The Levels

Learn How All Players Think Through

Their Plays…

By Yadi Javadi
 THE LEVELS

SETTING THE SCENE

This is, quite simply, the greatest strategy book of all time.
Primarily it serves as a step by step study guide for all those who
want to know how to play Poker. If you’re new to the game, this
book will guide you through the fundamental theory which will
enable you to contend with any opponent. If you're a seasoned
professional, here you will find all the defining factors involved
in an exploitative poker decision.

This book teaches you how to think through poker plays.

It teaches you how all players think through their poker plays.
Knowing how your opponent’s thinks through their plays is
ludicrously beneficial, especially if they don’t know it
themselves. This will give you a huge advantage at the poker
tables, it will make you wods of cash, your confidence will soar
and yet still it’s not the best thing about this book -
The most beneficial thing any strategist can learn is how to use
this thought-process for themselves.

This strategic method has been evolving for billions of years to

become perfect in almost every way. It’s the most effective
decision making-process for use in any game. It’s perfectly
efficient, and all comprehendable strategies can be derived from
it. In this revolutionary strategy guide, what I have done, is map
out the strategic capabilities of the mind.

Meticulous care has been afforded to the layout of this content.

YADI JAVADI

Each concept is introduced to you in the order that the mind

naturally evolved the ability to conceive it. This encourages the
mind to quickly accept the poker theory maximising the speed of
your development as a player.

I also teach you the correct order to consider each factor when
making your poker decisions. By extension, you will learn, step
by step, how to think through any strategic decision.

In short; this is the holy grail.

It’s time to say bye-bye to Poker theorists like Sklansky. Times
have changed. I give to you the true secret to mastering the game
of Poker and indeed any game of life.

No-Limit Holdem (two cards for each player) is among the

simplest forms of Poker, it's also the most popular version of the
game and has always been my game of choice; hence, I use it here
to illustrate the theories and concepts of The Levels.
Enjoy, embrace, expand and prosper…
 THE LEVELS

TABLE OF CONTENTS

SETTING THE SCENE .................................................................. i

THE INNOCENT GAME ................................................................. 1
THE PROFESSIONAL POKER PLAYER ....................................... 4
THE MASTER ................................................................................12
INTRODUCING THE LEVELS ......................................................16
DEFINING A GAME ......................................................................20
COGNITIVE DISSONANCE ..........................................................22
ADVANCING THROUGH THE LEVELS ......................................25
TIME ...............................................................................................29
LEVEL ONE ..................................................................................31
OUR CARDS ..................................................................................36
THE BOARD ..................................................................................40
OUR POSITION..............................................................................44
OUR CHIPS ....................................................................................46
OUR BODY/EMOTIONS ...............................................................49
LEVEL TWO .................................................................................55
THE VILLAIN’S RANGE...............................................................59
HIS BOARD....................................................................................64
ADDING THE CHIPS .....................................................................68
IMPLIED PROFITS ........................................................................71
THE EASIEST WAY ......................................................................73
THE VILLAIN’S BODY/EMOTIONS ............................................76
LEVEL THREE .............................................................................79
OUR PERCEIVED RANGE ............................................................88
BLUFFING .....................................................................................92
YADI JAVADI

PRE-ADJUSTING .......................................................................... 95
BET-SIZING................................................................................. 102
THE STANDARD PLAY MODEL ............................................... 106
OUR PERCEIVED BODY/EMOTIONS ....................................... 112
LEVEL FOUR ............................................................................. 114
LEVEL FIVE............................................................................... 121
THE FAMOUS CONTINUATION BET ...................................... 126
LEVEL INFINITY ...................................................................... 130
ONE LAST THEORY ................................................................... 139
ABOUT THE AUTHOR… ........................................................... 145
 THE LEVELS

THE INNOCENT GAME

The famous poker theorist, David Sklansky, started his illustrious

theory book by describing how beautiful Poker is. He wrote that;
"On the surface it is a game of utter simplicity, yet beneath the
surface it is profound, rich and full of subtlety".
Over the last 30 years his book has sold millions of copies. his
theories have been adopted by an entire generation of poker
players and his name has been written into legend.
I myself once thought his work was excellent. But to my own
surprise, I've come to realise that the old legend had absolutely no
idea what he was talking about.
His fundamental strategy book was fundamentally wrong.
Poker is not some beautiful game that fell from the heavens. And
nor was it forged in the fires of hell. If I had to come up with an
analogy, I would say that Poker came from the mud.
It is clearly a dirty game. It's a gambling game where you make
money by tricking people into giving you their cash. This game is
diabolical.
But it isn’t all bad. Poker truly is a game of skill. It really is very
similar to a sport.
The players don't use many of their physical attributes but we do
use all of our mental attributes - Bravery, confidence, accuracy,
creativity, moral. All of these are important to a poker player and
will be developed whenever you play.
Brain training is great, but the thing I like most about this game is
that you don't need to be Einstein to play it amazingly well.
You don’t need to be a mathematical genius to make a killing at
the tables. And nor do you need to read facial expressions like
some kind of Marvel hero.
All you really need is to have a good head on your shoulders.
And that, right there, is the key to Sklansky's biggest mistake.
YADI JAVADI

That "beauty" he wrote about didn’t belong to Poker. That subtle,

rich and ingenious thing he described, that wasn't Poker...
… It was the mind!
In actual fact – Poker is nothing but a lucratively simple card
game played using the mind.
It provides us with a platform on which our minds can compete.

The only things that really belong to Poker are its rules
The same is true of all games.
Learning a games rules is usually very easy and takes only a few
moments. Once learnt, we will usually feel as though we know
how to play, but, there are many things the rules don’t tell us.
They don't tell us when to bet nor how much to bet. They won't
tell us when we need to fold. Rules don't teach us how to
strategize.
Once we’ve learnt the rules to any type of game, we humans are
able to strategize without even noticing that we're making any
kind of calculation. Making strategic decisions, like betting, often
seems effortless. It seems as-though there’s nothing to it.
We don’t notice, but deep in the darkest recesses of our mind there
is a very specific process taking place.
When we memorise a game's rules, our subconscious mind
secretly assimilates the conditions into a formula which is then
used as a framework for making rational decisions. It's this
natural, built in, universal strategic formula, this framework for
rational decision-making, that enables we humans to strategize.
And so, if you want to know exactly how to play a game, you need
to understand not only it's rules but also this diaphanous formula.

Understanding this formula, along with the rational-thought

process it provides, could be the key to understanding
everything. But, unfortunately, the mind won’t give up its
secrets without a fight
Your mind knows all your strengths and understands all your
weaknesses. It knows if you’re sensitive to vanity, anger or fear.
 THE LEVELS

Your subconscious will often exploit these weaknesses in an

attempt to convince you to avoid its secret formula.
Luckily, if you're not too familiar with Poker you should feel little
or no side-effects whilst considering the logic here. If I have done
my job well you should find the concepts in this book insightful
and will walk away knowing exactly how everyone thinks
through their poker plays.
For the professional poker players it will be different.
The second an experienced player hears about this content their
own mind will become their very own perfect enemy.
They will do anything and everything to discredit this logic in a
desperate attempt to keep themselves from accepting this simple
formula.
Some of them will say that the formula is obvious and that
everyone already understands it.
Others will say it’s way too complicated and is clearly nonsense.
Some will discredit the logic by attacking me with sly pokes.
Some will probably attack you if you ever dare mention that you
like this stuff.
Dealing with these people is never a pleasant experience, and nor
is it very easy. They are often formidable opponents.
Professional poker players usually have highly developed minds
that they've trained for many, many years.

