Recommendation please-Harrington on Hold'em

Hey guys,

I play mostly NL Holdem and about 95% of that is cash/ring game based. Would those of you have read HoH recommend the book for cash games too, or is it more tournament focussed?

It's entirely tournament-based. Some of the concepts apply loosely to cash games too, but I'd recommend a book more specialised to the games you play, something like Sklansky/Miller's new NL book.

Very loosely phrased: HoH1 is "tips" and Sklansky/Miller's book is "theory." The Harrington concepts are easy to take in and you will quickly become a better (tournament) NL player from reading them. No-Limit Hold 'em - Theory and Practise is a book that requires a lot of playing to make use of. A LOT. But there's a lot of "oho" and "aha" when reading it, and if you take the time to really study, you'll end up just short of expert play. Loads of experience is the only thing that can carry you the rest of the way, though.

Brilliant. Thanks for that guys.

FP, I was thinking of getting this one, too. Can you explain what you mean here? Why is so much playing needed to implement the book's teachings? What types (without too much detail) of surprises does it have?

NL is such a complex form of poker, and this book doesn't shy away or take shortcuts. When it discusses preflop play, it dissects it. Reading it is not a problem, understanding it while reading it isn't that hard either. But learning it takes quite awhile, or at least it would have for me. I've put my NL game on hold for awhile, because I'm simply having too much fun playing limit to re-focus right now.

A good example of a tricky situation is, for instance, bet sizing. What factors should you consider when betting a decent, but not monster, hand and your opponent either has a draw (or one of several draws, even) or a weaker made hand, or some portion of the time a stronger hand than you. This general concept alone takes 12 pages of the book (explicitly) in the section of "Fundamentals" and is of course then implicitly discussed throughout the text.

The pot size philosophy was quite an eye-opener for me, too, along with how to consider deep stacks.

It's a really, really good book, but while HoH gives immediate payout - just after skimming those books, I was three times the tournament player I was before - this book requires a whole lot of thinking and practise before the concepts will take root properly and you can start to apply them. Some of them are easier than others of course, but you still need to practise. Or I did.

The Super System books is geared more towards cash games so you might want to breeze through the Limit and No limit Hold em sections.

Good thread, I found if you want to apply any of the HoH series to ring games, then the only one to read is vol I, but as FP mentioned above, for exclusive ring game play Slansky is the best. Unfortunately, a lot of the time he is talking about very deep stacked play, more than the usual 100BB MAX buyin on a lot of online sites.

yeah HoH is good reads for tournies but cash games it isnt. Very few lessons can be applied like the sandwich effect and things like continuation bets and probe bets.

Yup, Harrington on Hold Em is the only book I've read so far and it's the reason I'm now a profitable player on cash tables.

I've got the other books on my christmas list, but don't discount Harrington, it's a good read and offers enough general tactical advice to improve your game.

Myx

HoH all Vol. are very good books, mostly for Tournament style but would still be a great read for you IMO. They helped my game out a lot but I mostly play SnG.