You might have seen this on balugapoker.com. It has a very interesting table of contents and a hefty price tag - $300 for volume 1 and $700 for volume 2. Have a look and tell me what you think. Have you come across any other info on this book? Any precedent for costly books like this one?

Lots of discussion in these forums.

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/33...-where-444377/

yeah that baloogia whale is the best.

BW is an instructor at DeucesCracked - you can get a subscription there for less than the price of book 1.

Yeah, I'm at Deuces Cracked, been playing a few years, etc. Really just trying to get to whether there is enough unique info here to warrant $300 for volume one. Is that even possible?

from what i read, volume one was so basic it originally didnt even cover 3betting at all, though after some discussion he agreed to add an "intro" to 3betting.

I think it’s possible but it depends on your volume of play. The material will probably improve your game to some degree and we’re all familiar with the maxim that any improvement in your earn can be made up and then some quickly. My game has greatly improved due to reading the advanced material found in Bobbo’s book and I think Baluga’s will be of a similarly helpful quality. The cost of the material though is dependent on your volume of play and how advanced your understanding is prior to purchase.

IMO, a tendency people have is that they “think” they understand a concept pretty well, but oftentimes they understand it in only a generic blanket-statement kind of way and are unaware of the application of it in various scenarios or the logic behind it. Good books/discussions help with this.

This isn’t true and borderline haterish. The exclusion of 3-betting material from the first volume probably had more to do with the target audience for the first volume (more SS, some MS, - but many concepts applicable to all stakes) rather than the simplicity of its material.

I was one of the ones who suggested in that thread that he should add the 3-betting material, but I wouldn’t hastily make some judgment about the rest of the first volume. The topics outlined in the TOC seem to be very relevant and applicable to online small stakes and midstakes games and they’re super important to master if you want to beat those games.

Also a nice selling point for me personally is that it is written in a conversational style and is edited by a professional editor. I think this is a nice change in style from other books (more textbookish) and having an editor just does wonders for readability obviously.

I've gotta admit, the fact that the 3betting part was a late inclusion was a bit of a worry, considering how important it is, even at 50nl+. But it is Baluga we are talking about here so I'm more than willing to cut him so slack. Havent heard anyone break the game down so much as he can

i probably couldve worded it better, but im not sure what it is that i said youre saying isnt true.

i cant speak on the quality of the book at all as i havent read it. i was just talking about the contents of the book. as someone initially interested in buying the book before the details were released, and someone who plays SSNL 6M online, i was definitely disappointed when i read that the first volume was not going to cover 3betting at all. i think anyone who plays these games realizes its pretty important. youre saying the lack of material on 3betting had more to do with the target audience, but imo a book that doesnt cover 3betting at all would be more targeted to the micro games, definitely not some MSNL. still, as husker said, youre going to see a decent amount of it at 50NL even (obv not like at 2/4, etc). and as a SSNL player, i couldnt justify paying $1k or whatever it ended up being for both volumes to get the full chapter on 3betting.

hey guys,

I've admitted that leaving out a part on 3-betting pre-flop was a mistake. I'd felt that I'd addressed the necessary concepts enough in the discussions of basic handreading and player identification to answer most of those questions. However, when people saw the ToC and were upset with a lack of 3-betting, I rectified the situation immediately. The "introduction to 3-betting" chapter is definitely good stuff.

That said, dealing with 3-bets at uNL and SSNL is going to be much simpler than at MSNL or HSNL, so I've included the bulk of the 3-betting content in the advanced section. However, the intro to 3-betting stuff should really help with anyones game, especially people at uNL or SSNL.

Andrew

PS: I spend more time with my students going over the basic stuff than the advanced stuff for sure, no doubt. To say that the first volume is too basic and obvious, too simple and easy to understand, would be the total opposite of my experience.

I realize your books are probably miles ahead of anything the name live pros have put into writing, but c'mon, they're still freaking books at $949

To that end, and to reply to a previous question, I play .5/1 NL FR and sometimes drop to .25/.50 NL. I play about 60 hrs/mo., obviously not pro. At .5/1 NL, plateaued over past few months at 2 PTBB/100...want to get that moving. The cost is no big deal at all in an absolute sense, it's more than value I'm considering. Baluga, Grind, Vespa and others, what do you think about the fit?

A few months ago I'd have bought both parts of the book right away. Unfortunately I've lost 2/3 of my roll so it's only gonna be part 1 for now

lol 1k for books that don't include 3betting in vol 1

add 0.1k for a 1h47min 3betting/3bet pots seminar that is the framework to figure out 3betting as far as MSNL and below is concerned, and you have a nice package.

And I just lost 0.1k when I got my AA vs KK all-in and K hit the flop - it's all relative. For a 400NL player that would equal vol1 + seminar.

Besides, 3betting in vol1 has been fixed so I can't see a problem there.

Hi Baluga!

Thinking about buying the book. How many pages does it have? On balugapoker.com is only the table of contents but no information about the number of pages.

Thanks for an answer!

Unfortunately we're still going through formatting and final edits so we don't have a page total yet, so it really depends on formatting. We're sitting on about 100 pages of single spaced MSword, and I imagine it will get significantly bigger with formatting, images/diagrams, and final additions. Wish I had a more concrete answer. Will keep everyone updated as soon as we know more.

Andrew

Volume 1 = $300

Volume 2 = $700

Full Book = $949

Ok I'm going to attempt to ask this in a non-douchey manner. Baluga - How can you possibly justify your pricing here? I'm sure you're getting enough people to buy them but seriously $950 for a poker book???

Am I missing something here? Please enlighten me as to what makes the information in your book worth this much. Also please don't take what I've said the wrong way. I'm not trying to insult you or your book. I really just wanna know what the deal is. Thank you

P.S. - I'm sure some of you will wanna give me the flamez but please resist. I'm only interested in hearing what Baluga himself has to say.

He might not be able to fully answer your question due to 2+2's rules on self promotion.

Here are my two cents. Bobbo releases a book for $750 and is very successful with it. Slowhabit/CTS release a book for $1850 and people are still willing to buy a book at that price. So now Baluga gets a couple of his people together to help write his book. Which, I will add, looks like it will be a more in depth book than the shorter Slowhabit/CTS book. (I am not saying the slowhabit book isn't good, I haven't read it.)

Given the relatively small target audience (online poker players) and the precedent set by Bobbo and others, Baluga can charge a high price for his content.

The argument would be that if you can raise your hourly by say, $50/hour, this book will pay for itself quickly. It's difficult to properly price a poker book, because to some it may be worthless, and to others it may be worth several hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Andrew

Ok fair enough & thanks for answering politely and not getting upset with my question(s).

@ ukfan, thanks for also adding your thoughts - makes a little more sense seeing as there was already a precedent sent for price.

+1

I'd pay $499 for this. $949 is just too much for things I can get free elsewhere.

LOL by that line of thinking $1 is too much for things you can get for free elsewhere.

But it's only 949.

Seriously, I think attempting to go the e-book route is interesting but as mason pointed out is almost seemingly impossible to imagine these folks making more money than producing a book that meets 2+2 publishing standards.

I think producing a book that meets their standards is harder than most realize when first attempting this endevor.