Have you read the first two chapters of the book?

I've read the whole book front to back and have taken very detailed notes (3 pages worth) on every chapter.

Are people really discussing a situation where folding and calling are both 0ev? Or am I missing something and should I read the entire thread?

what was the first glaring error you found?

The book is mainly a conceptual book imo. The weakest part of the book is the hand histories but in defense to the authors they only serve to reinforce concepts and are not to be taken at face value.

Conceptually the book is very strong and I enjoyed going through all the chapters. They use qualitative examples instead of quantitative examples which makes sense because it would take a lot longer to write a book using quantitative examples.

If you are looking for how to play a specific hand in a specific spot and be taken through step by step using real data then this isn't the book for you.

If you want to learn broader concepts concerning live play adaptions so that you can apply it to any situation then this book would be highly recommended.

The book's suggestions are not always passive. Especially when it comes to big bets with excellent hands preflop or on the river.

But I would not object to that title as much as you think. After all the present title is about helping them GIVE you money not so much how to TAKE it. The thing is that the taking style alone will probably be the style that wins less if there are quite a few bad players in the game and the player/reader who is trying to implement mainly that taking style, (rather than the one in the book,) is merely good, rather than expert. Non experts playing against bad players (who rarely bluff, enter too many pots, call typical bets with mediocre hands and big bets with pretty good hands that are obviously beaten) will most assuredly NOT win less that top players that are playing in a similar game and are not adjusting towards our book.

All the examples in the Introduction are fine in context, but not in general. The problem is the Introduction didn't explain they were player and read dependent.

For example, the overlimp KK play. It is true 1/3 players don't raise much. However, I played in a 1/2 game with this terrible LAG. He played better than the others by raising preflop more often and bluffing more. However, the was bleeding money, by playing to loose, etc. He was raising 60% of hands. He called an UTG limp/shove for 60 into a pot of 35 with 62s and make a straight versus AK. Another time he raised to 12, go two callers and the same player cold shoved for 200. Maniac called and lost to KK. So that maniac was never folding to a 3-bet except maybe a shove. In that situation, it made sense to limp/3-bet strong hands. If you know a player is raising 60%, and then there is about a 65% chance someone will raise, then limping behind with KK in late position is good.

Also, I agree it isn't a generally a good idea to grind 1/3 for years. However, the swings are generally much less, and you can have a high percentage of winning sessions. So it is good for someone starting out playing professionally or for profit part-time. Once you get comfortable, you can move up to bigger games.

The Introduction was deliberately written that way. It was designed to create interest in the book and I think it did do that. However, if you read the whole book, you would see that everything was explained, including when it was right to do so, as to why the hands in the Introduction were played the way they were.

Mason

There was some guy who promised a review, but I don't think delivered. I don't want to be the only one commenting on the book.

IMO, it is excellent as far as it goes. I don't care if the authors can beat 5/10 NL in Vegas. However, there is a lot of HH analysis in videos and in the forums here and elsewhere. It seems like the authors came up with their own impressions rather than examining the recent consensus. It definitely is not comprehensive in terms of how to play in many situations.

However, the point of the Introduction, which a lot of people missed, is that playing bad players you need to vary a lot by situation and reads, and just playing by formula is very suboptimal.

how do you compare it to course?

Oh, the Miller book. I like this one better. The Miller book gives too many rules, like never limp. That sort of thing is good for fish to keep them playing solid. The Sklansky book assumes you know how to play, and discusses adjustments when playing 1/3 or whatever.

There are a lot of regs and part-time players who have difficulty because of the games getting harder, etc. Online poker is a mess, and very tough. Limit games are much less played. 5/10 and up NL players are using GTO, copying how a program plays, etc. So there are a lot of people who want to try 1/3 (or 1/2 or 2/5).

I stopped reading once they posted like 10 facts about gto.


I think 2 of the facts were legit. The rest not so much

I’ll post them today

I really admire hjow different this book is, it really is play passive pre flop and limp and over cal a lot

they dont really want you raising too much pre flop. for instance there is a section in their preflop where they say with AA if you see a raise and 2 callers that if we wanted to raiise, raise it lightly so you get more callers. to me that's goes against everything on 2p2 for the last 15+ years as with AA with that much money i assumed you would want to be HU also a few times they say raise with QQ+ but at times limp from up front to get more peoplein pot and they say sometimes just call to see flop

again its very intriguing to hear about this since its fundamentally against what A LOT of people say but who am I to judge, its just fascinating. maybe im reading the context wrong too tho not sure if they get into handling 3 betting or not as not that far

That's what I meant. They say things against the general consensus, and don't seem to be aware that consensus exists.

