Professional No-Limit Hold 'em Volume 1 Review Thread

[Tom Ames]

Got my pre-ordered copy from Amazon this week and just got the chance to start reading today. Will undoubtedly finish it tomorrow--it's difficult to put down.

I'm transitioning from limit, so I likely have a different perspective than many here. But to someone who has read some of the previous NL books and started playing some B&M NL, this book has clarified a lot for me already--and I've barely gotten past the sections on "basics".

The writing is clear and concise, making the concepts easy to grasp. I am looking forward to the other volumes.

[morphd]

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- If you are, doesn't this imply huge problems with cbetting, because when you cbet you promise it all?

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When you have 50bb I think you would not be committed if all you had was overs and villian was pretty sane. I think Ed Miller had something about this on his site and basically said to keep the pot smaller preflop at times and that it was an awkward position for sure.

This would be a similar situation to 3betting with AK, getting called, and whiffing the flop. You're still making a C-bet the majority of the time, especially against opponents who fold easily. But if you get raised all in, you probably aren't committed.

[quadaces9999]

overall what grade does this book get B or A?

[pig4bill]

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5 10, 2000 deep, 6 max online game, you hold kk on the button. utg opens for 40, co raises to 140, you make it 350. good player in the bb cold calls. both others fold. flop t83. he checks. you bet and he raises. folding has to be considered a viable option here whether or not you en dup folding, even tho this book reccomends never folding here.

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The point of the book though is to avoit these situation. After the preflop betting you have put more than %10 of your stack in. The book points out, that at this moment, you want to make a decision to commit to the pot or not. If you want to play a big pot at this point, then yes go ahead and bet. But who wants to play a big pot with one pair? If you don't want to commit your chips, then perhaps keeping the pot small and checking is your best option.

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So you'd give your opponent a free card? Do good players really play this way?

[ryanj247]

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5 10, 2000 deep, 6 max online game, you hold kk on the button. utg opens for 40, co raises to 140, you make it 350. good player in the bb cold calls. both others fold. flop t83. he checks. you bet and he raises. folding has to be considered a viable option here whether or not you en dup folding, even tho this book reccomends never folding here.

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The point of the book though is to avoit these situation. After the preflop betting you have put more than %10 of your stack in. The book points out, that at this moment, you want to make a decision to commit to the pot or not. If you want to play a big pot at this point, then yes go ahead and bet. But who wants to play a big pot with one pair? If you don't want to commit your chips, then perhaps keeping the pot small and checking is your best option.

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So you'd give your opponent a free card? Do good players really play this way?

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give my opponent a free card to what? 2 outs? 3 outs?

do you really think that protecting vs that kind of draw is such an overwhelmingly important priority that it will always take precendence over keeping the pot size manageable w/ one pair vs a tough opponent?

yes, good players play this way...

[Matt Flynn]

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The ideal stack would be around 50BB, since you can bring it in for a standard raise, one pot sized bet on the flop and one pot sized bet on the turn to get it allin. You are actually committed after betting the flop, or are you?

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ok this post is sick because it slings right the material we wrote then didn't put into volume 1 (deferring to volume 2). to answer this first part:

not at all. you only commit if it's profitable to do so.


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If you are, doesn't this imply huge problems with cbetting, because when you cbet you promise it all?

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even if you are not committed, you might well c-bet. you get into dangerous territory putting a third of your stack in with the intent of folding to a raise, but the value of c-betting can exceed the cost. we're getting into some of the volume 2 stuff that wouldn't shoehorn into volume 1 here.


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If you aren't (committed) this is great for cbetting, because if they call they know they'll be calling your entire stack, but you only risk half your stack? Is this inherent advantage enough to also cbet with air most of the time?

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absolutely. playing for target sprs for top pair can make your c-bet (with air) more powerful. your c-bet on the flop gets into the range of 1/5 or 1/4 the remaining money, which leaves about a pot-sized bet (or slightly more) behind. that's a stack decision. now you have momentum and stack decision leverage backing your c-bet.


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Why plan commitment if you decide you are not commited with half your stack in on the turn?

