Are their any college math classes that would be better for poker than others? I always loved brandon adams story because he attributes so much of his success to mathematics. Basically what i am asking is what class would be the best to take? Statistics? Calculus? Algebra?

Statistics and game theory I'd guess would be the best.

There is a class called game theory?

Possibly, or it might fall under "quantitative management", "optimisation" or something similar.

Game theory optimal play is a defensive strategy used to neutralize an opponent's advantage over you. Most opponents will have tendencies you can exploit. Only once you start playing mid and high limits will you run into opponents that are capable of playing you so well that you would prefer to use an equilibrium strategy vs them.

If we play rock/paper/scissors and I randomly throw 1/3 rock, 1/3 paper and 1/3 scissors, you cannot beat me - even if you know my strategy. However, if you throw paper 100% of the time (regardless of what I throw), then me throwing 1/3 of each (game theory optimal) would be 0EV, and throwing scissors 100% of the time (exploiting your paper tendency) would be the best strategy. Being that now I'm throwing 100% scissors, I have created a vulnerability in my play that can be exploited by you throwing rock. By using an exploitative strategy, you subject yourself to exploitation.

All that said, you want to learn basic probability and combinatorics.

Here's an entire semester of lectures on basic probability that you may find helpful: http://academicearth.org/lectures/in...y-and-counting

what about combinatorics?

If you mean combinatorics for math majors, not some sort of discrete math offered for non-math people then that's probably way over what you'll ever use in poker.

Although I have seen an old thread in Theory where people used Group Theory to count the number of different flops, but in the end they agreed that just looking at different cases and using high school combinatorics was the simplest way to do it.

Anything math class other than Geometry will probably help you. Obviously you will need basic math and statistic skills so take those. Number theory, Mathematical Statistics, and Number Analysis probably wouldn't hurt. You'll probably need a calculus somewhere in there too. My friends going to be a math teacher and he said be prepared to want to quit every day. He spends 5 hours a day doing homework during the week and all he wants to do is be a high school math teacher.

Math will definitely help you though. In highschool I made straight A's and I made 100 in all of my math classes except geometry and that's just because I absolutely hated it. I'v made all A's in my math classes in college as well so I know it will definitely help you to learn

These are probably all great suggestions, but Phil Ivey says pffft.....

Just live at the poker tables, any high school graduate has the basic math to play poker.

All the other math suggested here is only really good for away from the table discussion, planning or review. I suppose if you wanted to develop some new strategies, or develop a toy game model for some GTO project then higher math would be useful.

If you are in college, take whatever math classes that interest you or that complement your major. AFAIK there is no college course on how to improve at poker. Any math you learn will help you in general, in life and poker. My advice is to not over-think what math is required to play poker. Most of the best players in the world are either college dropouts or never attended any college.

Just my opinion

At least 97% of what you learn in any uni math class will be irrelevant to poker, no matter what class you take.

Obviously we use probabilities/combinatorics all the time in poker, but you don't need to know how to do the math yourself, since so many people have done the work already. But if you play any uncommon poker variants (or weird home games where dealers invent the rules), then knowing how to estimate probabilities on the fly can be pretty helpful. You'll probably find that in any uni combinatorics class, you'll be done with all the basic tools you'd need for poker within the first two weeks.

A lot of basic Statistics is relevant to poker. Not only do we talk about EV and variance all the time, but if you want to be able to analyze large volumes of hands and to be able to understand the significance of the sample size you're looking at, you'd need a bit of background in stats.

Game Theory probably sounds more promising than it is, at least unless you're playing high stakes.

I'm super-curious what application people in this thread have found of Group Theory, Number Theory or Calculus to poker.

Maths for Economists (or whatever it's called where you are) might be useful. A lot of concepts are directly applicable to all forms of risk taking (eg, gambling), and the effects of individual beliefs on markets (eg, poker fashions). A lot of it isn't useful to a poker player, too.

I can't believe anyone would really suggest Calculus. It has absolutely no application to poker at all.

What? I learned how to make those cool upper case Sigma expression thingies! Very useful ldo

I suppose Calculus is useful if you habitually cut the cards up into infinitely thin strips. It makes dealing a lot more difficult though.

Or maybe you're interested in the rate of change of the Ace of Spades. Or something.

Sigmas are cool though. Luckily you get to use them in Stats too - in both upper and lower case

Thinly veiled barg imo

I wouldn't be so sure about that. Comes down to what kamikaze baby said about other people having done the work for us.

If you want to know which PLO hands can profitably call a 4-bet v almost certain AA**, you're looking at your equity on the top x% of flops etc etc. Knowing that that's the area under the flop distribution curve is way easier to understand with a bit of calculus under your belt (imo).

OR, you could just look at the tables people have created and say, ok, I have wxyz, I can profitably call.

For sure, nobody is doing that sort of calculation at the table (well, nobody human anyway) but away from the table, I'd be fairly confident that the people who first modelled the decision in this way had some understanding of calculus.

Nobody in their right mind would ignore the tables and use calculus to come up with exactly the same answer that you would get in the tables anyway. Flipping through MoP the only calculus appears to be in the BRM section, the rest is all stats (which admittedly does involve calculus, however as mentioned most is already worked out and provided in tables somewhere to help the pretend mathematicians, like economists and the such ).

Exploitative bet sizing is often easiest to understand through concepts from calculus. For example with value bets you are trying to maximize the function (equity vs calling range)x(call frequency)x(bet size), where the (call frequency)->(equity vs calling range) function is given by your opponents range and the (bet size)->(call frequency) by your model of your opponent's play.

Of course if calculus just means methods of computing derivatives and integrals then sure, it's not very helpful.

OK - fair enough. Of course the fundamental principles of calculus are somewhat useful to know in relation to understanding the relationship of the different 'orders' (not sure right word) of describing a curve. But you learn enough of that in high school maths.

Not worth doing a calculus course at uni though. I had to for my computing systems degree (wrt calculating various behaviours in electrical circuits) and have happily forgotten nearly all of it. Actually, I think it's more a suppressed traumatic memory.

If you skipped calculus in school, then a general "maths for xxx" course will cover enough of it.

Take a class that teaches you the two times table. If you want to get really advanced, take the class with the four times table. When you know the rule of 2 and 4, you're halfway to winning the WSOP Main Event.

Perhaps.