Hello forum,

This is a question one of my friends asked me and I wanted to get others opinions before giving him an good answer. The question was about finding a book that best describes how to adapt to the tournaments in casinos with rapid blind levels (15-20 minutes, usually) and a lot of crazy players.

I thought I could give him a good answer but the books that came to mind (HoH 1 and 2, Jonathan Little's books, etc) were all for deeper stacked tournaments with larger buy ins and mostly competent players. A large amount of the players you usually encounter here aren't too competent. However, ABC poker is too slow for these insanely fast structure these tournaments have.

Are there any books I could recommend for this kind of style of tournaments? Any advice would be extremely helpful. In fact, it would be helpful for me as I'm considering playing in these types of tournaments before the WSOP Circuit comes to my area in about a month. Never hurts to keep my game as fresh as possible, although this structure can be pretty gross at times and very frustrating. Again, any advice would be helpful. Thanks again!

-strongrad50

Poker Tournament Formula is great for fast blind structure. Theres also Kill Everyone, which is just an amazing tournament book

Any of the books mentioned above will be fine.

Best advise I have heard though is take a CLOSE look at the rake. You need to decide the amount that is acceptable for you. Example is Horseshoe Southern Indiana holds more than 30% out of their daily tournaments.

Thanks for the suggestions, both of those books sound good. Heard mixed things about Snyder's book but not a single bad thing about Kill Everyone, reviews seemed to be great!

Yeah, no kidding about the insane rake of Horseshoe Southern Indiana. Found out yesterday when I played at the 1/2 tables. A tournament was going on at the same time and I saw the rake... Just wow.

I would think that HOH would be good for the first 3-4 levels. Then Kill Phil/Kill Everyone for the shovefest. I know that the nightly tournies around my area, the players will blind down to 3-4bb's with little regard. Kill Phil/Kill Everyone should suffice for shoving strategies right? Anyone feel free to critique this comment please, but I think this will point you in a solid direction.

i would say snyder's poker tournament formula is good. basically you are going to blinded pretty fast in many of these tourneys so you may as well take some action. and i also like that he basically advocates playing with courage as opposed to being scared.

i thought his part 2 book was pretty poor and really non-specific as to poker hands. seemed to try to expand on the first book without much else to say.

harrington 1 and 2 the original series are good too. even kill everyone is good.