To play Poker is to submit yourself to an assault of emotions

as win-streaks pound you to-and-fro
This toughens you up.
Your mind becomes a rock.
It's important to make sure that you don't leave your foot under
that rock, for, soon enough, a challenger will step onto the mud in
front of you.
YADI JAVADI

THE PROFESSIONAL POKER PLAYER

Professional poker players have been subject to many stereotypes

over the years.
First they were portrayed as cowboys in name and nature,
tricksters who risked their life on every turn of the card.
Next came the casino high-roller, spending his days lounging
around Vegas in Armani dinner jackets.
And more recently we have seen the rise of the intellectuals.

Many characteristics of the cowboy are prized by today's

professionals yet there are few who would risk their entire
bankroll in one night let alone one hand
Die-hard cowboys do still exist and always will, but they're not
the professionals.
They're usually untrained players who support their play with an
alternative income source.
They often converge in local casinos or in online tournaments
where the skill level is low.
Although capable of true greatness, these players gain very little
experience which usually leaves them outmatched.

Professional casino players are still around but they’re

sparser than ever
In most countries there are only a handful of these guys to be
found.
Making a healthy living at the casino requires lots of money and
so these guys do often drive suave cars and live the easy life.
They do often spend their days being waited on by Swedish
models in stylish hotels.
They even develop the stone-cold faces and callous confidence
you see in the movies.
 THE LEVELS

These “James Bond” style players never really went anywhere.

They were overtaken.

With the birth of the internet everybody became capable of

playing Poker at any time of day from the comfort of their
home
Professionals realised that they could play multiple tables which
multiplied their income.
They purchased software which improved their play.
Teachers and coaches learned to stream live lessons.
Smaller bankrolls reaped higher rewards.
The sheer number of people with access to the internet allowed
for much larger tournament prize pools.
All of a sudden the internet became the preferable place to both
learn and play this game.
The ability to read expressions became a minor factor. The
professional players learnt to read statistics instead.
Swedish massages were replaced by sore backs.
With inflated winnings and artificial assistance, becoming a
professional had become a lot easier. All that's needed nowadays
is a basic computer, an interest in games, and some small ability
with numbers.

Internet players have many advantages over casino players.

It wasn’t long before they began outmatching their casino
counterparts
Casino players will only play around 30 hands an hour, but an
internet player usually plays around 400.
A casino player who plays full-time will see around 60k hands a
year. An internet player sees close to a million. All of which are
assessed, analysed and recorded within their software.
The additional experience gained by playing on the internet is
valuable, but the software helps a lot too.
Tracking software feeds all the information it gathers on each
player back to the user in the form of statistics on a live HUD to
YADI JAVADI

aid the player whilst they sit at the tables.

Many other types of program are available too. Most of them act
as training tools, some are priceless, others are worth less than
nothing.
The best way to keep an eye on the ever-changing world of Poker
is by visiting online poker forums.
Lots of information can be learned on competitive forums.
When players with different styles come together to discuss
different theories the pool of information generated can be
invaluable.

Being able to consistently make money playing a game is the

defining factor which converts a player into a professional
Every professional poker player nowadays knows roughly which
games they can beat and how much money they will make per
hour on average at their tables.
Their profit and loss estimates are usually remarkably accurate
which makes it reasonably easy for them to enter into staking
agreements, which many do.
Lots of pro players hop from one casino to another chasing down
the easiest opponents. After selecting a casino they'll then hop
from table to table as they search out the exact seat which will be
most profitable for them.
These guys know that the weaker players give them more money.
They know that they'll make a better hourly wage if they're sat
with less skilled opponents and so they search them out.
Other pro's will find one good seat at one good casino and spend
the rest of their life taking money from the same opponents.
Others will play at the most difficult web-sites in a proud attempt
to gain recognition.

All professionals know that certain types of game yield a more

regular income than others
Ring games offer a more stable income, while tournament
winnings are more irregular.
 THE LEVELS

Omaha is irregular, Holdem steadier.

Information like this is very important to a professional player
because these people are just like everyone else.
They need to pay their bills!
Players who can only beat the smallest stakes will often find that
it's a constant struggle to stay ahead of their rent. These guys will
often grind hard for long shifts over many days.
Once capable of winning in medium stakes games, players
become fully aware of the freedom this profession allows. With
only a laptop and an internet connection they can make a very
healthy living with very little effort. You’ll find these guys sat in
cafes on beach fronts all over the world.
High stakes games are hard to find. Which means that the high
stakes players are usually restricted to the biggest websites or
biggest casinos. These players often travel a lot, following the
biggest competitions.
Not all professional players have irregular lifestyles, many have
families and use poker to provide a regular income. Even more
use their profits as a part time income whilst they work in other
professions or study at university.

Professional poker players are not all geniuses

It’s a misconception to think you need super human powers to
play Poker well. Anyone can learn the game and win.
In fact, “ordinary” people even get picked up by poker scouts
(there aren’t many of these around, but they do exist, and they do
go around headhunting for the best players to win for them).
A poker scout isn't specifically looking for mathematicians or
academics. First of all they look for hard-workers. They need their
players to be level headed individuals, down to earth people. They
need to be brave and/or open-minded people.
Remember that it's our mental attributes that we'll be using to both
learn and play this game. Things like bravery, confidence, moral
and stamina all come into play.
Math ability does help a little, but there are very few sums and so
YADI JAVADI

you will pick them up very quickly.

If you’re currently working for minimum wage at a

corporation that you care little about, I certainly would not
advise you to quit and put all your money on the poker tables
My advice for you is to put a tiny amount of money on the
cheapest and easiest tables and get your head around the logic in
this book.
As you become proficient, you'll start to win. You'll then have the
money to move up to higher and more difficult games.
Slowly but surely, you'll build up money. You’ll build a stack.
Once you start winning regularly you can choose whether or not
to enter into a staking agreement. From this point onwards, you
won’t need any money at all.
Staking companies will pick you up and take all your risk away
but they do also take a cut of your profits. Using staking
companies is often be worthwhile if you can find a deal to suit
you. They often come with coaching programs which can be
useful. But they will usually force you to play a certain number of
games/hands per week too, which can be annoying.
I started my professional career on a staking agreement and within
the first year I’d bought my own stack. I personally found it was
far more comfortable to use my own money. There was less
pressure, not more. And I got to take home all my profit too. But
each to their own.
If you’re able to apply half of the information in this book you’ll
never need to work any job you didn’t want ever again. You’ll be
able to make a career from Poker without needing to commit
much capital, if any.
If you fully understand everything in this book you can do
whatever you like.

