Re: Poker books
First, you are receiving, through this debate and discussion, some valuable insights about the recommended books.
Second, on a personal note, It took me ten years to progress from fish to small winner at limit hold-em. I can't imagine starting out in poker in No-Limit Hold-em as so many of you obviously have and are.
In his Essays, Mason Malmuth has always maintained that limit hold-em is harder to learn than no-limit because limit involves more decisions on more streets than does no-limit which boils down to pricing opponents in or out of the hand (I'm grossly oversimplifying here). He's written about no-limit players condescendingly killing some time at his limit table until a 'real' game started meaning no-limit. And the no-limit guy always gets killed.
When my all time poker hero Doyle Brunson labelled limit hold-em in SS1 as a 'mechanical game' he wasn't being complimentary. Yet that didn't keep him (and Bobby Baldwin in Limit) from writing the definitive works of the day in BOTH Limit and No-Limit.
Malmuth has observed that these days No-limit is commonly played with small buy-ins relative to the blinds which controls the size of the game. You have to beat a guy out of ten buy-ins of $200 instead of one of $2000 which 1: makes the games last and 2: changes strategy. And naturally Doyle, thirty years ago, has this covered cold. Super System 1, page 491 "...you'll have to adjust your play in a small game. You'll probably discover you'll get re-raised more when you raise in a small game than you will in a big game...Here's why: If I'm in a game where there's not much money on the table...a guy with big cards is going to move-in on me. They do it all the time in a small game. And when I've got a 7-6 or a 9-8 and someone bets the rest of his money at me...I can't call it. I'm not going to take two small connecting cards and try to beat two Kings, A-K and so forth when I can't win anything if I get a hand. So, in a case like that, I throw my hand away. And because of that...I have trouble winning in a game where there's not much money on the table.--But it's a totally different story in a big game. If I raise it $300 or $400...If he raises me $700 or $800...and I've got small connecting cards, I'll call, now. If we've both got $25,000 in front of us...then all I'll be putting in is about 5% of my money. And it's worth it. Because now...if I get a hand...I might be able to break him."
The point to all this is (aside from displaying my unending loyalty to Doyle Brunson and SuperSystem 1) to demonstrate that there is no dichotomy between so-called 'math' and 'instinct' players. You need to understand this because the best players understand each approach. This thread is very interesting and doesn't need to get sidetracked.
Finally, I see that in this month's 2+2 magazine Mason Malmuth has observed that some casinos are now spreading no-limit games without a cap on the buy-in which means it now is much easier for the good players to kill the bad, and with it, no-limit.
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