Recommended Poker Books / Poker Software

[Gus Mango Fish]

A recurring question seems to be: Which poker book should I buy?

Therefore, it would seem a good idea to create a sticky featuring books that other players have found to be of use to them.

As well as this, we'll post up recommended poker software (such as hand calculators, trainers and the like - but no bots!).

Please list your favourite poker books and the reason why in this thread, as well as any software that you've found to be useful.

[stew]

Poker players bible by Lou Krieger is a good starter



Stew

[a1056688]

Hand Calculators? Interesting.

E.G Your playing hold em' online. Use the hand calculator to make decisions?

Anyone confirm how easy it is to make money through online Poker after a bit of experience?

[stew]

depends on the stakes your playing i suppose? i know someone who was down 4k after 20 minutes and then turned it around to 18k profit in the next 2 hours

[Gus Mango Fish]

Hand Calculators? Interesting.
E.G Your playing hold em' online. Use the hand calculator to make decisions?

Yeah, there's a few bits of software around that help you make decisions about your hand. Probably the two most widely used are:

Paragon Poker Pal and Texas Calculatem

Both give you the percentage chance of winning a hand with the cards you've got, the chance of improving to other hands after the flop, turn, river; and so on

However, relying on the odds of winning a hand is never enough on it's own. You also have to take into account other people's actions - are they betting heavily because they have a good hand, or are they bluffing? You also have to take into account their previous actions and what they did last time a similar hand was played out. With this added information you have a much better chance than playing the odds themselves.

Poker bots have been written that will use the odds and play the hands for you without any need for your input. Poker bots like Win Hold Em (can't find this anymore though) will even allow you to link 3 or 4 computers together and Team-Play. Imagine a 10 player table where only one human is playing. The 9 other players know what cards each other has and are sharing the same bankroll - a nightmare vision of the online poker future, though I believe this was infact possible in WinHoldEm. However, the A.I. was considered pretty feeble.

Poki-Bot mentioned on this thread will also play the game for you. Poki-Bot is based on the same A.I. as Poki's Poker Academy (though I don't think it is a product they condone you using - rather it uses the same API available from them for a cost), and this is much more advanced. Instead of just using the odds, it also takes into account other players actions, and also attempts to bluff. I've checked the site and it costs $299! So, you'd expect something pretty damn good for this.

It is worth bearing in mind that any site that catches you using a bot - and previous ones have been very easy to detect - will usually immeditely ban you and withold any funds they believe to have been obtained by using the bot.

To get back on topic, I'd recommened you feature the following books:
Super System (or Super System 2) - Doyle Brunson, Internet Texas Hold'em: Winning Strategies from An Internet Pro - Matthew Hilger. These are the only two I've read and found them both to be very useful. Worth noting though that Hilger's book deals only with Limit games.

As for software, I think Texas Calculatem and Paragon Poker Pal seem ethical enough to list. I also use Poker Calculator, a handy little program for giving you the odds of certain hands winning against other specified or random hands. You can also use this as a free alternative to Texas Calculatem and Poker Pal if you are quick enough inputting the hand details.

[Gus Mango Fish]

Just noticed over at the official Poki's Poker Academy Forums that PokiBot is indeed an unofficial product.

They say it has either been hacked from their source code, or is a scam whereby you pay your money and recieve nothing in exchange..

[SlaineMcRoth]

I personally think it's a bad idea to use any program which calculates the odds for you. In live poker you won't have that program with and so now you're stuck. Because of all that use of these programs you'll start to rely on them and not only that you've now still not learned how to quickly calculate odds in your head. Bad practice if you ask me. Then again, there might be people who only ever play online. I just don't know any. But then again I wouldn't now would I? As they never come out of their cave

Books that are highly recommended:

Caro's book of poker tells (old but still well worth reading for the live pokerplayer) by Mike Caro

The theory of poker by David Sklansky

The psychology of poker by Alan N Schoonmaker

And a good book to learn Omaha (consist of practise hands only) is:

How good is your Pot-Limit Omaha? by Stewart Reuben

[7-2offsuit]

I think I've got most of the poker books Amazon stock, but these are my top three tomes at the moment:

• Winning Low-Limit Hold 'em by Lee Jones

• Thursday-Night Poker by Peter Steiner

• The Complete Book of Hold 'em Poker by Gary Carson

and anything by Sklansky

[SteveDude2]

Hi all!

I agree with everyone's book suggestions. It is essential to read as many books as you can if you want to improve your game. Anything by Doyle Brunson or David Sklansky is well worth a read. You have to read them over and over again until it all sinks in and makes sense, and it is always worth keeping an open mind and not following the books to the letter or you will develop a predictable game.

As well as all the aforementioned I would like to recommend a book called Poker Nation by Andy Bellin. It touches on many of the intricacies of Poker, and explains the rules and a basic strategy well, but it also offers a great insight into the world of gambling and people's lifestyles. It shouldn't be bought as a book solely to help you improve your game, as there are better ones out there. But if you want a highly amusing book of gambling tales and fascinating anecdotes, this book is a unique and well worth buying. You won't be disappointed.

[SlaineMcRoth]

Another great book to read is Positively Fifth Street, by James McManus. Again a book which is highly amusing and gives a great insight in the poker world and the whole back story into the Binions casino and all the colorfull people assosiated with it. Well worth a read!

Apperently Shut Up and Deal by Jesse May is a very good book as well, but haven't read it yet. Will update as soon as I've read it