Confirmed they cannot beat Texas or Florida 2-5.

If you understood the statistics you would know that winning a very large pot occasionally can make up for a lot of plays that don't turn out like you had hoped. no?

Mason , sounds like a solid book by you and David , and really glad to see what seems like a solid exploitative theory based book.

Yeah, that looks awful by both players. Limp 3-betting AQo and gii for 300xBB is terrible. If you are going to do that without AK/QQ+, it should probably be something like a suited connector/gapper and you should fold to a 4-bet or sometimes call with the right odds. It is fine to make that play as a bluff representing AA/KK, and representing that postflop if called. That is legitimate to balance with bluffs, particularly at like 2/5, where the limp/3-bet generally works better in a way with regs automatically raising limpers, but you are more likely to be put on a premium hand.

Sklansky's play is totally legitimate with a read that someone to act is usually raising limpers. In a 1/3 game, there aren't many 3-bets, so I would not at all assume he was 3-betting a lot. It is obviously terrible from that position without strong reads, as preflop tends to be loose/passive.

Do you at least feel the irony of mentioning balance when talking about the type of book they just released?

I meant balance mainly at 2/5. If you are going to to use a 50+ year old play that seems extremely face up as AA/KK, then there is benefit to be balanced.

Why would someone need to be balanced at 2/5?

Were going back to the origins of my first post ITT where I stated its way more +ev to study beating bad players then beating good players with GTO when most low stakes live games are not full of euro pro crushers. We must be playing in completely different worlds because its not common for me to run into anyone limp reraising with AA/KK as the 3rd or more limper in. Its usually mid PP's or in my HHs case I could have easily had him dominated but this isnt the thread to type up a paragraph of live reads and game flow of a personal hand of mine that you'll probably not understand and throw more solver stuff at me anyway. This book Sklansky wrote is probably perfect for you.

The answer is no, that is why every time this question or graph requests come up Mason and Sklansky ignore them

I said limp/reraise works at 2/5 with some regs raising limpers very light. If a reg knows you have AA/KK, he can just fold or call with the right odds with a pp or maybe like QJs/98s and stack you when he has AA/KK beat. You don't have to be balanced. You can have a big pair or a bluff all the time, depending on the players, table, etc. However, it is a bad idea to let some players know exactly what your hand is. In general, you don't have to be finely balanced like GTO, but you don't want to be face up at 2/5.

In the podcast, Sklansky said Mason wrote the Introduction to create controversy to sell books. Maybe he created too much controversy and made it look like they were OMCs and didn't know what they were doing. The KK hand was a special case where there was a high probability a certain player would raise.

In the podcast, Sklansky says he played some 10/20 NL at Bellagio. He didn't say if he beat it. Like 15 years ago, he used to play like 150/300 mixed. I think he may play mixed and/or PLO now. Pretty sure he could beat 2/5NL. Mason used to always play 10/20 or 20/40 limit holdem.

What he could do and what has been done are two different things.

Yeah, you have a point. In the podcast Sklansky said he had played 10/20 NL
(he didn't say when or the results) and in tournaments. He presumably has not played 2/5 or 5/10 NL. Everything I have seen about him was playing mixed games or PLO, so I don't think he has played much NLHE cash.

If you know of another book on 1/3 NL by a mid to high stakes live NLHE crusher, please let me know.

I've put the book in my Amazon cart and look forward to reading it.

If all you keyboard warriors have all the answers, then why don't you write a book and put it on Amazon?

I've recently been semi-successful at low limit and the main thing I've learned over 30 years of playing is to stick to one of the fundamentals, table selection. Our local casino spreads 1/2 $300 max, 1/3 $500 max, mainly for NLHE. There is a big 5/10 game but most of us can't afford, or don't want to risk, a $5k or $20k buy in.

The difference between 1/2 and 1/3 is profound. The 1/3 is nit infested regulars that buy in for the minimum then shove the nuts to build up their stack. The 1/2 table is mostly newbies and drunks just off the golf course. Some of the best games ($1k wins) come at about 530 pm with multiple golf buddies shoving stacks blind. Just got to wait on a good hand and only have to win two big pots per night, can't be in every hand, and don't play bad cards from early position, nearly always raise, don't call.

Take care and thank you Mason and David for the taking the time and hard work to put the book out. I appreciate the effort.

P.S.- guess who is a regular at our cardroom? Garret Adelstein's dad! He's a great guy and fun to play with.

They put out the book to make money - no other reason. They tried to take a new approach coming up with extreme scenarios that exist <1% - I like the thinking side of this but most will wrongly apply it and hurt their win rate. I think with all the info out there these days low stake books are obsolete, and really the practice should be with solvers and other tools.

I find posts like yours quite annoying because they question our motives and integrity. I would think that after all these years that wouldn't be an issue with anyone. And yes, while 2+2 is certainly a for profit company, our history has been to publish very good books. In fact, that's the way you do make money and this book is not an exception. Publishing poor books doesn't cut it and the expected sales of poor books won't be worth our time and effort..

Mason

As I indicated previously, Sklansky explained in the podcast that the weird plays with extreme scenarios were put in the Introduction by Mason to create controversy and therefore interest in the book. If you read the book or listen to the podcast, you will see that is not what it is about.

There are some other things in the book, which were badly presented, butwere important theoretical points. For example, it talked about limping like Q6s in ep, which just seems bad. In the podcast, Sklansky mentioned open limping 22 or A6s in ep in some 1/3 games, although theoretically those are folds. IMO that is reasonable play in most low stakes games. In general, you want to play those hands multiway, so limping or raising smallish is generally better than folding or raising large to get it HU or 3-way.

He also talked about miniraising at several limpers. IMO that is silly when you can make it like 12 in a 1/3 game and build the pot more without the weird play. He mentioned that was particularly good with like 55, as they will often check to you and you can check and get to see 4 cards rather than 3.

There are useful points in the book, and I don't see how you would get that information from studying GTO, much less working directly with solvers.

Even though I don't actively play poker anymore, I still appreciate the books you put out and still buy them. I will pick this one up. Keep publishing!

There is not a single hand that has more equity multi-way than heads up

Is there?

Oh well named one, small pps and suited aces play better multiway, because you have better immediate odds. You are mostly trying to make a set, nut flush, or some other big hand. This is discussed in Upswing GTO-oriented material, etc.

For example, if you have 22, the hand plays poorly HU, has awful playability, and is probably -EV. However, 7-ways you are almost getting immediate odds to hit your set. Plus all you can extract on later streets. Lots of players who can make 2-pair or whatever and lose big pots.

bought this book def interested in preflop sections!
kinda interested to read through it

No, there are no hands that have more EQUITY multi-way than heads-up. But what's your point? There are many hands than have more EXPECTED VALUE multi-way than heads-up, some of which have positive expectation in the right circumstances.

I misunderstood Pointless. I didn't understand that equity meant chances of winning the hand. Yes, of course all hands have more equity the fewer players in the hand. However, that seems sort of pointless. I would think $EV is more important than equity in terms of chances of winning the hand. Small pps and Axs have higher expectation the more players in the hand.

Suited connectors, by contrast, generally have better EV with fewer players in the hand. Sklansky indicated that with 100x BB stacks AA has better EV multiway than HU calling the same size raise, but not with deeper stacks and this is not true for other strong hands.

Sklanksy is prob wrong about that

AA stacks off all the time

Worse hands folds, better hands call/ or raise

You may be right. However, you can win big pots from top pair, particularly at low stakes. That is why he said only if stacks were 100xBB deep or less. There may be some data or simulations behind it.

You can win big pots with any hand. Doesn’t mean it’s going to happen enough to be profitable or enough to make it a better play than other plays

For sets and nut flushes to make “good” money , the other person has to have some kind of hand , and we would have to suck out

They have to have a hand or draw they would play a big pot with. Without those things these hands won’t make any more money than if it was heads up.


When you play poker you look at the EV of each play and then compare. Some will be plus EV, some will be breakeven and some will be losers.

I do not think the times that you win big pots cause of coolers is going to be higher EV than the EV you get heads up.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EuDEYfc7nac&t=875s
This video discusses how pps and Axs play better multiway.

I already explained why a small pp plays better multiway. That is pretty fundamental.