Dam that sucks, yeah i would deffo be interested in a paperback, it doesn't sink in for me otherwise. Back in the day i traded my kindle in like 2 days after i bought it.

Currently working my through, but my priority is to complete Jandas book just now...however this wound me up

if you skim it, you could easily focus on the beginners stuff and draw a very erroneous conclusion as this poster has (not mention the ludicrous misuse of the word "ludicrous").

The chapter on cbetting (which I dwelt on a little, as I was pretty much in the same place in Janda's book, so it gave a fascinating comparison) is as good advice on cbetting as I have read anywhere to date.

I don't have any difficulty seeing this book as good enough to beat 50nl...and hopefully in few months I can add some empirical evidence to that notion.

Anyway, I've enjoyed in thus far, and I'm pretty sure it will improve me, and it got it for free in my Kindle account, so what's not to like.

Hi I am enjoying this book quite a bit. Very solid material for pretty much everyone in that intermediary area that wants to help fix their leaks. So far I've already corrected two of my leaks from reading this so props to the author

That being said... I have a question about Hand #69. On the turn when deciding to call... doesn't having JJ actually decrease the amount of bluffs in villain's range due to blocker effects? Wouldn't it take out hands like KJs and TJs from UTG's double barreling range? I understand that villain has all of his flush draws in his bluffing range... but does that really constitute the 30ish% equity that we need to call turn. Maybe I'm missing something from the example and need to do a harder range analysis but my intuition at first told me that he wouldn't have 30% bluffs here but I may be way off. So my reasoning here would only apply if the villain was balanced right? Would we fold this if our opponent was more balanced with his betting? How much does having JJ as blockers here matter overall? If at all? Also... if villain were to bet a blank river with a fairly decent river aggression stat would it be a call?

I guess in your example the villain is more aggressive than usual so that justifies the call in a "Vacuum" EV perspective correct? Just wondering if you could elaborate on this hand a bit. Thanks

Just bought it.

First comment: Pls justify the text (left and rigth alignment).

Hi Everyone:

I'm still reading and am now 57 percent through the book. And based on what I've read so far this is an excellent book.

However, here's a spot I disagree a little with. In the 3-bet chapter the author warns against 3-bet bluffing with too many hands because of "long term EV." The idea is that even if it's profitable to 3-bet in a particular spot with virtually every hand you shouldn't do it because even the weakest of opponents will adjust.

Well, this has to be wrong. If you think your opponent will adjust then only do it a small number of times. If you're not sure when he'll adjust, perhaps only do it once or twice. Why pass up on any available EV when an obviously exploitative strategy is available.

Best wishes,
Mason

I haven't read the book and I could be wrong but this is how I understood this post.

Author: You should definitely 3bet bluff but not so often that even the weakest player notices you're bullying him and starts to fight back
Mason: No, you're wrong in saying that you should never 3bet bluff. What's correct is that you should definitely 3bet bluff but not so often that even the weakest player notices you're bullying them and starts to fight back

We do want a 3-bet bluff range and against players who overfold vs. 3-bets we should be inclined to bluff wider than a balanced startegy. However, when we have good reason to assume we'll be playing future hands with villain we should be aware that a decision to 3-bet a very weak hand in a vaccuum leads to a strategy of 3-betting a very exploitable frequency that could lead to us losing our edge through causing villain to adjust his play appropriately and stop making the overfolding mistake. We can't always sieze vacuum EV just because we know it's there if this leadsa to a lower EV session due to future spots.

Sure you can make arguments for doing it a few times with any old hand and then readjusting, but we don't normally know when villain is adjusting/readjusting. If we end up overfolding to 4-bets this is significantly worse than villain's orginal mistake of folding too much to 3-bets and it's very easy to lose the EV we'd previously gained by palying our hand to maximum EV in a vacuum.

I'm enjoying the reading so far. Very good examples with thought explanation.


*****
My PG&C thread: http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/17...monds-1622428/

If we're only going to do it a limited number of times then shouldn't those times be the times it's most plus EV for us to do so rather than the marginal times?

So let's say we have hands A,B,C,D which we want to either 3-bet or fold

A is worth +0.1BB to 3 bet compared to folding against a GTO player (or against our default player pool read)
B is -0.1BB
C is -0.3BB
D is -0.5BB

- so we only 3-bet hand A.

