Poker Night: Winning at Home, at the Casino, and Beyond

by John Vorhaus

This smart, accessible guide to basic rules, strategy, and insider secrets shows how to win at poker, at home as well as in the casino and online. This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0312334923
• ISBN13: 9780312334925
• Release Date: September 2004
• Publisher: Griffin
• Length: 275 Pages
• Weight: 0.60 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 5.5" x 8.3"

Customer Reviews

Pretty good for the home game player

The book is geared for the home poker game and the goal is to teach you how to cream all your beer-drinking buddies and take their money. The first part of the book is a brief rundown of hand rankings, how to host a game, house rules and then a brief synopsis of the four major games - Draw, Hold 'Em, Omaha and Stud. Then the book goes into strategies for these games with a short section at the end on playing in casinos and going pro. Overall I thought the book was ok and worth the money. I picked up a good dozen or so tips on strategies for playing. I coupled these tips with what I learned in Peter Arnold's "How To Play Poker" and I guess the tips are working because when I play online I win a lot (with play money of course). I liked the section on odds - no complex mathematical equations on calculating odds or memorizing tables of probabilities. Just a simple explanation on how to calculate card odds and then pot odds. I would recommend the book to anyone who buys it. For $14 you can't go wrong. Plus it's funny too - I caught myself laughing out loud a few times at the humor Vorhaus put in the text.

Concise and succint hold 'em strategies.

I've hosted and participated in home games for 15 years, including a hold 'em game the last two. Our games are a lot of fun with a lot of bravado. Now we're sending a player from our table to a WSOP satellite and, since, I want to be the one, I'm looking for a quick study to improve my hold 'em game. This book meets that need well. I've thought about giving it to my poker buddies as a gift . . . but that would be pretty stupid, wouldn't it? I'm on the cusp of knowledge, and do plan to read Brunson, Slansky, Cloutier, Caro, etc. For a quick study, though, those books are a little intimidating. Vorhaus does a good job of explaining odds, pot odds and strategic considerations in hold 'em, including playable hands, how to vary your play in various stages of a tournament and how to play against various types of opponents. It's pretty distilled, which is what makes it a good starting point. There are a handfull of succintly stated useful tips that will improve my play. Now if only I can remember them . . The rest of the book is OK. I suppose if you're just starting out with a home game, there's useful information. The author has some pretty strong biases against crazy games and wild cards; though those are staples of many home games, he chooses to ignore them. And he sums up play in various games nicely with a major piece of advice: FOLD. That's his advice for 7/27 if you don't happen to start quickly with the nut 7. Of course, if you start "playing to win" at some of these home games, it might mark you as an unfun person. He talks about that, too. If you're looking for a compendium of poker variations, especially the whacky varieties, there are other books that offer much more. This book serves as a quick start guide for the casual player just ready to step it up to a more serious level.