Why You Lose At Poker by Russell Fox and Scott Harker, a review

Players don't seek out negativity when looking for good poker books, thus a book entitled Why You Lose At Poker may not draw beginning poker readers that, say, Winning Low Limit Hold'Em will.

But Russell Fox and Scott Harker's book falls into that Mark Blade school of blunt honesty that many players struggling with their game really need to read and drill into their heads if they want to improve.  Facing facts, most poker players are losing players, and most lose because they fall into common bad habits, all of which Fox and Harker address at length over 200+ pleasantly written and readable pages in an attempt to bluntly tell readers, "Look, these are the reasons you can't seem to get ahead."

Sixteen chapters each focus on a common leak in both limit and no limit poker.  They hammer:

• bad bluffs in Limit Hold'Em
• bad bets in No Limit Hold’Em
• mechanical errors like mucking winning hands due to a misread. 

Then Fox and Harker move on to Hi/Lo Omaha and Stud in criticizing players who play for half the pot.  They typically elaborate with written accounts of fictional characters playing a hand at the game in question, followed by an explanation of the error acted out.
Fox and Harker also cover typical subjects like:

• playing without a solid bankroll
• playing scared
• not being well-read and informed on correct play
• not selecting the right game
• playing when you don't feel well.

It's counterintuitive for a player aspiring to win to pick up a book called Why You Lose At Poker, but the title shouldn't necessarily scare you away.A lot of the advice is common rhetoric in most poker materials... just not put in as bluntly a prevailing tone as Fox and Harker use in their aptly titled book.

Full Tilt Tournament Strategy Guide, a review

Full Tilt Poker's Tournament Strategy Guide reeks of a gimmicked attempt by the popular online poker site to capitalize on the poker book boom.  But Michael Craig's compilation of poker essays from the site's top pros carries a lot of useful, in some cases groundbreaking material.  Albeit, some of the material also leaves a lot to be desired, remaining too general in scope and adding little more than general ideas and basic tips.

Full Tilt founder Chris Ferguson writes several of the books chapters, and while he throws out a variety of useful ideas, figuring out how to situationally apply his advice is left entirely up to the reader.

In fact, this is a universal theme of the book, just like many other poker books.  A lot of principles and ideas are not too fleshed out, and calling the book a Strategy Guide may be abit misleading, as few of the chapters do much to guide the reader.  It's a lot like telling a lost tourist, "Well, you'll want to follow the signs, and pay attention to landmarks."

As the chapters were written by different perspectives, many of the chapters disagree with material and ideas in previous chapters, and some are written better than others.

• Howard Lederer's chapter on leverage brings forth a neat concept but Lederer never elaborates on concrete principle application of the subject.
• Gavin Smith's ideas on big stack play are so basic that they should be common sense.
• Mike Matusow has a couple of neat ideas in his Omaha Hi-Lo chapter, but the chapter has little more use than a random magazine article.
• Richard Brodie's ideas on sit & go play are covered in far greater depth by other materials (like Colin Moshman's Sit N' Go Strategy).
• The gimmicky textual conversation on Razz between Huck Seed and Ted Forrest doesn't give the reader much of use.
• And Ted Forrest doesn't seem sure himself of what exactly he's discussing in his chapter "(Don't) Pay Like Ted Forrest."

But as weak as some chapters, some of the material has very strong, concrete strategic advice.

Andy Bloch strikes the motherload in his chapter "Play Before The Flop," which goes into great detail on hand selection in No Limit Hold'Em tournaments.  Bloch provides multiple charts that focus on win percentages against particular ranges of hands, plus a chart that provides a framework for the reader to create his own selection of starting hands.  Bloch does provide a sample chart of starting hands, but it's almost an afterthought once he provides the methodology for the reader to create their own.  This chapter alone might be worth the purchase of the book for an aspiring No Limit Hold'Em tournament player, even granted the filler that precedes it.

Other chapters prove useful as well.

• Chris Ferguson puts better work into his No Limit Hold'Em chapter "Play After The Flop" as his examples infer more concrete ideas the reader can cross-apply.
• Phil Gordon's chapter on "Short Stack Play" has some useful, unique ideas.
• Howard Lederer provides great detail on situational strategy in his Limit Hold'Em chapter, though he provides a tight, limited hand selection chart without Bloch's advice on how the reader may frame his own.
• Keith Sexton gives useful, applicable advice on Stud Hi-Lo.

The Full Tilt Tournament Strategy Guide has some useful concepts, but you have to sift through a lot of jumbled, sometimes hollow material to get to the good stuff.  Certain sections may hold enough value to warrant the purchase themselves, but purchasing this book is akin to purchasing an album with a few good songs surrounded by filler tracks.  If the songs are that good, the album's worth getting, but you may pass if you're in it for the collective product.

Bloch's chapter is groundbreaking, and experienced players looking for random ideas to cross-apply to their tournament game may find the book worth their while.  However, if you're looking to play tournament Stud, Omaha, or H.O.R.S.E., you may still be better served learning the hard way: through trial and error at minimal expense.

The cost of this book may not significantly improve your overall game, as once you've read it... true to the context of the book, you're still completely on your own.

Examining software strategic profiles for profitability in a typical 3/6 game

Before proceeding with middle position trials, I wanted to make sure we were using an optimal strategy. I decided to run some preliminary 500K trials on Wilson Turbo Texas Hold'Em using the following profiles:

Conan the Librarian: Typical tight aggressive profile that plays about 18% of hands.
Bret Maverick: The v6.0 Advisor. The software author's optimal Limit Hold'Em strategy as derived from lengthy research.
Nicely Nicely Johnson: Tight aggressive preflop, but plays hands passively postflop, keeping pots as cheap as possible until the big hands hit. I have noted in previous trials that this profile has shown routine, minor profitability in some 3/6 environments.
Gypsy Rose: Tight passive pre, playing the same hands as a typical TAG but rarely raising. Tight aggressive postflop.
Lee Jones Hybrid strategy: Programmed in manually. Preflop strategy is taken from Lee Jones' Winning Low Limit Hold'Em. Postflop strategy is a cautious, relatively passive strategy that avoids aggression without a strong made hand or strong draw.

I simulated 500,000 hands for each profile in a 3/6 Limit Hold'Em game with a 10% $4 max rake and $1 jackpot drop (to simulate typical Seattle area conditions: 10% $3 max rake with a $1-2 jackpot drop) plus a $1 toke for every pot larger than $13 (leaving 2 big bets).

For opponents, I used a set of 8 average profiles, of which two or three were TAG profiles and the remaining profiles a bit loose (35% of hands played) but reasonably thoughtful, with one or two programmed to draw regardless of pot odds (typical of some weak players in low limit games).

To properly simulate a typical, not-as-friendly low limit game, I made sure none of these profiles were particularly loose. I also set the simulator to periodically vary the strategy of these other profiles to mix things up. This table saw an average of 3.8 players to the flop. This is not a friendly game, but the idea is to develop a strategy that can beat a sub-optimal low limit game. Any loose low limit game can be potentially profitable despite the rake, but such conditions aren't frequent, and with the current recession, such conditions will become more rare as fish and dead money disappear.

Profile	Net $ per hand
Conan	-0.12
Maverick	-0.08
Nicely	-0.11
Gypsy	-0.09
Lee Jones	-0.05

As you can see, all these hands post a net loss over 500,000 hands. As experts say in their texts, these tight strategies indeed cannot turn a profit at 3/6 due to the rake and jackpot drop.

All of these strategies have playable hands that lose money at such a 3/6 table. I believed I could improve the profitability of each strategy by eliminating the starting hands that showed a long term loss over several thousand samples. For each strategy, I decided to improve the starting hand requirements using a simple, crude method I examined data the chosen starting hands and noted only the hands that turned a significant profit (more than $0.10 per hand), eliminating the others.