Now if villain folds too much, the EV of 3-betting all these hands can increase by 0.4BB, so we have
A +0.5BB,
B +0.3BB,
C +0.1BB and
D -0.1 BB

So obviously A remains a 3-bet and D remains a fold. If we are only going to get chance to do these exploitative 3-bets a few times before the player adjusts, then surely we'd rather do them with B, and pick up 0.3BB each time compared to our default strategy, rather than with a mix of B and C.

There is a second reason to do it with B not C, which is that under normal play while B is quite marginal whereas C would only be played that way exploitatively, so doing it with C tips off the villain that we are exploiting him in a way B doesn't and therefore cuts down the number of exploitations we can get away with before villain counter-adjusts (though this second reason assumes certain things about what villain knows and how he thinks).

Solid post. I might add that, while no specifics were given in the book (I assume the passage that Mason refers to is "A Word on Long-Term EV", on p.323.), we only have reason to believe that a 3-bet is profitable in a vacuum is because we have data on the initial raiser that suggests a high Fold to PF 3-Bet stat, which we (usually) only have after having played a significant amount of hands against Villain, and thus are actually not in a "vacuum" anymore.

It is similar to hand example 6 on p. 58, where we fold 82o on the button, even though the stats of SB and BB suggest that combined they overfold their blinds enough to assume that actual fold equity exceeds required fold equity if we were to open it.

Do you have a link to your results anywhere Carroters? Also, what stakes do you play (probably in the thread and I've missed it)?

great book, finished 30%, helped me find several leaks so far.

Hi Everyone:

I'm sidetracked again but so far have read about 75 percent of this book and it's very good, and based on what I have read, would highly recommend it to beginner/intermediate players who want to get a lot better.

Best wishes,
Mason

Stupid question: 10x rule for setimine

You made an example with UTG raising to 3x, you said we need to make 30BBs on average. Assuming all the other players folds do we need 30 - 4,5 = 25,5 BBs more?

Let's make another example, we are UTG now and we raise 2x, BTN 3bets 8x, our investiment in order is 8BB in total or just 6BBs?

You made the +EV play of min-opening a PP, and you got 3bet. Now you are on to your next decision point. That 2bb is no longer yours. It is up for grabs.

So you are calling 6bbs to win the total pot (+ your implied odds), which includes your initial open of 2bbs.

Therefore, once you get 3bet, you are investing 6bb and the 10x rule would mean you have to make 60bb off your 6bb investment.

Note that if you had known 100% that you were going to get 3bet, it would be an 8bb investment and you would need to make 80bbs. But obviously this is never the case.

Yes so if the pot is 7.5 on the flop you really need them to have a hand that can put in about two streets more of decent-sized bets/calls to get an extra 25 BBs - of course sometimes they will call 3 streets and because the bets get progressively bigger that compensates for several times when you don't get 2 streets.

Ty guys

Just about now this thread turned into a total train wreck and a non-advertisement for the book.

Which of the things you mentioned in your OP, SPR, defending the BB, etc., weren't important a few years and won't be important in a few years?

Don't worry. The thread gets better after that when Mason reads the book (and is pretty complimentary).

I'm using 'relevant' wrong tbf. What I mean is 'capable of teaching players to beat the stakes it claims to'. In that sense, basically no older poker books are relevant right now, except maybe MoP. TGM's biggest pro is that it is still relevant to the games in 2016.

I'm about halfway through and so far I find this book much better than anything Harrington has written. But to be fair I think the 'Harrington on hold em' books are some of the most over rated poker books out there.

BTW, Mason, are you a winning long term poker player?

I won last night. Does that count?

MM

Like a few of us said earlier in the thread, it's not just about the information given but also whether the way it's taught enables it to get into people's heads. For me Harrington on Holdem's explanation of c-betting was the first time I'd seen it presented in a way that actually made any sense to me.

Just want to throw out a big thank you to everyone who has enjoyed the book and taken the time to come on here and say so.

I'm very happy with how the book is being received and for all of the feedback, error spotting etc. that has been handed out to me.

Thanks to Mason as moderator of this forum for taking the time to read the book in depth and submit a positive review.

For now I'll say this: A sequel book is in the very early stages of being made. It will essentially be a hand review book with none of the structure and progressive style of TGM.

I want to show the reader how to think about the random spots that arise every day in-game and so there will be 100 hands all analysed in depth but in no particular order; much like playing poker.

Stay tuned <3

Great news!!