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Applications of No-Limit Hold 'em: A Guide to Understanding Theoretically Sound Poker
One of the most daunting moments in a poker player s career occurs when he realizes his knowledge of how to play a specific hand well is incomplete without the additional understanding of how to play every other hand in his range well. This task would be impossible if a player had to actually think about every other hand in his range, but by understanding theoretical sound poker, he can quickly design balanced ranges using the proper bet-sizing while playing.
Applications of No-Limit Hold em teaches theoretical sound poker, and thus the ability to create the bet-sizings and ranges which will beat the better players. The theory in this book is not designed to be complex or abstract, but rather it s intended to be applied immediately producing better overall results.
Many confusing concepts such as overbetting, balancing multiple bet-sizing ranges, donk betting, and check-raising as the preflop raiser are crucial to a player s strategy despite few players implementing them or talking about them. And after reading this book, you should be able to not only conceptually understand these ideas, but also know how to begin incorporating them into your game, and thereby successfully compete against tough opponents.
Applications of No-Limit Hold em teaches theoretical sound poker, and thus the ability to create the bet-sizings and ranges which will beat the better players. The theory in this book is not designed to be complex or abstract, but rather it s intended to be applied immediately producing better overall results.
Many confusing concepts such as overbetting, balancing multiple bet-sizing ranges, donk betting, and check-raising as the preflop raiser are crucial to a player s strategy despite few players implementing them or talking about them. And after reading this book, you should be able to not only conceptually understand these ideas, but also know how to begin incorporating them into your game, and thereby successfully compete against tough opponents.
544 pages, Kindle Edition
First published May 1, 2013
159 people are currently reading
707 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
January 20, 2016
To many novice poker players, this book will be confusing. It's certainly far from an entry-level text. The target audience is more those playing the upper microstakes (and above) online, or somewhere between 2/5 and 5/10 live. The focus is clearly on understanding balance in various spots, but, to his credit, Janda does a good job of outlining that balance is not always necessary, and reminding the reader to take the most profitable line in any given spot. The theory itself contains some errors (mostly corrected in the 2+2 forum thread), but despite that, it's mostly pretty useful and on-point.
With that said, the format of the book is somewhat sub-par. In a lot of places where heavy maths should be footnoted or even contained within an appendix, it is simply reproduced, often in full. This greatly damages the readability of the book, and thus its utility - though it's important to be aware of some of the underlying maths, this certainly is not the case for every single part, and so often the reader is tempted to skip over actually important bits as these are not denoted as such. Further, some points are elaborated on too much, so that one gets bored, while others are skimmed over. It results in a not-very-balanced (pun not intended) coverage of the material.
However, despite this lengthy criticism, it is still quite possibly the best poker book available at the moment (The Mathematics of Poker is also very good), and comes at a far more reasonable price tag than some others, especially considering the theory-based approach of the book will likely give the advice contained therein longevity as it does not pertain so much to a specific state of the games (or, at least, where it does, the assumptions which are made are stated clearly and can be tinkered with to the reader's content). It's a pity that poker books are very rarely well-written; that this is such a good book is perhaps a consequence.
With that said, the format of the book is somewhat sub-par. In a lot of places where heavy maths should be footnoted or even contained within an appendix, it is simply reproduced, often in full. This greatly damages the readability of the book, and thus its utility - though it's important to be aware of some of the underlying maths, this certainly is not the case for every single part, and so often the reader is tempted to skip over actually important bits as these are not denoted as such. Further, some points are elaborated on too much, so that one gets bored, while others are skimmed over. It results in a not-very-balanced (pun not intended) coverage of the material.
However, despite this lengthy criticism, it is still quite possibly the best poker book available at the moment (The Mathematics of Poker is also very good), and comes at a far more reasonable price tag than some others, especially considering the theory-based approach of the book will likely give the advice contained therein longevity as it does not pertain so much to a specific state of the games (or, at least, where it does, the assumptions which are made are stated clearly and can be tinkered with to the reader's content). It's a pity that poker books are very rarely well-written; that this is such a good book is perhaps a consequence.
October 18, 2019
While others have criticized Janda's style of lengthy mathematical justification for every statement of theory he makes, I think it was necessary for a book of this scale. I agree with that sentiment-and often found this book difficult to read through-but digging through the math behind poker allowed me to understand when and why certain plays are profitable, rather than just memorizing vague ideas. Though it has been six years since Applications' first publication, it is still without a doubt the holy grail of poker books for aspiring poker players like myself. Applications will teach you how to be a balanced and unexploitable poker player by making theoretically sound decisions. While this is valuable enough on its own, Janda is quick to acknowledge the value of deviating from a balanced strategy to exploit unbalanced opponents. This makes the book particularly useful for those trying to tackle lower stakes games (again like myself). All in all, Janda deserves tremendous credit for creating such an all-encompassing guide on an incredibly complex game, and I will continue to refer to Applications for years to come.
January 28, 2018
For most of my Poker career I've focused mostly on sit-n-gos and MTTs and not cared too much about sound post-flop play. This book helped me understand how much I was missing regarding post-flop play, how to apply some game theory and got me excited to study and play poker again!
May 2, 2019
This book is ama-a-a-azing. It is now my favourite poker book. I really loved all the math and logical thought processes. The book was dense, which means I'm going to have to read it multiple times. I think that, as I learn more in this game, each new layer of understanding will peel back a new epiphany. I want to buy two copies of this book... One Kindle version so that I can make highlights and see what other readers have highlighted, and one softcover copy that I can mark up the margins and flag different sections for further study and basically take it with me everywhere like a Bible. Fun read for sure. I can see why others recommend it.