On average, the following hands showed a profit with each profile: Pairs AA-88, AKs-A8s, AKo-AQo, KQs-K10s, QJs, J10s. All other playable hands posted a loss, including small pairs, suited connectors down to 54s, weak suited Aces, suited Kings down to K7s, suited Queens down to Q8s, suited Jacks down to J8s, and unlisted offsuit Broadway hands.

Each profile had its share of limited exceptions: Maverick and Conan profited with AJo and A10o. Maverick turned a profit with KQo. Maverick and Gypsy profited with Q10s, plus Maverick turned a profit with 10-9s. The Lee Jones profile won with 77. Some also turned a loss with the aforementioned profit hands: 88, A9s and K10s were losers for Nicely. Maverick and Nicely turned a loss with 88 and QJs. Granted, some of these losses could also be a factor of how the strategies played these hands preflop: raising with these hands could be a leak, or maybe the hands are played too passively. But we'll examine the strategy for hands later.

For now, I omitted the leak hands for each profile and ran another 500K test with revised starting hand requirements in the same environment. From here, I'm looking for significant improvements in win rate (or in this case, reductions in loss rate). I also cleaned up the strategies: allowing for more limping behind with draw hands such as Axs and small pairs, knowing the postflop strategy would dump them on the flop if a set or flush draw didn't flop. The original strategies, for some reason, didn't exercise this strategy with limpers in front, curious since most times you limp behind, you will see a multiway flop with the implied odds to draw, or flop a big hand that's way ahead, even if you have to call an extra bet when someone raises behind you.

The results are noted along with the original results below:

Profile	Original Net $ per hand	Revised Net $ per hand
Conan	-0.12	-0.02
Maverick	-0.08	-0.02
Nicely	-0.11	-0.08
Gypsy	-0.09	-0.05
Lee Jones	-0.05	-0.04

Again, all profiles showed a net loss, but certain profiles saw significant improvement in profitability potential, while others barely budged.

While the Lee Jones profile showed the least loss originally, an adjustment of the starting hand strategy netted minimal improvement. This is likely because the starting requirements for the Jones profile were tighter originally than the others, so there was minimal room for improvement. The other strategies had relatively loose starting hand requirements, playing weaker suited Kings, Queens and Jacks in middle position, for example. Once the K7s and Q8s hands were ditched, most of the strategies improved quite a bit, though they still posted a loss.

The biggest net improvment came from the Conan profile, which produced the biggest original loss, but immediately improved to tie for the lowest loser with the Maverick profile, the official software advisor, which also saw a significant improvement, though not as great.

Though these starting requirements were deemed optimal by software designers, they also assume games with a minimal rake, while dismissing lesser games as unbeatable. Bob Wilson himself has noted how a relatively higher rake can turn a normally profitable hand into an unprofitable hand, though stronger hands still remain profitable despite it.This leads  me to believe that the key to finding a profitable 3/6 strategy is to take a normal strategy and eliminate lesser drawing hands whose payoffs are reduced by the rake, or at least reduce the circumstances in which they're played to profitable circumstances.

As we see here, by noting the drawing hands that post a loss and eliminating them from the starting strategy, while maintaining a typically solid postflop strategy, you can improve your profitability in games with a relatively high rake.

Now, before we begin trials in middle position, which profile will we use as a strategic baseline? While the Conan profile showed the biggest improvement, I decided to go with the software advisor Maverick. The end profitability was the same, and while it didn't improve as much once the starting strategy was sharpened, it also originated with a small loss rate than the Conan profile. It is also the advisor, which the designers concluded was an optimal strategy, and its solid postflop parameters are fairly similar to the Conan profile, if not nearly the same. And finally, the starting hand selection for the Maverick profile is a bit looser than Conan, which will allow me to run trials for more starting hands directly from the profile, without needing to manually configure a revised profile to test additional hands.

In trials for middle position, late position and the blinds, I will focus on the hand selection for the Maverick profile as our control profile. Later, we'll run tests for the Conan profile in kind, and see if we note any improvements in profit.