Poker is a game played using the mind. If you'd like to develop

or make money from your mind, then Poker is a great way to
do it
 THE LEVELS

At the poker tables, you don't have to wait for your boss to give
you the promotion you deserve.
If you're good, you win.
If you're better, you win more.
Poker is not a strict task master, you can work or study the game
whenever you like.
It's for everyone and anyone.
From time to time I’m teaching my young daughter how to play.
When she's 18 I expect that she’ll be able to make as much money
as she'll ever need by sitting in front of her computer whenever
she likes.
I don’t know why everyone’s not doing it…
Well... I suppose I do...

There is obviously always a chance that we will lose

This isn't much of a worry for a professional player, but for an
untrained player the uncertainty can be daunting.
I don’t blame them. Everyones heard stories about some
unprofessional player who lost their family home playing Poker.
Some people let games like this ruin their entire lives.
Some people have even died because of Poker.
The Pro's don’t have some magic trick which grants them
immunity to losing in this luck based game. Profession players do
lose, and often too. They just know that the money always comes
back. They will only play with a specific portion of their bankroll
to ensure that they always have enough money behind to cover
their losses.
If some disaster does befall a professional, they simply move
down to cheaper games and go back to building a stack.
Losing does still sting as you get better and better at the game.
This can make Poker a very uncomfortable profession. Over time
the downs don’t affect you so much but losing money still hurts
the best of them (even though they won’t admit it!).
The professional doesn’t expect to win every day, many don't
expect to win every month.
YADI JAVADI

The very best player in the world will know that there’s a chance
he could make no profit after tens of thousands of hands.
Professional players are constantly coaching themselves into not
caring about these large expected losses. Pro’s consciously aim
not to be results-orientated, they try to concentrate on the correct
factors at all times. Whether they’re winning or losing, rejoicing
or crying, they know they must keep their mind on the cards.

Ultra-high stakes players seen on TV do obviously exist but I

deliberately haven’t spoken about them
Once you find yourself famous your career changes dramatically.
The TV player will not be searching out better tables and planning
their hourly earnings. Instead, he or she might spend their time
preparing themselves for some interview or article.
I'm not taking anything away from these players. Some of them
look like they might well be better than me at the tables. It’s just
that their career is somewhat alien to that of the “regulars.”
Every Reg will dream of reaching a final table in a major event
and thus gaining fame, fortune and a sponsorship deal.
But even the best of them know that they have little chance in
such large, rare and expensive competitions.
To enter these £10,000 per ticket tournaments, most Regs
wouldn’t feel safe unless they were sat on at least £500k.
Most Regs won’t ever be able to afford those games.

Professional players sit at the tables they can afford to and

play against a group of players that they can usually beat
Sometimes they push for higher, more expensive and more
difficult tables.
Poker players are not all daredevils, and most have never been to
Vegas. They’re not all chasing massive jackpots.
The vast majority of regular players will spend their days sat at
their computer as they grind away at their profession so as to earn
the money they require to live.
Someday, after a few years, when they have enough capital
 THE LEVELS

behind them to enter major events, they are sure to start taking
shots at the biggest tournaments.
And, sooner or later, they know they'll win.
YADI JAVADI

THE MASTER
In this book I deliberately teach as few strategies and plays as
possible. I concentrate only on the theory behind the plays, which
enables you to design your own strategies and plays. The perfect
master would be able to comprehend all strategies, all plays, all
opponents and they would understand all the theory.
I can teach you how to play, I can teach you the theory, but to
master this game all of your mental attributes will come into play.
If you're a creative person you will find it easy to concoct abstract
plays for extra profit. If you’re brave, you will make it difficult
for your opponents to bully you with aggressive plays. If you have
a great memory, you’ll find it easy to remember all the strategies
and plays you’ve witnessed.
Poker is just a game that uses the mind. The better the mind, the
better the player.

To master Poker is to master the mind

Throughout history there has been an endless number of
individuals who have developed our understanding of the mind
and its different abilities.
The first name that jumps out at me is the famous Greek
philosopher Socrates. He famously said:
“The only thing we can be certain of is that we cannot be certain
of anything.”
Plato studied alongside this great man and has highlighted many
truths about the mental processes that we're all subject to.
Many a military general has helped us develop our understanding
of the mind by showing us our strategic capabilities.
Countless artists have tuned into the mind to toy with our
perception of everything.
I’d bet that all the greats would be amazing at the poker tables. All
 THE LEVELS

of them seem to have gotten close to mastering the mind.

To truly master the mind appears to be impossible, however, there
is one guy out there who might well have pulled it off... Somebody
I haven’t mentioned yet...

2500 years ago there was a man called Siddhartha Gautama

who understood the mind and its capabilities unbelievably
clearly
This man claimed to have completely unlocked his own mind, and
in doing so, claimed to have gained access to all knowledge.
Quite a bold statement wouldn’t you say?
Surely it couldn’t be true… Right?
This is from Einstein –
“According to general relativity, the concept of space detached
from any physical content does not exist.”
And here is Siddhartha describing the same thing –
“If there is only empty space, with no suns nor planets in it, then
space loses its substantiality.”
Huh! How could he know that?
There are hundreds of these unbelievable quotes from this dude.
Here’s another –
“All such notions as causation, succession, atoms, primary
elements...are all figments of the imagination and
manifestations of the mind.”
How the hell did this guy know what an atom was!?!
He lived 500 years before Jesus was born yet he clearly
understood specific facts regarding quantum physics. How could
that be?
It doesn't stop there...
He described the development of a baby whilst inside the womb.
He described the expansion of the universe. And he also said
thousands of things about the mind.
This dude didn’t have a laser guided microscope, and nor did he
perform any crude experiments on pregnant women. He said that
the way he learnt all these ridiculous things was by sitting under
a tree and meditating.
YADI JAVADI

Once his mind was perfectly calm and therefore free from all
emotional interference, he claims to have unlocked his true
cognitive capabilities which go way beyond anything that we've
learned through science.
He also said that each and every one of us is capable of acquiring
this same mental state.
He then spent his life explaining how we'd go about it.
He explained how to develop concentration.

This man truly is the master

He's been revered by millions upon millions of people since he
lived.
There are countless statues depicting his image.
Everybody’s heard of him.
When he acquired this perfect mind, he left his old name behind.
He said that he was no longer Siddhartha.
He said that he had become a Buddha.

Scientists have always revered his teachings, but most of us

common folk disregard his lessons before even hearing what
he said
This is partially due to our own arrogance, but I place most of the
blame on the way religions have been used as a method of control
over thousands of years, killing and maiming millions of people
whilst demanding blind obedience to logic which doesn’t often
make sense.
Buddhism is not like other religions.
Buddhism makes sense of the other religions.
The Buddhists don’t say things like, “abstain from lusty thoughts
or you will burn in hell for all eternity!” they say that if we do
lust after things we will find it more difficult to concentrate. Our
mind would be clouded. This clouded mind could then lead us
down dark paths.
The primary reason for all Buddha’s lessons was to help us
develop concentration so that we too could reach the same state
as he.
 THE LEVELS

His lessons were often surreal, making the translations hard to

comprehend, but, once deciphered it's often a surprise to find that
he did seem to make a great deal of sense.

