SNG Book Announcement:

[seemorenuts]

What's the big issue here?

1. Poker theory evolves, thousands of people enjoyed and benefited from NLPTP, though DS said later that it probably didn't apply to 200/400NL cash games and up.

2. Similarly, this book is going to appeal to a huge market, certainly in comparison to the STTF, right?

I'll bet most of the readers of this new book will be pretty happy too.

Mason is fully capable of deducing that a book of this quality NOW fulfils the demands of the market better than waiting around.

[Gelford]

Actually NHTAP is a good example of a book being ok and actually the best on the market, but nothing great or extraordinary with some advice, that many find peculiar (pf betsizing for example).

[Mason Malmuth]

Hi Gelford:

[ QUOTE ]
I don't see that statement aimed at Mason in particular, it is just a general statement about the publishing business.

[/ QUOTE ]

Except that we don't run Two Plus Two like a typical publishing company. Instead of using hype and promotion to sell our books, we developed this website and it is now the main driver of our book sales, and it does a great job of that as long as the book is a good one. But if we put out a bad book, the criticism on these boards will stifle sales. If that should happen, we'll end up with an unprofitable book plus a lot of time and effort will be wasted.

So we have a lot of incentive to only publish books that are top notch. That's because we know that no books are automatically profitable, even for us.

Best wishes,
mason

[Aleo]

I never post in the STTF anymore and I don't actually post much at all, but in some ways I suppose I was one of those who initially contributed to some the development of SNG strategy as accepted today.

I, some might remember, once tried to write a SNG book. This project took about a year of my time as a side project, and in the end I never went beyond about 40,000 words and I was never satisfied. I had started out writing a very basic guide for play, something like a more accurate extension of my guide which became so popular for a while. Then I realized I hated that kind of book. SNG poker was changing fast at the time so I tried to include advanced ICM material and create a book with more long term value. That turned out to be exceptionally hard to do as well.

In the end, obviously, I scrapped the whole project. It is a great regret of mine that I did so but I have no intention of picking it up again. Still, everytime I pass a complete section of poker books in Chapters, I feel like I missed out on a great opportunity. As was already mentioned in this thread, three years ago would have been a great time for this.

I have been expecting a SNG book to appear for some time now, and frankly I am amazed it has taken this long. Nevertheless, I am pleased to see it is happening. Perhaps this book will not be filled with ICM calculations. That's fine. How long were SNG noobs (many who now consider themselves experts) discussing that awful guide as if it was the end all of SNG strategy. At least the next generation of new players will have this book to go on and it's bound to be a better starting point.

This is a worst case scenario. Best case scenario and it will be really really good. Besides, do SNG players want life injected into their game or not? A book like this is something good irregardless.

As far as caring about 2+2 'quality', I think many of you haven't read all that 2+2 has ever offered. They don't all fall in the same stratospheric realm that TOP does. That's the business and this is just another book. Besides, if Mason thinks its good, then I simply cannot believe it is horrible.

I guess my point is just that writing is hard, and I applaud the fact that someone finally wrote a SNG book. It's about time. If all you SNG experts want to write the definitive masterpeice, or the 'SNG theory for advanced players' then by all means, do it. Until then, I eagerly await this book.

Regards
Brad S

[New York Jet]

[ QUOTE ]
I never post in the STTF anymore and I don't actually post much at all, but in some ways I suppose I was one of those who initially contributed to some the development of SNG strategy as accepted today.

I, some might remember, once tried to write a SNG book. This project took about a year of my time as a side project, and in the end I never went beyond about 40,000 words and I was never satisfied. I had started out writing a very basic guide for play, something like a more accurate extension of my guide which became so popular for a while. Then I realized I hated that kind of book. SNG poker was changing fast at the time so I tried to include advanced ICM material and create a book with more long term value. That turned out to be exceptionally hard to do as well.

In the end, obviously, I scrapped the whole project. It is a great regret of mine that I did so but I have no intention of picking it up again. Still, everytime I pass a complete section of poker books in Chapters, I feel like I missed out on a great opportunity. As was already mentioned in this thread, three years ago would have been a great time for this.

I have been expecting a SNG book to appear for some time now, and frankly I am amazed it has taken this long. Nevertheless, I am pleased to see it is happening. Perhaps this book will not be filled with ICM calculations. That's fine. How long were SNG noobs (many who now consider themselves experts) discussing that awful guide as if it was the end all of SNG strategy. At least the next generation of new players will have this book to go on and it's bound to be a better starting point.

This is a worst case scenario. Best case scenario and it will be really really good. Besides, do SNG players want life injected into their game or not? A book like this is something good irregardless.

