Harrington on holdem is pretty good so far.

[bottomset]

is the book out in stores yet?

as for tourneys, I remember feeling totally out of my league in the first big tourney(1900) players, after making the money, everything from the tables waiting to finish, the fact that the rounds were 5k/10k(15ppl's starting chips going in as blinds), watching 100k stacks disappear in 1 hand, is something you don't see in your normal sng, 1 mistake can cost you hundreds even thousands of dollars .. looking back i had very little NL experience and got really lucky 3/4 crucial hands(QT vs AK, im allin board goes 44j j 4 for the split, it was a really bad push on my part, other highlights getting AA in the BB with 20 of my 26k in the pot, catching a river T so my ATs knocked out a player in 7th with AQ, and giving me a solid stack, we were almost even preflop in chips) so any insight wouldve been very beneficial, specifically how to advoid the major problem scenarios



i play on getting the book in the near future

[Sam T.]

I think it is great. I've been playing low buy-in tournaments and reading the hell out of this board for a few months now, and I think this book will help my game considerably.

I agree that the writing is far superior to many poker books. While there are ideas I have to stop and think about, I've yet to find a sentence that confuses the hell out of me.

The sample hands are also great, as it allows you to play along. I found it particularly interesting that in a number of cases, he explains what the right play is and why, and then tells you that the right play lost. (I could have the details wrong, but one example was calling an all-in with KK on a J8x board. He goes through the logic for a call in detail, and then says, "You call. He turns over 88, and you lose.") I think it is easy for newbies to think that if we make the right decisions, we will cash every time, but it's just not the case. Cards happen.

[steamboatin]

Order the book from twoplustwo.com Support your local forum.

They give us a discount so shipping is free. Why pay $2 a gallon to buy it for full price? They take neteller payments. Its easy.

[kevyk]

Hi everyone,

I have a mixed opinion of the book thus far.

While I agree that HOH is a good book, I was hoping for a bit more tournament-specific advice. Most of the advice in HOH seems to deal with situations where the blinds are small compared to the stacks; the fact that you're playing in a tournament is therefore not all that important.

I was hoping for more content on proper level of aggression as blinds increase, inflection points, playing near the Wall (I forget where this term originated, but I'm using it to mean the period in the tournament in which the blinds begin to encroach on conservative players who haven't built their stacks much) and the Bubble.

Perhaps I was simply misunderstanding Harrington's definition of "Strategic Play," and all of this will be covered in Volume 2.

All that said, I am going to keep the existence of this book a secret from non-2+2'ers as long as possible. I'd much rather play against someone who has not read it.

[jakethebake]

[ QUOTE ]
Perhaps I was simply misunderstanding Harrington's definition of "Strategic Play," and all of this will be covered in Volume 2.

[/ QUOTE ]
I don't recall the exact thread, but I seem to remember Mason (or maybe it was someone else) implying that Volume I was more applicable to early stages of a tournament, while Volume II would be more about the latter stages.

[Lloyd]

In fact, Harrington mentions several times that things like inflection points will be covered in the next volume.

[kevyk]

[ QUOTE ]
In fact, Harrington mentions several times that things like inflection points will be covered in the next volume.


[/ QUOTE ]

I find this totally believable. The material on hand-reading, betting, etc, is so well thought-out that I can't believe that Harrington would neglect the rest. I simply had a different expectation for the book.

[Eclypse]

Okay, at least 3 people in this thread have mentioned "inflection points," but do any of you know what it means?

Because I don't.

[kevyk]

I don't have the book in front of me, but Harrington essentially defines it as a point in a tournament at which proper tournament strategy forces a player to abandon what would otherwise be the correct cash-game tactics.

An example of this would be the point at which the increasing blinds make it correct to play aggressively against a hand which you figure to be beating you and against which you do not have proper odds to draw.

[Eclypse]

[ QUOTE ]
I don't have the book in front of me, but Harrington essentially defines it as a point in a tournament at which proper tournament strategy forces a player to abandon what would otherwise be the correct cash-game tactics.

An example of this would be the point at which the increasing blinds make it correct to play aggressively against a hand which you figure to be beating you and against which you do not have proper odds to draw.

[/ QUOTE ]

Thanks Kev!

I did a search and found a post by Mason that pretty much aggrees with what you say:

"Dan refers to these as "inflection points" a term which is borrowed from economic theory (I believe). I refer to them, since I was once a mathematician, as points of singularity or "eigenvalues." These are spots in tournaments where conventional poker strategy just doesn't apply anymore."