Book Review: The NLHE Workbook – Exploiting Regulars

After Let There Be Range and The Pot-Limit Omaha Book – Transitioning From NLHE To PLO, here is DailyVariance’s third ebook, entitled The NLHE Workbook – Exploiting Regulars.

It was written by Tri “SlowHabit” Nguyen (who co-authored all DailyVariance books) with the help of Tom “kingsofcards” Marchese, a strong and successful high-stakes NLHE player.

The book webpage says it will be explained to the readers “why many SSNL/MSNLers fail to reach 5/10NL”. It costs $200, and it is available for $120 as of this writing. The target audience is clearly small and mid-stakes players with good experience, looking for getting ahead of the competition — even if they are already winning at their current stake thanks to good table selection.

The ebook is 119 pages, divided into 13 chapters. The first eleven chapters explain the concepts, and Chapter Twelve (The Exam) contains a full list of sample hands, organized as a quiz so as to put the previous advice into practice.

Chapter One (1 page) is a short introduction, underlining that the purpose of the book is to show how to exploit bad regulars, and avoid being exploited. In other words, what does separate the best players from your current stakes from you and the others?

Chapter Two (6 pages) focuses on hand ranges and more specifically what distinguishes a preflop hand range in a given situation from that of another player. Everybody plays the same “core” range, so to speak, but we all add or suppress some hands to/from this range, at least periodically — that’s why we say some players are tight and some other are loose.

Three ranges are examined in details, for a standard TAG player in the small blind, big blind and under the gun, respectively. For each case, a sample flop is considered, and the number of hands that hit this flop is calculated, each hand being weighed using combinatorics. Further action naturally defines more precisely each range, eg. a check-raise range vs a check-call range on a paired board. When a range betting for value becomes too thin, floating or raising become options you must consider.

Blind vs blind play is also mentioned, in addition to 3bets, 4bets and 5bets in these spots. The UTG range discussion analyzes how the range hits a given flop, what part of it would bet it, and what the equity of a caller would be with a midpair or a connector, facing this range. UTG range is then refined on the turn and the river, since some combinations are going to give up when they meet resistance. Scare cards also change the players’ betting range, especially against regulars; again, it is important to react accordingly and exploit any edge. These are typical spots where one would hem and haw, and often make a wrong decision — this part shows you with maths how you should consider the situation.

These are typical spots where
one would hem and haw
and often make a wrong decision.

Chapter Three (1 page) sort of concludes the previous chapter, but it deserves its own chapter given how important it is. One’s range can be stronger or weaker depending on the situation, and inside this range, some hands are naturally stronger that others. The way you play each part of your range is going to make a huge difference, and that’s what this ebook will help you do, in a nutshell.

Chapter Four (4 pages) deals with a special kind of opponents, the pouncer. It explains how they proceed and how you defend against them, but also how you should incorporate their own weapons into your arsenal. Two examples are provided.

Chapter Five (1 page) is in the same vein, titled “Offense Is The Best Defense”. It warns against the pitfall of excessive pot control, a topic that was discussed in greater details in Let There Be Range.

Chapter Six (5 pages) deals with rang balancing in the aforementioned situations ie. when pot control could be seen a natural choice — or overlooked. Sometimes one’s range looks so strong that keeping betting would fail to extract further value, while paying off better hands.

Chapter Seven (4 pages) analyzes river play based on how what the preflop range was and how it got thinner on each street. Combinatorics are used again to show that some ranges are quite thin, while some others are reasonably wide. There are times when you can shove the river after a 3barrel from your opponent, because so few hands could legitimately call. Conversely, as you move up in stakes, some opponents will shove over your barrels, and you will have to make thin calls so as not to be exploited. Obviously, you must know how your opponent plays, since not everybody uses raw aggression that way (in smaller stakes, this rarely happens).

Several other ways to strengthen one’s range and counter “pouncers” are mentioned. Again, balancing is important, provided you play against good players.

Chapter Eight (3 pages) gives another example of some of these tough river decisions you could face against good, aggressive opponents. As usual, the decisions are based on a study of villain’s range, and how it widens as your opponents can turn some made hands into a bluff.

Chapter Nine (3 pages) briefly discusses overbets, for value or as a bluff. Big bets can make you a more dangerous player if you use them well, but many regulars often do not consider this option — the standard play always appears safer, as said in the book.

Chapter Ten (1 page) talks about small pairs, and what your options are to play them profitably from the blinds. Many players setmine, but it has become clear lately that this is generally not a good choice, so a few better plans are proposed.

Opponent’s range is dissected
and weighed in several river spots;
very interesting exercise.

Chapter Eleven (6 pages) goes through several river spots, explaining how the situation changes with a different river card. This is a very interesting exercise; the opponent’s range is dissected and weighed, depending on his profile, and there are times when it gets too strong while there are other times when it would contain a good deal of bluffs. Yet, an untrained eye could easily fail to see the difference.

Chapter Twelve (78 pages) is The Exam, a quiz with 35 problems and the proposed answers. They illustrate perfectly well the concepts presented earlier, and this is not a pure exercise of learning by rote and mindlessly applying what you have been taught; answers are not obvious, and most readers won’t get “full score” (even though there are no grades or only one “right” answer).

Eventually, some final notes conclude the book (Chapter Thirteen).

Recommended

The NLHE Workbook — Exploiting Regulars is a very practical book, containing a lot of examples, all from the online 6max games most people play. The chapters are concise and the authors go straight to the point, which makes the book quite easy to read. Like other DailyVariance ebooks, the content is not organized as a textbook, but more like a list of important points and concepts, and this suits the workbook format perfectly well.

The content is fairly technical, and it is quite unlikely a small stakes player would not pick something in this book. This is not a book for beginners though, and micro-stakes players should study other material before reading this book profitably. However, a solid NL100-NL200 player will certainly learn a lot, and play better against other regulars. With a $200 price tag, the price-quality ratio is currently pretty competitive and it is a clear buy for the aforementioned audience.

You can find further information on the DailyVariance page about the workbook.

Note: I received a review copy of this book.