June 12, 2019
Too heavily imbedded in mathematics to be a pleasant read for everyone.
Nonetheless, the concepts and the strategies explained are revolutionary and could give you an "edge" at poker tables, if well applied - GTO is definitely worth knowing for non-amateur players.
Personally, I strongly recommend reading the second one to strengthen the theoretical knowledge of the first one.
Nonetheless, the concepts and the strategies explained are revolutionary and could give you an "edge" at poker tables, if well applied - GTO is definitely worth knowing for non-amateur players.
Personally, I strongly recommend reading the second one to strengthen the theoretical knowledge of the first one.
April 7, 2021
The only poker book I would recommend. Not the most pleasant read but, a MUST read if you're a serious player.
January 5, 2022
This is a bit of a weird book to review, because it's both very technical and niche. If you're not interested in poker, or game theory/economics, then the rest of this review probably isn't worth reading. There are some poker books with general life lessons to extract from them - this isn't one of them.
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The book breaks down a game theory approach to poker, and does so at a very high level (though I think I'd recommend Janda's other book over this one). If you are playing "optimally" (from a game theory perspective, also "GTO"), then there is no strategy your opponent can adopt to exploit you.
.
The idea is knowing what is optimal serves as a baseline for play, and then we can make adjustments to exploit opponents we know have leaks.
.
A lot of this (like any GT) is structured around math/equilibriums. For example, if there is a 100$ pot, and your opponent bets 75$ (a fairly standard bet), you have to call/raise roughly 60% of the time (or more) to prevent them from exploiting you by betting any two cards.
.
So, an example of exploiting an opponent would be, if they are folding more than 60% of the time, to just bluff more (or even every hand, if you think they can't adjust).
.
This technical approach also involves not evaluating play in terms of individual hands, but instead looking at the entire -range- of hands you can have in an individual spot. If we know our range, then this idea of "defending 60%" becomes much easier to do in practice.
.
The practice becomes taking all the hands we play from a certain position, and splitting them into ranges that we bet, we check, we call, and we raise. Generally, when we are betting/raising, we want to do so with a polarized range (extremely strong hands and bluffs), and when we are calling we want to do so with a condensed range (medium strength hands/ draws with a little showdown value), while still mixing things up a bit to prevent us from being exploited and also thinking about our opponents ranges. So, not exactly the laypersons poker book lol.
.
The book breaks down a game theory approach to poker, and does so at a very high level (though I think I'd recommend Janda's other book over this one). If you are playing "optimally" (from a game theory perspective, also "GTO"), then there is no strategy your opponent can adopt to exploit you.
.
The idea is knowing what is optimal serves as a baseline for play, and then we can make adjustments to exploit opponents we know have leaks.
.
A lot of this (like any GT) is structured around math/equilibriums. For example, if there is a 100$ pot, and your opponent bets 75$ (a fairly standard bet), you have to call/raise roughly 60% of the time (or more) to prevent them from exploiting you by betting any two cards.
.
So, an example of exploiting an opponent would be, if they are folding more than 60% of the time, to just bluff more (or even every hand, if you think they can't adjust).
.
This technical approach also involves not evaluating play in terms of individual hands, but instead looking at the entire -range- of hands you can have in an individual spot. If we know our range, then this idea of "defending 60%" becomes much easier to do in practice.
.
The practice becomes taking all the hands we play from a certain position, and splitting them into ranges that we bet, we check, we call, and we raise. Generally, when we are betting/raising, we want to do so with a polarized range (extremely strong hands and bluffs), and when we are calling we want to do so with a condensed range (medium strength hands/ draws with a little showdown value), while still mixing things up a bit to prevent us from being exploited and also thinking about our opponents ranges. So, not exactly the laypersons poker book lol.
February 15, 2020
The best poker strategy book I have read. It is theoretical and abstract at timea, but the information is exactly what one needs to build the foundations necessary to be a successful player. I am certain I will be re-reading this over and over.
Why only 4 stars? Far too many mistakes, which can really throw you off as you try to grasp new concepts. Go to the twoplustwo forum thread on this book, the author graciously addresses many questions as well as giving a summary of errors. Before you start reading the book, find this thread and make the corections in the book. It will save you time and angst.
In addition, I felt there were several places where just a bit of clarification would have save me time trying to understand where a statement or number in a calculation came from.
Bottom line though is this is a must read, and I highly recommend it.
Why only 4 stars? Far too many mistakes, which can really throw you off as you try to grasp new concepts. Go to the twoplustwo forum thread on this book, the author graciously addresses many questions as well as giving a summary of errors. Before you start reading the book, find this thread and make the corections in the book. It will save you time and angst.
In addition, I felt there were several places where just a bit of clarification would have save me time trying to understand where a statement or number in a calculation came from.
Bottom line though is this is a must read, and I highly recommend it.
October 16, 2024
Recommended by a good player at BPO Kontenders league that I play in. This is an advanced poker book and I read 1/2 of it got confused about what they were discussing and thought that I needed to read other books to see if I could come back to it and understand it better.
I will write more when I come back to it and finish.
I will write more when I come back to it and finish.
December 26, 2013
Best poker book ever!
May 16, 2017
Simply the best book ever written on no limit, and probably won't be topped until his follow up book. Literally every page is gold if you want to get good at poker
February 28, 2019
Very informative
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews