your aces will win well over 80% of the time. For each opponent you add into the mix, your chances of winning with aces go down 10%. That means that against five opponents, you’re still a favorite against any one of them, but an underdog against all of them taken together. Why on earth would you want your aces to win less than 30% of the time against a full field, when they’ll win more than 80% of the time against one guy.”

This is EXACTLY the problem I’m trying to point out with their logic. They are obviously ignoring the concept of making decisions that maximize EV. Their advice would lead to more frequent wins, but LESS money earned. I can’t state this fact any simpler than this. EV is more important then win rate percentage. Do you disagree with this?

Sigh, again. I don't believe I'm twisting anything; I'm simply commenting on the words taken verbatim from their book that I think are incorrect. Do you really believe that the paragraph I quote above from Duke is good advice for a poker player? I hope not.

Look, I’m not saying this is a worthless book, but I am pointing out what I believe are some fundamentally incorrect advice that they’re advocating. If you think they're correct, then OK. you and I are obviously going to have to agree to disagree. You can believe that all-in with aces is better against one opponent. I’ll believe it’s better against multiple opponents, as evidenced by the charts above.

Peace.

I agree with their conclusion but disagree with their argument. The equity of aces is not what matters here. You do want few opponents because having few opponents lowers your chances to make mistakes post-flop and making mistakes directly impacts your EV.

Note: I haven't read the book. Just commenting on the quote.

The quote is not about multiple players going all in. Its about playing in a mult-iway pot vs heads up and why its too your advantage to play heads-up
as much as possible. besides this important fact , its no limit so your example doesn't automatically make more money because you are assuming equal stack sizes as well. They arent the first to write about this.

Actually, the quote is implying that they're discussing multiple players all-in. When they write that "your aces will win well over 80% of the time", the implication is that you are running your hand hot-and-cold to the river. They're not talking at all in that section of the book about outplaying opponents. They're just saying that aces will win 80+% of the time.

You're absolutely correct. A number of other books on the market get this concept wrong and miss the whole maximize-EV thing. Theirs is just the latest to miss the mark.

Would it make a difference if they were talking about Tourneys specifically? would it be more important in a tourney that your aces hold up more often even if it results in fewer chips being won each time?

Is Duke more of a tourney player than a cash game player?

Originally a cash player I believe, Not NLHE cash though

So you are saying in NO Limit, that if you have aces, you prefer multiple players rather than one player as an opponent, correct?

Same here. Deep-stacked, you only want a few opponents with aces. In the all-in pre-flop game, you don't mind most of the table going in.

In the end, aces usually make a one-pair hand. You rarely want to risk a lot of money with one-pair hands against good players.

Poorly written and poorly edited- if the goal is to clearly communicate ideas.

Kudos for lining up a slate of name endorsements. I doubt any of these people would have endorsed the same book had it been written by Ms. X. Self promoting, politics, and exploiting self-interest at its best.

A few theoretical flaws in some of the playing advise that will be highlighted by other 2pls2 posters.


Annie try's to stealthy borrow from the Kelly Criterion in her money management section featuring %-of-BR buy-ins but she does not understand the concept on a professional level.This is an important concept used by many blackjack teams for well over 30 years. Using a fractional Kelly method was clearly the way to go for many.

However, the idea of being very conservative with buy-ins and using a %-of-BR method is a good one. This chapter could be helpful if it provoked serious thought and planning in a reader.


As a first book, or as one of several primary learning books, Thumbs Down for all levels of play. As an addition to a library, well, ok.

Yeah like i'm going to read a book on a woman that donks a 10 man sitngo freeroll then claims to be the best women poker player in the world

The term Game Theory appears in the book in relation to some of Annie's strategies, as if the term should be taken seriously.

A greater effort should have been taken to clearly explain how GT applies to Annie's strategies, and to clearly explain its basic ideas.

I'm sure at this point in her life Annie has a basic idea of what GT is and is not simply trying to sound "cool".

Since the term Game Theory appears in the book as if it should be taken seriously, a greater effort should have been taken to clearly explain how it applies to Annies strategies, and to clearly explain its basic ideas.

I'm sure at this point in her life Annie has at least a basic idea of what GT is and is not simply trying to sound "cool".

In future writing, perhaps more serious pre-publishing critique of ideas and style-flow.

Trying to Bet your edge (even under laboratory conditions) is not correct.

Under Lab conditions this would only be optimal on 1 to 1 payoffs- and who gambles under those conditions?

/////////


Proportional betting notes:.

Dividing your edge by the pay off is correct under lab conditions if you would like your BR to grow at the fastest possible rate with no chance of going broke- Kelly Criterion.


This would have you betting 100% of your bankroll with a 100% edge on a 1 to 1 pay off (think of betting on the outcome off a coin flip when the coin had two heads!). You would only be betting 1% of your bankroll with a 100% edge on a 100 to 1 pay off.

Betting over 2X Kelly on a regular basis will cause your bankroll to dwindle down to nothing even though you have an edge.


Well over 30 years ago black jack groups realized betting a fraction of Kelly was the way to go as their edge may be smaller than they thought for mystery reasons, Kelly swings are too hard on most peoples psyche, one can not drop down too small when losing due to cost-effectives which means at some point no further drop down in bet size can be taken (and there are minimum table limits), money won does not stay in the BR forever, and so on...

I got this book for Christmas and I read a few random passages before returning it.

It seems the authors are more concerned about simplifying the game than maximizing profit.

Most of the postflop stuff I read was pretty bad, especially the section titled 'dont open the betting with a hand that cant stand a raise'. She advocates not vbetting thin so you cant get bluffed off your hand which anyone who plays cash games knows leaves money on the table.

Specifcally she uses the example AQ on A296 saying the in position you should check back the turn since no one will call turn and rivers bets with AJ and you dont want to lose the pot to AK/2pair/set or fold to a bluff.

I also laughed when she advocates flatting a ~10bb shove with TT,JJ,QQ and 30bb effective, so you can fold if someone in the blinds comes over the top. In her view, by not reshoving, you will still be alive if the blinds have AA,KK

Just read the first few posts and ur argument is a bit wonky? How many times do u see more than lets say 3 ppl go all in pre flop ?

In the real world prob next to never? So why u going on about EV for 7 ppl all in pf?

Does not compute sorry