Material recommended for studying and the process of learning
It is a very frequently asked question which poker books and articles are worth reading. In this part of the ebook, we have collected all the sources that we have used to improve our gameplay and find very useful for beginners.
Books
Many experienced poker players say that these are not overly important, but we still think that it is worth starting with some kind of book. You should definitely read at least one basic work on the subject, which gives you a full picture of the game. I tis important to have a basic 'mantra' and background that lies down the main concept.
In order to analyze a hand, many aspects need to be taken into consideration; more than you would think at first glance. If you want to properly analyze hands in forum posts and your own play, you need to be clear with the details of making a decision. If you start with a book that lies down the theoretical basics, you have a better chance that your gameplay will not contain gaps and blanks.
The first book we would recommend is Gettting Started in Hold'em by Ed Miller. If you are just getting familiar with poker and the rules, it is a perfect book to start with.
If you already know the rules and basics, you can continue with Harrington on Hold'em Cash Game I-II. Althoug Harrington's book will not teach you micro limit strategy, it is an essential tool for all players. The knowledge you will later collect from studying poker videos and hand histories will work greatly with this one. We haven't really seen any other that so concisely analyzes every element of poker.
Hand analysis forums
The Rakerace.com forum has a great hand analysis section that is worth reading. Start with this one, for example. If you feel like you have studied enough hands and got to know the customs of posting a hand, feel free to share all of your own hands that gave you a hard time.
Poker Strategy Articles
Along with the hand discussions, it is well worth reading the Poker strategy articles found on our site. These will also help you a lot. The biggest advantage of these articles is that they round up a subject in a short and easy-to-understand manner, and they won't take you long to read. Whenever you have a lunch break or a few minutes of spare time, you can just go through one of them.
In case you got lost concerning which ones to read, here's a short list for you:
The 20 most important features a poker player needs to possess (from PokerGuruBlog.com)
Ryan Fee's 6-max NLHE Poker Ebook (a must for SH players!)
Training videos
DeucesCracked is a reliable source for poker tutorial videos. If you want to improve in SG CG, these series are worth watching (in this order):
- Baby StepsBaby Steps
- From the Ground Up
- Turning the Corner
- The +EVolution of a Poker Player
- Real Life Micro NL-Grinder
- Hand Readers
- Memoirs of a Limidonk
- King for a Day
- King For a Day Part Deux
- Road to Robusto NL
- The Ugly Duckling
- Unconventional Wisdom
- Mathematics of NL Hold'em
- Tool Time
These series consist of about 8 videos each, and each one is about an hour long, so with these you have around 120 hours of poker videos to watch.
2+2 article collection
The poker forum 2+2 offers a huge amount of poker strategy articles and forum threads. This collection features the most important ones. This seems to be a huge amount of information at first glance. Unless you have endless amounts of time or decide to only deal with poker (and if you are just abou to start playing you probably belong to none of these), it will take you at least one, maybe two years to get through all this, and that is when you could probably get up to NL50-NL100. So, in case you didn't know what to study and how to improve, here is the whole list of the things we have studied to become a good player.
The series will soon continue with the fifth part.
