[stoxtrader]

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I'm still a micro limit player, but I bought the book because I was sure I would gain some valuable insights. (and I was right)

I have a few general comments and I hope at least a few expert players will give me their thoughts in response.

When I look at "any" advice (especially pre flop) I almost always play more conservatively than suggested. The reason is that virtually every marginal situation in my hands is worth less than it is in the hands of an expert (the author for example). IMHO, if I were to follow the advice given for many marginal situations, my win rate would actually start falling until my entire game had improved to the expert level.

I think this is something that way too few people (even extremely bright ones) seem to give enough consideration.

The profitability of a hand or play is very correlated to the overall skill of the person trying it. A great player can even turn marginally EV- hands profitable and vice versa.

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yes, a large factor in examing pre-flop play by emperical profitability, as we did, is the POST FLOP SKILL of the player. We did use three different players with different results to try and mitigate this somewhat but you are exactly correct that the worse you play post flop then the worse each hand should perform. Also, the rake is a consideration as well for marginal hands, so overall I think your thought process is sound.

Remember however, there is a mitigating factor at work here as well. If you feel like your abilities are not as strong as they could be and correctly play at lower levels, then the average skill level of your opponent should be lower as well, so your ABSOLUTE skill level is not really the issue here, it is your skill level RELATIVE to your competition.

As an example, you may have a LARGER skill advantage against a 50c/1 player than I have against a 30/60 player....