I don’t fully understand what he was trying to explain

But I do see the value in developing our concentration. For Poker
players it is huge. If we can concentrate on the correct factors
when we're sat at the poker tables we can't go far wrong.
If we cannot concentrate on the correct factors at the tables, we
can quite often ruin our entire poker career.
In this book I will teach you those factors. I'll teach you all the
things that you need to think about while making a Poker decision.
But if you can't concentrate on the correct factors whilst playing
you will still struggle.
Meditation is an exercise Buddha said is certain to improve your
ability to concentrate and it is quite easy to do – you simply centre
your awareness on any one thing, and then when your mind
wanders, you bring it back. Meditation. Simple. You just train
yourself to stay on topic. You practice concentrating.
Yoga has very similar origins to meditation and it helps a lot with
concentration too. As does keeping a healthy diet. Or being nice.
There are all kinds of ways to improve your ability to concentrate.

If you want to understand how to develop any of your mental

attributes then Buddha's lessons are the place to go
In this book all that I really do is explain how to use the mind to
play a simple game. Buddha described how to use the mind in life.
He described the mind in general.
I'm still delving into his stuff myself, but from what I see so far,
his lessons seem to match up to the logic I describe scarily well.
YADI JAVADI

INTRODUCING THE LEVELS

All strategic decisions are broken down using the Levels.
When a boxer fakes with his left and follows with his right, he's
using the Levels.
When a tennis player screams as she blasts the ball to the back of
the court, she's using the Levels.
When a shopkeeper raises the price on his most popular product,
he’s using the Levels.
When the Chinese built their wall they did so in accordance with
those same Levels.
The Levels are followed by parents as they punish their children.
They're embraced by the nurse who stays at her patient’s bedside.
They are that which leads to lions having claws.
The Levels don't belong to any one particular game; they belong
to the mind. They make up the formula that we use to strategize
through all our decisions.

Professional poker players are making tens of thousands of

strategic decisions every day
I calculate that whilst playing online I personally make one
strategic decision every two seconds or so. Under these conditions
it's not difficult to see the importance in understanding the
decision-making process itself.
While others around me were busy memorizing more and more
complex plays, I was sat in the sun considering the simplest of
situations so that I could figure out the generic logic behind all
plays. Without realising it, I had begun mapping out the decision-
making process for Poker, and soon enough, all I could see was
the Levels.

The concept of these Levels in relation to Poker is well known

 THE LEVELS

They were named the Levels of Thought and are acknowledged as

a fundamental component of a style called exploitative.
Many years ago, while grinding away at the poker tables, I found
a strange pattern within the Levels of Thought. I noticed that when
we are making our decisions, the Levels need to be considered in
a specific order. This meant there was a specific order to consider
all the different factors for every exploitative poker decision.
All that I needed to do was match up each individual poker factor
to its proper Level and I would have the formula for creating
exploitative plays.
It looked so easy.

Finding that pattern in the Levels of Thought was like finding

the first numbers on a Sudoku board
One thing led to another, and then crashed into another, and
before I knew it I found myself gazing at the boundaries
surrounding all comprehendible strategies.
All I was trying to do was find the most efficient way to think
through a Poker decision! I was not trying to find the way we
think through all decisions!!
This came as a massive surprise to me.
I do not mind admitting that I am ‘under-qualified’ to write a book
on a topic as broad as this. I’m just a normal guy who happened
to be open-minded enough to embrace new ideas and concepts
while working away at my profession.
I am not much of an academic, I'm not a scientist, a psychologist
or a mathematician. I’m just a poker player. I’m a poker player
well out of his depth.
I honestly wish I could’ve had some help with this content. I tried
to get help…

After stumbling on way more than I'd bargained for, I set

about validating my theories with my peers
I found it ridiculously hard to get any coherent contributions from
any other poker players. Almost everyone I spoke with
aggressively rejected the logic stating many weak and contrasting
YADI JAVADI

reasons for doing so. If they couldn’t find a single word out of
place with the logic, they would mock me and then walk away.
The other Regs didn't help me like I ‘d hoped. Instead, they have
hindered me at every step.
I'm sure there are some players out there who could have aided
me in deciphering these Levels, but as I write this now there are
only a handful of people on the planet who know how to play at
Level Four. If I could have spent a few months with a few of these
guys then I’m sure my work would have taken a fraction of the
time that it did, but these fabled players are hard to find at the best
of times. I had to work on this by myself.
Eventually I found a great editor who knew nothing of Poker and
with his help I created this book.

This book was completed independently and my budget was

very small
But who cares! By organising poker theory into the Levels of
thought I have managed to map out the strategic capabilities of
the mind.
I’ve tested it countless times, it’s stood up against all manner of
assaults, and now I’m ready for the world to see.
I am ready to introduce you to; The Levels of the Mind.

• Level One – Level One relates to our real, physical

strength in the game.

• Level Two – Relates to our opponent’s strength: At this

Level we compare our strength to the opponents before
deciding what to do with ourselves.

• Level Three – Relates to our perceived strength: Using

this Level we decieve our opponents to gain control over
their actions.

• Level Four – The opponent, the “villain’s”, perceived

strength: Using this Level we counter the opponents
 THE LEVELS

attempts to decieve/control us. (This is the last Level you

need to learn).

• Level Five – In many ways Level Five doesn’t exist, but

the strategies we use at this Level do still change. Level
Five is used to double bluff.

• Level Infinity – is not like the others; it’s commonly

known as G.T.O. Game Theory Optimal. The unbeatable
strategy…

Each subsequent Level contains all the factors from all the
previous Levels.
It grows like a pyramid being built from the top down.
The later the Level, the more information there is to consider for
it also contains all the logic from all the Levels before it.
But don’t let that put you off
Once you start to take it all in you will soon understand each Level
quite easily. It really isn’t rocket science.
I promise that it will all come naturally to you. Believe it or not,
you can already use all The Levels like a master.
YADI JAVADI

DEFINING A GAME
A game is defined as –
"A competitive sport or activity played according to rules."
There are only two requirements for any activity to be a game.
It must be competitive, which means that it must have some kind
of goal.
It must also have rules.
That's all.
The common understanding of a game is an activity or sport
which has rules that have been deliberately made for that specific
game by some person. Games like Football, Monopoly, or jigsaw
puzzles, all have specific rules and goals concocted by a person.
The Levels do not exclusively work on games that have been
deliberately created, they cater for every situation which has rules
and goals

When we start to consider rules like gravity or "Thou shalt

not steal", it's clear that every situation we might find
ourselves in has rules
Throughout our day to day lives we are quietly bound by many
such rules. All of which are stacked on top of each other in our
minds.
Exactly the same is true of goals. If we had no goal then we
wouldn't get out of bed. We wouldn't have gone to bed in the first
place.
Every action we make works in-line with both goals and rules
whether we notice them or not.
All decisions are made using them both but usually we’re not
aware of the fundamentality of their existence in our minds.

Rules and goals are vital to all strategic decisions

 THE LEVELS

From them we define the very first factors in the coming formula,
and from those first factors come everything else. Without rules
and goals this coming formula would have no structure. No shape.
No purpose.
Without rules or goals the entire universe would have no
substance. Rules give us that which is physical in nature, and
goals give us all that is, for lack of a better word, spiritual.
Together, they give shape to everything.
They are at the forefront of all our happiness and our sadness.
They are everywhere, which means that everything can be
considered as a game.