As far as caring about 2+2 'quality', I think many of you haven't read all that 2+2 has ever offered. They don't all fall in the same stratospheric realm that TOP does. That's the business and this is just another book. Besides, if Mason thinks its good, then I simply cannot believe it is horrible.

I guess my point is just that writing is hard, and I applaud the fact that someone finally wrote a SNG book. It's about time. If all you SNG experts want to write the definitive masterpeice, or the 'SNG theory for advanced players' then by all means, do it. Until then, I eagerly await this book.

Regards
Brad S

[/ QUOTE ]
You are greatly missed. STTF is no where near as good as it was when Andathar, Eastbay, Gigabet, and yourself posted regularly.

[Galwegian]

[ QUOTE ]
I never post in the STTF anymore and I don't actually post much at all, but in some ways I suppose I was one of those who initially contributed to some the development of SNG strategy as accepted today.

I, some might remember, once tried to write a SNG book. This project took about a year of my time as a side project, and in the end I never went beyond about 40,000 words and I was never satisfied. I had started out writing a very basic guide for play, something like a more accurate extension of my guide which became so popular for a while. Then I realized I hated that kind of book. SNG poker was changing fast at the time so I tried to include advanced ICM material and create a book with more long term value. That turned out to be exceptionally hard to do as well.

In the end, obviously, I scrapped the whole project. It is a great regret of mine that I did so but I have no intention of picking it up again. Still, everytime I pass a complete section of poker books in Chapters, I feel like I missed out on a great opportunity. As was already mentioned in this thread, three years ago would have been a great time for this.

I have been expecting a SNG book to appear for some time now, and frankly I am amazed it has taken this long. Nevertheless, I am pleased to see it is happening. Perhaps this book will not be filled with ICM calculations. That's fine. How long were SNG noobs (many who now consider themselves experts) discussing that awful guide as if it was the end all of SNG strategy. At least the next generation of new players will have this book to go on and it's bound to be a better starting point.

This is a worst case scenario. Best case scenario and it will be really really good. Besides, do SNG players want life injected into their game or not? A book like this is something good irregardless.

As far as caring about 2+2 'quality', I think many of you haven't read all that 2+2 has ever offered. They don't all fall in the same stratospheric realm that TOP does. That's the business and this is just another book. Besides, if Mason thinks its good, then I simply cannot believe it is horrible.

I guess my point is just that writing is hard, and I applaud the fact that someone finally wrote a SNG book. It's about time. If all you SNG experts want to write the definitive masterpeice, or the 'SNG theory for advanced players' then by all means, do it. Until then, I eagerly await this book.

Regards
Brad S

[/ QUOTE ]

I think that this post really nails it. However, let me add my own tuppence worth.

1. A lot of the STTFers who are getting snotty about this are forgetting that you must be a decent writer as well as a decent poker player to write a good poker book. Have a look at the typical standard of "explanation" offered by many of the STTF regulars and I think its clear that most of them should never be let within shouting distance of a publishing house. I'm not talking about grammar/punctuation here. Rather I'm talking about the ability to explain concepts clearly

2. Earlier in this post someone mentioned some point to the effect that the advice in HOH should be taken seriously because Dan Harrington is a former world champion, whereas Collin Moshman is a relative unknown. I think that this is completely the wrong way to think about poker strategy books. Advice in a strategy book should be heeded because it is logically sound and will make you money, whether or not it is written by a wsop winner.

3. A book on sng's does not have to be exhaustive to be useful. There are many people out there who would benefit from a basic strategy book but are not yet ready to think about Nash equilibria on the bubble etc....

4. I will definitely buy it

[Gelford]

Mason

I do not doubt that you an 2+2 are doing an excellent job and are the best in the business [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

[HSB]

"And I can't understand why the concerns of several top posters and players are so easily dismissed (by people who don't play sngs as well for the most part)"

This is easy. They came in here acting like know it all jackasses dismissing a book they haven't read yet.

They assume that because they don't know who this guy is, he's not as good as them. That may well be true or it may not.

Regardless, they have precisely zero idea how good the book is. All they have are assumptions about how good the book will be based on assumptions about how good the author is based on the fact that they don't know him.

When the book comes out, read it. Then critique it. And, if you think a better book should be available, write it.

[deacsoft]

WORD.

The only fair assumption at this point is this...
If Mason is going to publish it it's on par with the quality of and meets the high standards of Two Plus Two Publishing, LLC.

[unfrgvn]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I never post in the STTF anymore and I don't actually post much at all, but in some ways I suppose I was one of those who initially contributed to some the development of SNG strategy as accepted today.

I, some might remember, once tried to write a SNG book. ....Brad S

[/ QUOTE ]
You are greatly missed. STTF is no where near as good as it was when Andathar, Eastbay, Gigabet, and yourself posted regularly.

[/ QUOTE ]

QFT.