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usually you try to avoid putting half your stack in and not being committed.


really good questions here mvd. hope this clarifies enough. gonna be tough opening the kimono further here because 2+2 owns the copyright on volume 2 and it isn't in print yet.

[Matt Flynn]

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??? im still confused , so SPR is almost useless in shorthanded 100bb games ..since we're rarely going to hit our target SPR's with TP/ overpair hands ...seems like i wasted my money on this book ...hopefully its not 2 late and i can get a refund...

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keep in mind you also miss flops, play chicken when everyone misses, play pocket pairs that don't typically flop overpairs, play connectors, one-gappers, suited aces, etc.

top pair hands don't work well in 100bb stack games, but there are plenty of strong uses for SPR thinking in 100bb games.

[Matt Flynn]

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5 10, 2000 deep, 6 max online game, you hold kk on the button. utg opens for 40, co raises to 140, you make it 350. good player in the bb cold calls. both others fold. flop t83. he checks. you bet and he raises. folding has to be considered a viable option here whether or not you en dup folding, even tho this book reccomends never folding here.

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The point of the book though is to avoit these situation. After the preflop betting you have put more than %10 of your stack in. The book points out, that at this moment, you want to make a decision to commit to the pot or not. If you want to play a big pot at this point, then yes go ahead and bet. But who wants to play a big pot with one pair? If you don't want to commit your chips, then perhaps keeping the pot small and checking is your best option.

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So you'd give your opponent a free card? Do good players really play this way?

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i don't play hands this way. i wouldn't build an $885 preflop pot and an SPR < 2 heads-up to lay down kings as an overpair on an uncoordinated board unless that cold-caller's range is AA/KK or maybe AA/KK/QQ preflop OR that raise means i'm probably drawing to two outs. remember, SPR is the battle plan. sometimes the plan meets the battlefield and dies. new information can override your preflop SPR strategy / commitment decisions. if that raise means huge hand then you do indeed fold after putting half your chips in.

but you better be right.

as to my play, i might check to let him fire, or bet small to encourage him, but betting $600 then folding would only happen if i was really sure i was beat (it has to be > than pot odds b/c sometimes you will suck out even if beaten).

most often i might bet $400 because that gets into people's heads and matches a strategy of always using half-pot continuation bets, but the intent would still be to get the chips in.

[phydaux]

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??? im still confused , so SPR is almost useless in shorthanded 100bb games ..since we're rarely going to hit our target SPR's with TP/ overpair hands ...seems like i wasted my money on this book ...hopefully its not 2 late and i can get a refund...

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keep in mind you also miss flops, play chicken when everyone misses, play pocket pairs that don't typically flop overpairs, play connectors, one-gappers, suited aces, etc.

top pair hands don't work well in 100bb stack games, but there are plenty of strong uses for SPR thinking in 100bb games.

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Geez, I've been playing NL for a year and I'm still such an r-tard.

Matt, so you're saying that hands like KQ play better when effective stacks are around 50bb because when you make TPGK then the commitment decision is easy and getting all the money in is easy once you commit.

Hands like KQ go down in value when effective stacks are 100BB+, since it takes more betting rounds to get all the money in and allows your opponent more cards to make his monster before the commitment threshold is crossed. Hands like 87s go up, however, because of the implied odds plus the chance that you'll either make your monster draw on the turn, or not make it and get away from the hand with plenty of stack still left.

Sorry if these are bog-simple questions. Work turned up the heat and I've had no time to read this week, so I'm currently stuck on page 97. Plus I seem to spend most of my poker thinking time wondering how to play SCs & suited aces from MP & LP.

[phydaux]

Jesus, you know now that I think about it PNL is actually a Tournament book, since it helps you adjust to playing the differing stacks sizes you go through in a long MTT.

Cripes! Ideas are linking and chaining together in my head. I can feel myself becoming a better poker player.

I'm gonna go and buy 10 more copies of this book tomorrow, because I feel like I owe you guys my money.

Then I'm gonna burn them, because I don't want anyone else to accidentally learn this stuff. [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]