… If anyone ever tells you that “life isn't a game” you're free to
explain all that to them if you like, but, that is exactly the kind of
information many minds will reject…
YADI JAVADI

COGNITIVE DISSONANCE
We humans habitually meander through life making all kinds of
strategic decisions without giving any thought to the thought
processes that allow us to achieve these truly amazing feats.
We're perfectly happy to leave all the work to our ever-loyal
subconscious mind.

Throughout our day to day lives the subconscious mind uses

the Levels to strategize for us
We innocently throw in information and the subconscious
carefully stores away the knowledge in its proper place.
We feed in problems and the subconscious uses the Levels to
show us our different solutions.
The subconscious usually takes care of this stuff for us, to make
our lives easier.
If we do decide at some point that we want to consider our
strategic thought process, as standard, the subconscious instantly
grants us conscious access to whichever part of the formula we
like.
Consciously recognising factors related to the Levels, as standard,
is not a problem.

The problems in accessing this information only arises

because we, consciously, have control of our own minds, and,
in our ignorance, we make mistakes
If we learn any game whilst unaware of the minds strategic
method, it’s very likely that we will accidentally build trust in
strategies that do not work in line with it.
We’ll begin to trust in strategies that conflict with our natural
strategic formula.
This conflicting knowledge then initiates something called
 THE LEVELS

cognitive dissonance.
Cognitive dissonance is a reasonably well-known term which
describes a negative feeling experienced by a person who holds
multiple contrary views at the same time while confronted with
information which conflicts with one of their beliefs.
It is also well known that the person would actively attempt to
avoid situations or information likely to increase this negative
feeling.
In short, when a person has learnt to trust in strategies or plays
before understanding their own natural strategic thought-process,
their own mind is likely to protect the strategies by stopping the
person from understanding their own strategic thought-process.

The more trust we place in conflicting strategies/plays for a

game, the more aggressively the subconscious will covertly
dissuade us from recognising its all-important formula for
that specific game by making us feel, in some way, bad
And that is exactly why experienced poker players will struggle
so much with this book.
If we've been building trust in knowledge of imperfect Poker
plays our mind will protect the knowledge by stopping us from
seeing how we calculate Poker plays.
If we trust that there is a specific way to act at the dinner table,
our mind will make it difficult for us to understand the reasons
why we act in that way in that situation.
If anyone or anything ever challenges our impure trust in any way
our mind will reject the information. We’ll experience a wave of
emotion as our subconscious mind uses our negative
characteristics to distract our conscious mind. This distracts us
from seeing the true reasons for our own actions to protect the
imperfect play that we taught our subconscious to trust.

Throughout our lives we are all subject to the same kind of

feelings, the same mental states
Is it just a coincidence that not a single one of us consciously
understands the reason why we’re alive? None of us are aware of
YADI JAVADI

the reason why we are playing this game of life.

I suspect that our own minds are blocking our ability to see
information like this. I suspect that happens because of all the trust
we’ve placed in all the knowledge we’ve gathered regarding all
strategies throughout our entire lives.
I suspect that if we were perfectly open-minded, we probably
would be able to understand the meaning of life, we’d probably
be able to strategize perfectly, and I even suspect that we would
not experience any negative mental states.
But we all went to school. We’ve all memorised all kinds of
strategies. We trust in lessons from our parents and many peers.
We’ve all learnt loads, and loads, and loads of plays that may or
may not work in line with the Levels.

All of that matches up perfectly to what I learnt through

Buddhism
If I understand Buddha correctly, he does say that not all strategic
knowledge is bad for us.
He says that there is a kind of pure, perfect knowledge, a type of
knowledge which we can place our trust in that will not hinder
our ability to strategize. He described it as ‘right knowledge’.
He said that the second we consciously come to understand all of
this right knowledge we will see how life works and then all our
negative emotions will disappear as we are granted a feeling of
enlightenment.
 THE LEVELS

ADVANCING THROUGH THE LEVELS

We develop our understanding of our game by becoming aware
of the Levels one by one.
We are able to learn individual aspects of a Level before
completely understanding the last, but in general, we advance
through the Levels by breaking through our cognitive dissonance
to unlock them in chronological order.
In the instant you come to recognise all the key aspects of a new
Level you will suddenly feel that you now know your game.
In this moment of realisation you're granted a feeling that can only
be described as enlightenment. From that moment onwards it
appears as though a veil is lifted, you can see everything more
clearly. Your game time becomes much more enjoyable.
It really does feel like you're a video game character who's just
killed his hundredth zombie. You do seem to Level up. You feel
stronger. You are stronger.
In one glorious moment you see everything about the game more
clearly and you win more too.

Unfortunately, every time we break through to a new Level,

due to feeling that we now know the game, we will usually
reinstate the trust in the knowledge which made the last Level
advancement difficult
Beginners can sidestep this problem easily by pushing
themselves, or coaches can push their students, through the Levels
quickly without allowing time to settle at a specific Level until all
have been consciously grasped.
In this way all the Levels can often be learned in a matter of
minutes.

If you’re a beginner, please do be aware that understanding

YADI JAVADI

the Levels is not quite the same as being aware of them for
every decision
For a little while after you grasp them in relation to your own
game you'll probably have to keep reminding yourself of each
while actively playing.
But don’t worry, provided you recognise their importance for
every decision, you'll notice them lodged in the back of your mind
in no time.
Developing an unconscious grasp of these Levels is very, very
easy once you consciously register them.
Remember, you already know all these Levels. All of us are
proficient in their use. We use them all day, every day.
So, we don’t really need to learn them.
We just need to notice them.

Advancing through Levels One and Infinity is slightly

different to the others
You won’t feel a wave of euphoria when you recognise Level
Infinity, which does seem to make sense to me and I think it will
to you too.
And Level One is learned in stages rather than all in one go. We
unveil the different sections of Level One as we come to recognise
the higher Levels.
The first time we feel we know Level One is when we first learn
the rules to a game. At this stage of our development we do still
use all the higher Levels subconsciously. We call this acting on
instinct which isn’t the worst way to play. I think a vegan snake
charmer might do quite well in todays games using only their
subconscious, but realistically; We need to develop our conscious
ability to recognise these Levels before we can make precise
decisions.

Without any conflicting knowledge related to Poker dragging

them down it's clear to me that a completely untrained player
is far more capable of making, say, a Level Three poker play,
than an experienced player who only consciously recognises
 THE LEVELS

Level Two
The only reason beginners haven't been obliterating Level Two
players is because the knowledge the experienced player gathers
isn’t all bad. It might be imperfect, but it is usually a long way
from being completely inaccurate.
As I write this now, most Level Two players will have already
learned almost every Level Three factor at least as well as I will
describe them. They will also have learned all the Level Two
theory and many, many strategies and plays.
It's not what they know that's their real problem, it's what they
don’t know. They must be missing one key piece of theory from
Level Three or else they would have cracked the Level.
The knowledge of strategies and plays they have gathered whilst
only being consciously aware of Level Two is making it difficult
for them to approach these missing pieces of theory.
Cognitive dissonance attacks.