I think they have a point about sometimes limping or raising smallish. If people are going to limp/call or cold call a smallish raise with like 50% of hands, maybe it is better to build the pot rather than drive them out.

Small pp and Axs clearly play better multiway. Often it is a mistake to call with a small pp likely HU. Axs can be used as a 3-bet bluffing hand, usually in tougher games. With a small pp, you get great immediate odds say 6-way. Then if you hit, you can get a lot from someone who makes some random 2-pair and can't fold it. With Axs, you can make various draws and strong hands, but you are really looking for the nut flush. Again, you get people calling with almost any suited cards, and they will have a hard time folding when they make their flush.

Now with JJ+/AK, it is usually considered better to play it 3-way against mostly good but dominated hands. if you play it 6-ways, you sort of have negative implied odds. When you make and overpair or TPTK, you likely want to play it strongly. However, when someone make some random 2-pair, you likely lose more than you win with a better one pair. Now maybe if you are good, you can handle the tricky postflop situations.

It is sort of standard for 1/3 players to make huge raises with some portion of 99+/AQ+ and bet smaller or limp lesser hands. This is viewed as fishy, and gives way too much information. But there are some reason that kind of play makes sense.

There are some hands that play better for an limp or small raise in ep. There is also often no point in raising to drive out players rather than limp behind or make a pot building raise (but to way more than 2xBB as Sklansky suggests) with marginal or speculative hands.

So they say it way to strongly, but IMO they have a good point that you don't want to make a big raise that will drive out players with every hand you decide to play

While its true that you dont want to blast everyone out of the pot but you don't really want a 3+ way pot either

I think the Miller book, The Course, is a good book. But it seems to be designed for games where the make-up of the players is much stronger and more competent than the players we're addressing in the small stakes live games. For example, Miller says to have a hand like ace-five suited in your three-bet range, and against better players where you might need a more balanced strategy, this can be good advice. But we don't see where it has much positive value in the games we're addressing.

Also, Miller says to never limp in if first to voluntarily enter the pot. That's not our advice since we're looking to get poor players into spots where they might lose a lot of money on a later street (and these are spots where a better player is much less likely to do this) or where we might be able to get a three-bet in (before the flop) with a strong hand.

Mason

Going by memory, I don't think it says anything like this. Perhaps you can find the place and I'll take a look.

On page 62 it says:

We’re not sure why this happens but suspect that many players in these live small stakes games have a phobia about being “pushed around.” Or perhaps they are thinking “He would never actually raise this much with a great hand like aces or kings.” Maybe they are using the second reason as a rationalization when the first reason is the real culprit. In any case, you should seriously consider raising up to about ten times their initial raise with aces down through queens plus ace-king suited.

On page 68 it says:

Assuming average small stakes stack sizes, average small stakes opponents in terms of skill, an early position raiser, middle position for you, and no callers between you and the raiser, you should usually reraise to about three or four times the initial raise with AA, KK, and maybe QQ, JJ, and AK (suited or offsuit).

And on page 69 it says:

If his raise is more than about three or four times the big blind (when no one else is in) you need a better hand than usual to call. (Those calls would now include the bottom end of hands you might usually reraise with). If he’s raising limpers already in, you can stick to your normal calling requirements as long as his raise isn’t that much larger than normal. The hands that you reraise with should usually be aces or kings, and these hands should reraise big. Maybe even very big.

Mason

We have a chapter, starting on page 77, titled "Tend To Prefer That The Pot Be Multiway."

Mason

“Dispensing with GTO”


1. Except for heads up NLHE , nobody, and this includes computers, know what the perfect GTO strategy is although in some cases they are close

2. Since GTO is designed to beat all styles of opposing play from the tightest to the loosest, it should be obvious that it does not win at the rate of a good player who knows that his opponent is much too tight or too loose and plays accordingly

3. It doesn’t attempt to read hands. It doesn’t attempt to put someone on a hand or even a range of hands based on their previous play. Rather is plays the best strategy that exists under the assumption that the opponent is also using GTO. It doesn’t play the best strategy against other ranges as a good player might and this is particularly true against a poor player who’s making a lot of mistakes.

Fact one, imo, even if true is irrelevant. You don’t need to know perfect Strat to mimic GTO and get similar results

Fact two, GTO isn’t designed to beat all styles of play is it? I thought it was designed to lose the least amount of money possible against opponent(s)

Fact three, I don’t think gto plays the best strategy that exists under the assumption the other player is playing GTO



How right or wrong am I ?

It obviously isn't optimum to try to play GTO at lowth stakes. However, there are thingst that have been learned from GTO. I don't agree with totally dispensing with it. Maybe the authors don't understand it.

If people are willing to limp/call or cold call a raise to say 15 at 1/3 with like 40% of hands, I don't see why we should raise big to force them to play better ranges. It may be better to narrow tthe field with premium hands. However, if you have say AJo, QJs, or 88, is it optimal to narrow the field to comparable strength hands and get them to fold junk? You can raise bigger with bigger hands, but most fish at 1/3 do that and it becomes readable even to 1/3 players.

I'm going to copy/paste my notes on this book and give my review at the end.

1. Limping first in - important.

1A. Buying in for the minimum to have an advantage over larger stacks!

1B. In a typical $1/$2 live game - we should be opening $6 preflop as a default!

2. Short term tilt is an important concept

3. over limping 22-44 in GTO in the CO has the same EV as raising 2.5x! Check GTO Wizard

4. Page 14 - GTO can be essentially memorized and does not take as much talent as
exploitative play. This statement is not correct, no one is memorizing full GTO game trees, especially river nodes.

5. page 52. No calling it's either a check or raise. Bad wording

6. Page 55. Don't cbet vs the non bluffer! fold to his turn bet. Very important.

7. Page 56. You can fold A3cc on A96r OTF against weak player!

8. **How do you identify a non bluffer? Player profile - how long does it take you to identify a non bluffer?**

9. Being 9 handed vs 6 handed encourages limping. Difference between online vs live play

1. Isolation Raises - 3 reasons to make them:
A. If you're in late position
B. Opponents make big mistakes post flop
C. Players who may fold preflop when they play well postflop

2. Small raise with hands like 98s and 55 to sweeten the pot over limpers. If a hand makes money when it
limps, it reasons that it should make about double the money when you raise 2x.

3. Understanding rake, you want more players in the pot! On average we don't want to raise limpers
with mediocre hands, only hands that play well multiway.

4.Page 99: "When opponents almost never bluff, you should fold more often against them than against
others postflop. That's obvious. But you do that after the first round (preflop). Before the flop, you should
fold less often because of the extra edge you'll be playing with."

5.Page 121. Min betting (betting the size of the big blind when checked too). Range composition
should be great hands or poor but not hopeless hands!

Example 1:

We overlimp 87o OTB, flop comes AJ7r - checked to us. Considering min betting instead of checking back!

Example 2:

Raised MW pot and are OTB with FD. Checks to us - we can consider min betting so we don't get bet out
of the pot OTT. Exploit vs both Regs and Fish because if you nodelocked a sim to us doing this the OOP
players would have to develop significant donking ranges to counter our strategy and they won't do that.

Example 3:

MW pot OTB with 99 on K95r - min bet works well here. Question for the authors: Would you not min bet on FD board? Ask him this
question page 123.

There's almost no SBvsBB HU spots because the vast majority of players chop here.

Online this is the highest EV spot to study. It has 100% practice priority but it is virtually non existent
in live games. This is one of the main reasons a lot of live players have difficulty transitioning to online
play. The highest EV spot online is a spot you have almost never been in!

Page 124-125: Rope-a-Dope play - Bet-->Call-->we XR. Overbluffed HU in X-XR!
I like that you add KK to the play because it protects you from observant opponents.

I'm predicting a lot of 1-3 star reviews on amazon out of 5 stars because this book is going to go over
most players heads. A lot of these plays are very good as exploits but your readers aren't going to
1) Understand theory well enough 2) Understand MDA and how people actually play this game

Live players will be too static in their strategy to appreciate this book and mediocre online players
will be too steeped in solver play. You need to understand MDA at a deep level to recognize how good
some of these plays are.

I think you guys both understand MDA (I know you don't call it that but we are talking about the same thing).
on a deep level except you learned it through trial and error instead of from a Database like you would online.

The preflop play is actually very very good. If most of your opponent's are fish you are supposed to limp
and over limp a lot. This strategy doesn't work online because usually there aren't more than 1 or maybe 2 fish per table and if the fish does limp you are incentivized to play him heads up and isolate him. Limping is also much better at 9-10 handed games vs 6 handed games because isolation plays have less success vs multiple opponents and the possibility of a limp-XR goes up. Again, online players who read this book will very likely misinterpret your reasoning here and claim "you don't understand the games," or "the games have passed you by" when ironically it is them who don't understand the adjustments.

This is coming from someone that has studied MDA at a high level for the past 30 months.

Live players may have the same fate as the online players because they are likely too static in their approach to the game and don't understand the theory part well enough to know why they are adjusting.

I'll give you an example: Your "wait for the aggro player to bet so that others call and you XR to fold out all the capped ranges OTT and the likely weak range of the aggro player is the exact same play as an online play when they XR your delayed cbet (HU). The X-XR-B line is weak precisely because of the reason you just stated, but it works because the delayed cbet is range is too weak to withstand multiple streets of aggression.

I like that you add the KK hand into that line as well because this will confuse observant opponents and make them doubt their read on you (It's why I reverse MDA lines against better competition).

I think you two might have underestimated how advanced this book is. To understand why these plays are good the reader is going to have to understand the logic behind the play. I don't think most readers will do that and because of this I think this will be your worst reviewed book ever, although it is probably your best. I'm looking at the Amazon reviews right now and I'm seeing a lot of 1-3 star ratings. I would lay a lot of money that they those readers don't understand most of the concepts laid out in this book and that the review is a reflection of this frustration and has nothing to do with the merit of the book. I can see the narrative being that David and Mason are getting senile in their old age and that the game has passed them by which really couldn't be further from the truth.

I plan on re-reading this book to fully grasp some of the plays since they will not work online (based on 6max vs 9-10 max dynamic and also fish are more aggro online than live)---->Actually a very important point. The psychology and shame of getting caught bluffing drastically reduces live bluffing relative to online bluffing. The player type of "non-bluffer" is almost non existent online. But will very likely be common when playing live.

1. Page 128. Early position raises and we just call in late position with TT. Flop comes 962r. If he bets
half pot we should raise for protection because if he comes over the top we will know he has JJ-AA and he
will fold out all overcards. Good play when deeper against weaker competition.

2. Profit from live small stakes NL comes from 2 areas:

A. Recognizing when to make unusually large bets against opponents who call too much.
B. Saving lots of money with with 3 types of folds.

1. The flop fold when your hand is good but not great.

2. The fold against a big bet that can't be a semi-bluff.

3. The early multiway fold when your opponent to the right of you bets.

Page 144: Be cautious when the hand you think your opponents are putting you on is close
to the hand you actually have. No matter how well you play or how good your hand is, you'll
not beat your game if your hand is often essentially face up.

Page 144: "If you flop top pair of kings down through jacks, you should usually bet if your kicker is smaller than your pair but often check if it's higher since hitting your kicker when it's the higher card may
result in a nice win from someone who would have folded but has now turned top pair.

Page 146: QJcc on A84r HU as PFR vs BB. You suggest checking as a default play to gain information on
your opponent. If he checks turn you delayed cbet. Question for the Authors: Are you betting river here as well if he x/c turn?

page 148: Reduce variance when you have a nut hand but your opponent has outs on you. Set vs Straight
Flush vs Ace of suit etc.

page 160: "The fact is that almost all bets, especially on the river in small stakes games, are not bluffs."
Much different online! They overbluff in a lot of nodes.

page 173: A9642 runout no flush. If you have A3o you should bet small (not theoretically correct - you rarely
bet 1/3 OTR when IP).

page 174: After x/c flop or turn - it is frequently correct to donk river rather than check to the bettor.
Donk spots include Flush complete turn/river and straight completing turn/river.

page 174: We call a preflop raise out of the big blind in a MW pot with ATcc. Flop comes Ts6h2h.Turn 9d and we x/c turn. If the river is a heart we should donk lead. For thin value? Most players will X back weak Tx so we need to develop xc/xc/donk range to get value from them.

Page 195: If you would have called that larger all-in bet, then it's almost always true you should move in
yourself, even if you think you're less than 50 percent to win. This prevents him from saving money on the river those times he has a draw or a weak hand and gives up without betting again - important concept. We are allowed to ship <50% equity hands OTT.

Overall I give this book a 5 out of 5 stars. And would highly recommend.

I also have some questions for the authors scattered throughout my notes.

“Small raise with hands like 98s and 55 to sweeten the pot over limpers. If a hand makes money when it
limps, it reasons that it should make about double the money when you raise 2x.”

You’re a coach and you believe this?

It's a good heuristic, yes.

It's probably higher than 2x vs fish and lower than 2x vs regs.

Fish don't understand relative vs absolute value as a general concept so playing for stacks will be higher EV.

It sounds made up to me.


But this quote is also in there

“ over limping 22-44 in GTO in the CO has the same EV as raising 2.5x! Check GTO Wizard”

Wouldn’t you get 2.5x the EV?