The amount of trust in conflicting knowledge related to our

game determines both the difficulty of each Level
advancement as well as the intensity of the enlightened feeling
Beginners reading this book will find it easy to recognise the
factors relating to any Level, but they'll only feel a slight wave of
euphoria after fully cracking each one. It won’t seem like a big
deal.
Experienced professionals will usually struggle to approach any
factor from a higher level than that which they are currently
aware, but, the instant they come to accept a new level they are
likely to feel elated.
The benefits are relative too; as a knowledgeable player advances
they’ll learn the real reason behind all the knowledge that they've
previously memorised. They'll suddenly understand everything
they know better which often makes a huge difference.
Beginners won't really know a great deal to begin with, and so
instead of a massive and sudden improvement, when a beginner
learns a new Level they'll have attained the correct foundations
on which they can come to learn, or concoct, specific strategies or
YADI JAVADI

plays for their game.

If you're an experienced player who suspects you may not be

the highest Level of player then fear not
In this book I've separated all the key pieces of poker theory,
given them their own chapter and placed them in their proper
Level.
In a way it’s very easy for you to pinpoint the exact chapter your
mind rejects, but if for whatever reason you can’t find it, there is
another technique you can try:
A great way for an experienced player to break through to a higher
Level is to write out an individual play, one individual decision,
ensuring that all the information is organised correctly (as I
describe later in the book in the chapter entitled “The Standard
Play Model”).
While organising your own play on the page you unwittingly
organise your own thought process and then the Levels are
magically revealed.
If you collect many of these perfectly written out plays, please do
put them together into a playbook and send it through to me. I'll
be happy to help you publish your work.
Now that the standard play model has been established all Regs
can put together their own playbooks. This is an excellent way for
all of us to give something back to the Poker community whilst
gaining recognition as well as a passive income.
 THE LEVELS

TIME
Time, the element of change, provides the building blocks which
make up the Levels of the mind.
It seems to me like there should be a Level Zero in which there is
only time because the past, the present, and the future are
represented in each section of each Level.
Time is everything here.
In a way, the only reason the coming formula exists is to help
us make sense of time
To help us make sense of changes.

The past dictates our present situation, but if we considered it

properly during it's time then we wouldn’t need to consider it in
the present.
The future is used to calculate improvements to our present
situation. If it’s considered carefully then the present is expected
before it appears and so little consideration is needed regarding
our present situation either.
If we're capable of contemplating the future perfectly accurately
we'd never have to calculate either the past nor present ever again.

The past, the present and the future are used in the same way
for all decisions
We don't simply think, "I want cake."
Instead, by using the past we're able to recognise our present
situation, "What was that feeling I just felt? Ah yes. I am hungry".
Then we consider our future situation after either eating or not
eating the cake.
We recognise that we wouldn't be hungry if we ate the cake, that
our present situation would become more positive once we have
a bite, and so we delve in.
YADI JAVADI

Some of us look further into the future and decide that if we eat it
we will get floppy ankles or clogged arteries. We might then
conclude that this future would not be worth the satisfaction
gained from eating the delicacy and so might decide against that
option.
We might decide to make a different play.

Day to day calculations like this are usually completed

subconsciously
We can watch our thought process as it happens if we want, but
strangely, we don’t usually bother. We don't usually watch the
engine, we just drive the car.
The conscious mind is more than this formula alone. It's like an
awareness, an awareness that wields an all-encompassing power.
This formula acts as a filter that we use to make sense of the
changes that happen to the six things that we're aware of:
Sights, sounds, feelings, smells, tastes and thoughts.
We make sense of everything using this formula so that we can
see what we might do to make changes of our own.

There is one other time that has a place within every Level.
It's called the future-present
The future-present becomes very important as the Levels
progress. It relates to the instances when we'll have a chance to
make a further decision in the future.
Most games operate in real time and so we make decisions
constantly. Even in these games the future and the future-present
represent different factors.
Any change in circumstance possible in the future gives us reason
to reconsider our condition and decision after the changes have
materialised.
We consider our next move, and the move after that.
 THE LEVELS

LEVEL ONE

Level One contains our real, physical presence within the game

Level One is a sum of all the physical factors that belong to us in

our game.
This Level can be understood very easily – if it belongs to us, is a
part of the game and is a real thing, it's a Level One factor.
Our chess pieces are our Level One self in chess.
Our feet in football.
Our hands in boxing.
Our subconscious makes Level One appear to be very straight-
forward - we simply think about what is ours in the game and our
subconscious shows us our Level One self.

At first glance Level One seems simple

But when I try to think through the details I can feel that cloudy
confusion signalling to me that I’m missing something.
I do understand how this Level works regarding Poker, but I don’t
YADI JAVADI

fully understand how it works in general.

This is the Level that merges all games with all Levels. This is the
one Level that rules them all. I suspect that if you could find all
the laws that govern Level One you would find the laws that
govern all things.
This first Level is all about the self, which means that to write this
introduction perfectly I’d need to describe the boundaries of our
own self.
What we truly are.
At first glance this does appear to be a simple question but it is
not!
When I was a teenager my father asked me, “Is your hand a part
of you?” I laughed prematurely for then he continued; “What
makes it a part of you?”
At first I said that it was mine because I could control it and so he
pushed it aside. Then I said it was a part of me because it was
attached to my body and so he grabbed it.
Ever since that day I’ve been trying to solve Level One, I’ve been
trying to find the laws that govern the self.

Level One consists of all the things that we can use to help us
win in our specific game
In some ways the entire universe is a Level One factor, as
everything contributes in some way towards our winning.
The Sun, for example, is very important to every game on the
planet. If we weren’t using its light we wouldn't find ourselves
winning very many Poker hands.
We could say that the Sun is a part of this overall thing that we
call ourselves, but the Sun is also a pretty irrelevant variable to
consider during a poker decision.
At Level One of the decision-making process our mind needs only
deduce the relevant factors from the 3D world that we can use to
help us reach our goal.

It appears to be the rules that we use to deduce these relevant

physical attributes
 THE LEVELS

When we acknowledge rules to a game like Poker, we're teaching

our subconscious which restrictions it needs to apply to its
understanding of our physical self to comply with the individual
game’s specific conditions.
Here are two examples to help you understand what I’m saying –
1. In life we're aware that we can move anywhere on the planet.
The whole planet is ours!
But when we follow the rules to Football, we learn that we can
only move around the pitch. The only part of the 3D world which
the mind deems relevant for this game is the grassy pitch.
Our mind simply restricts our physical capacity in coordination
with the rules to the game.
2. As we go through our day to day lives, we're free to make
decisions whenever we like, but in Poker the rules state that we
must wait until it’s our turn.
Again, we restrict our physical capabilities in coordination with
the rules to the game.
Every time we learn a rule, whether we're learning a new job or
how to deal with a specific person, our mind always restricts our
understanding of our physical self to enable us to strategize as
efficiently as possible in that specific game.

Poker is a very simple game so when we come to deduce our

relevant physical attributes, we need not worry about much
The weather won't have an effect on our winnings.
We don’t need to worry about our teammates, nor our colleagues.
The fitness of our pectoral muscles isn’t important either.
The only physical attributes that we need to consider, the only
things that contribute towards us achieving our goal in this game,
are a handful of cards, a stack of chips, and a seat.
These three things make up our Level One self in Poker.
And so, to learn Level One for Poker, all you need to learn is the
qualities of these three attributes.

Once you’ve established an understanding of your physical

attributes for any game, to complete this formula you must
YADI JAVADI

then re-visit each attribute from a new perspective at each

new Level, considering the attribute in the past, the present,
the future and the future-present at each Level.

Cards, chips and a seat are the physical things that we use to
play Poker
It’s only because we can use them that they become part of our
self in this game. This leads me to thinking that it’s actually the
control that we have over the physical attribute that gives the
physical thing a place in the formula.
So, the rules allow for manoeuvrability, and it’s from the
manoeuvrability that the mind derives our relevant physical self.
In a game like football the rules allow for many manoeuvres
enabling us to use many physical attributes. Provided we're on the
pitch we can run, stop, jump, kick the ball, step over the ball, the
list goes on and on. To make these manoeuvres we need to use
our whole body and so the entire body becomes a Level One
factor when playing football.

In Poker, there are only three things that we can do with our
self at any given time – we can bet, we can check, or we can
fold
At the higher Levels we learn how to make these manoeuvres. So,
from a Level One perspective, without the higher levels, we'd
have no concept of these three actions. From a Level One
perspective, without atleast a subconscious understanding of the
higher Levels, our three options wouldn't exist. There would be
only the potential for manoeuvres.
Does this mean that the 3d world we perceive contains nothing
more than potential? And that any substance we see is just a
manifestation of the mind as it tries to make sense of all the things
that could have happened in the past to make us who we think we
are today?
This seems about right. And it seems to match up to what Buddha
and Einstein were saying. But this is all well beyond me…
 THE LEVELS

It's very difficult for anyone to be sure of what Level One

would look like without the higher Levels
The higher Levels are built into our subconscious and we have to
use them whether we'd like to or not. If the subconscious were not
taking care of those higher levels for us, we would have no
concept of anything.
There are objects in the universe that observe things from a Level
One perspective - Things like rocks, minerals, atoms and such.
A rock’s reasoning is non-existent and it abides in the universe
only as a physical presence within a set of rules.
Rocks exist only at Level One.
YADI JAVADI

OUR CARDS
As we advance through the Levels we learn how to use our
attributes, like our cards. At Level One we only need to learn how
strong are they are in relation to all that they could be.
The strength of Level One attributes is very important to every
game. Without some kind of value, our attributes would never be
better than the opponents and so we would never be able to win.
Every encounter would end in a draw.
If some of our cards weren't stronger than others, or, if we deemed
all things of equal value, then none of our deliberations would
have any purpose, we could reach no goal, and so we’d have no
need for this thought-process.
In this chapter I'm not going to explain the basic hand strengths
for the sake of the readers who are not planning on playing this
game. I won’t explain which hands beat which, but if you need to
know then please do look it up.

To teach you the strength of the cards, I do need to explain

how often the different hands will appear
In Holdem each player is given two cards.
We need to learn how often we will hold A, A.
How often we will hold 2, 3.
I won’t be filling your mind with confusing sums and useless
figures regarding the thousands of combinations of cards we
could have.
Instead, I'll show you using percentages how often you will see
each type of hand.
I find this is by far the easiest way to understand the probability
of a hand arriving and it will also teach you to read a HUD on
Poker-tracking software.
 THE LEVELS

This is how often each hand appears in a full range –

Pocket Pairs appear 0.35% of the time each.

Non-Pocket Pairs appear around 1.2% of the time, and, from the
Non-Pocket Pairs, Suited Cards appear 0.3% of the time
YADI JAVADI

If we then come to guess what a range of cards containing the top

3% of hands might look like, we can do it reasonably easily -

JJ+ ~1.4%
AK ~1.2%
AQs ~ 0.3%

Together, these hands add up to, approximately, a 3% range.

When you come to play it is very important to understand

roughly which hands the different size ranges will consist of
You need to be able to picture roughly what a 20% range might
 THE LEVELS

look like.
You need to be able to imagine roughly what a 50% range might
look like.
You don’t need to be accurate. Your math doesn’t need to be
perfect. You just need a rough idea of the hands these ranges
could consist of.
This is very easy to learn and will probably only take you a few
minutes to grasp. If you do struggle to visualise ramges of cards,
there are apps/programs that make it even easier. Try playing
around with an equity calculator like Equilab for a few minutes
and you’ll get the hand of it.
When we consider how future changes will affect the strength of
our cards the sum does become a little more complicated, but not
a great deal more so.

Step 1 - Learn the strength of your hand

by learning where it stands in a full range
of possible hands
YADI JAVADI

THE BOARD
In Holdem, after receiving our two cards, and after everyone has
had an opportunity to bet, extra cards are placed in the middle of
the table for all players to use.
These extra cards are called the board.
The board is a shared attribute in Poker. All players can use these
cards to strengthen their hand.
Shared attributes like this are common in all games.
I'm talking about the monopoly board or the football pitch.
Perhaps the most important shared attribute in this day and age,
in a general sense, is the customer.

To understand the true strength of our hand we need to know

how strong it will be once the future has come about
We need to use a sum to guess the probability of a board coming
that will make our hand stronger.

Let me start by explaining this sum at the end of a hand when

the equation is at its most basic:
If we're on the fourth shared card, known as the Turn, we will
only have one future card left to come (The river).
At this point we've seen six of the total seven cards that we can
use to make our hand.
There are only 46 cards left in the deck and each has an equal
chance of arriving.
We can easily surmise that there's a 1 in 46 chance of seeing each
remaining card. We then use this information to calculate how
often we would see a card which strengthens our hand. For
example -

Our Cards =
 THE LEVELS

Shared Cards (Turn) =

In this situation, there are 9 hearts left in the deck which would
lead to us hitting a flush.
There are a total of 45 cards left, and so we have a 9 in 45 chance
of hitting our heart.
45 divided by 9, gives us a 1 in 5 chance of hitting our flush.
In this situation, we also have a chance of hitting a straight.
This adds an extra 6 outs which would improve our hand.
Meaning that we now have a total of 15 from 46 cards which
would improve us.
Around a 1 in 3 chance of hitting our card.
We might also consider how often we hit a single pair and add
that to the equation in the same way.

Now, let’s take the situation back a step and see how it looks
with only three shared cards revealed. This stage is known as
the flop –

Our Cards =
YADI JAVADI

Shared Cards (Flop) =

This time we have two cards still to come so we need to add a

little to our calculation.
To keep it simple, we can just double the number of outs as we
now have two chances to hit the cards.
I'd now say that we'd hit either the flush or a straight a little less
than 2/3 of the time.

When we step back to the very start of the hand, back when we
only have our original two cards (pre-flop), the same sum starts
to become far too complicated to calculate in real-time.
This round of betting is known as pre-flop.
At this stage, there are still five shared cards to come which
equates to around 250 million different possible futures.
There is no simple way to work out the future strength of our five-
card hand when faced with such an equation. But at this stage we
don’t really need to calculate it anyway, and so I wouldn’t worry
about it much. Provided you understand how well your two-card
hand stands up against the others you’ll be fine.
If you do want to build up an understanding of how strong your
 THE LEVELS

preflop hand is likely to become, then by all means do look up

different ‘flop frequencies’ just to give you an idea of how often
the different boards will appear.
There is lots of software which can help you learn this. Equilab is
a great program that you can download for free to your PC, and
there are also apps you can get for your phone. These programmes
will show you the exact strength of your hand and its exact chance
of improving to beat your opponent.

Step 2 - Learn how strong your hand will

become in the future
YADI JAVADI

OUR POSITION
One of the rules in Poker states that we're not allowed to take any
action until it's our turn. This rule gives birth to a lesser attribute
which is usually hidden to beginners:
Our seat, or, our position.
In Poker, the last person to act during any round of betting holds
an advantage. This advantage exists mostly because they are able
to see what everyone else does before making their own decision.
By gaining some idea of the strength of the opponent’s hands the
player in position is stronger, which enables them to play more
hands more profitably than they could if they had to act before
their opponent, which we call being out of position.

The most advantageous seat in Poker, the strongest seat, is

known as the Button
If we're sat on the Button; during the pre-flop stage of the hand
we're in a late position and on the flop, the turn and the river we're
the very last person to act.
Imagine we're sat on the Button pre-flop, and then every player
who acted before us has a weak hand and so folds.
When we look to our left we'd see that there are only two players
left in the pot, both of whom will act before us on the next three
streets of betting.
This already sounds good but it gets better.
The players with the worst seats are forced to put money in the
pot before they even see their cards.
They have to put in the blinds.
These two players could still hold the worst cards possible and so
the chips which they have already committed to the pot might well
be free money for us to steal.
 THE LEVELS

Having a better position helps us in other ways too

The most beneficial of these seems to be the additional control we
have over the size of the pot.
If we're the last person to act then we get to choose whether to
make a bet which will enable everybody to raise it up before we
see the next card.
Or, more importantly, we get to choose not to give everybody a
chance to raise before seeing more shared cards.
If we're worried that a player who didn’t bet might be planning to
raise our bet, we can simply not bet.
Not only doesn’t our opponent have a chance to raise us until the
next street (flop, turn or river), he also misses out on one entire
round of betting which can drastically reduce the eventual size of
the pot.

When you come to explore your options after learning all the
Levels you’ll be able to recognise many different places where
position offers an advantage
Position is a reasonably simple factor in poker, but it's also very
important, even at the highest Levels.

Step 3 - Learn which seats are stronger

than others. The stronger your seat, the
weaker your hand needs to be.
YADI JAVADI

OUR CHIPS
Chips are the most important attribute a poker player has in his
possession.
Even if we’re holding the best hand and sitting in the best seat, it
won't help us much if we only have one chip left.
The strength, or the value of these chips is obvious. The more
chips we have, the more valuable they are, and so, the stronger we
are.
If we have lots of chips then we become more dangerous.
If we find ourselves with no chips the game is over.
Gaining chips is our primary goal for this game.

Every attribute exists to aid us in winning chips

Whichever cards we play and however we choose to play them,
we do so for the chips.
If we did not see a potential to make chips then we'd give up on
our hand. We'd fold.
Technically speaking, the sole reason we make a play in this day
and age would be to make cold hard cash. Which does make a
slight difference while attempting to win a specific prize in a
tournament, but in general, chips represent the prize that we stand
to win or lose.
In Poker, the chips are the only attribute which can be transferred
between players. We can win them from our opponent or we can
lose them to our opponent.
As Level One is all about ourselves without the consideration of
an opponent, there is very little to say about our chips in this
section. Most of the stuff related to them is only unveiled at the
higher Levels.

The Level One rules in relation to chips are simple:

 THE LEVELS

• The chips allow us to take one of three options – we can

bet/raise, check/call, or fold.

• When a hand reaches its conclusion, the strongest hand

takes the chips.

At any given time we won’t have more than three main options
available. However, to understand our potential capabilities in
their entirety we also need to take into consideration future
opportunities to make plays.
We then find that there are potentially loads of different lines that
we might take. There are loads of combinations of moves we can
make.
Reg’s have names for most of these lines. For Instance: A
continuation bet is when you continue to bet the flop after
betting/raising pre-flop. A donk is when you call pre-flop, and
then lead out with a bet on the flop before anyone else has a
chance to act.
Once you reach the higher Levels you will be able to see the
reasons taking these lines, but here at Level One you just need to
understand that these plays exist. All we need to understand here
at Level One is that we manoeuvre in Poker by making three basic
types of play: We attack with a bet/raise, we defend with a fold,
or make the neutral check/call.
It is good to become familiar with more complex lines, but before
looking at any strategies in any depth it’s important that you
understand all the Levels.

At the end of each hand, as well as the victor taking the

winnings, the casino takes a share of the pot in the form of the
rake
This rake is usually a percentage of the pot but the casino might
take an hourly fee from each player instead. In tournaments the
casino usually takes an initial entry fee from the players which
doesn't interfere with their chip stacks.
YADI JAVADI

Regardless of the method the casino opts for, it's vital that a
professional player ensures that the casino’s rake does not exceed
their own potential profit figures.
We players are essentially sharing the profits with the casino. If
the casino is taking too large a cut then there won’t be any profits
left for us. If, on the other hand, the casino is taking a smaller cut,
we will make more money.

Step 4 – Learn your potential

manoeuvres. (In poker this is easy.
You’ve basically just done it).
 THE LEVELS

OUR BODY/EMOTIONS
Our body is something we can use a little at the poker tables,
and so it is among our Level One attributes
There is more room to use the body if we’re playing live games
rather than online, but the whole body does come into play either
way, if only very little.
Things like facial expressions are important. Our heartrate. Our
body language.
The value of these attributes seems to come from how well we
can control them. How well we can control our heart-rate, or our
facial expressions.
If we are not in control of these attributes, we risk losing lots of
money at the poker tables.

The way I see it; The body is lorded-over by emotions. If we

gain control of our emotions, we take control of not only our
body but also our mind
Before studying Buddhist logic, I hadn’t clarified the difference
between cleverness and wisdom:
Cleverness is the ability to solve problems.
At any given time, this ability can be hindered by the emotions
that we're feeling.
If we're crazed with anger, we won’t be thinking clearly so will
find it difficult to solve our problems.
If we're overjoyed, we won’t be thinking clearly either.
The more the emotion affects us the less clever we become. And
so:
Wisdom is the ability to be unaffected by emotions.
We could separate ourselves from our emotions by ignoring them.
We could use discipline to overcome them, forcing our mind to
think through our decisions in an organized manner.
YADI JAVADI

Or we might embrace our emotions and use them to drive us

forward.

Through playing Poker I've certainly increased my

proficiency with these three techniques
I often separate my emotions from my plays; I might feel bad after
losing but that’s got nothing to do with my next move.
I often force myself to think through each Level properly
regardless of how distressed I may become. (This is very valuable
in the early days).
Then there are the times when I embrace the rage and play using
the dark side. If a player is annoying me, I study him, enabling me
to compose a more detailed strategy so as to obliterate him.
Each of these techniques works for me but I'm sure there are
millions of other ways to control your emotions.
We're all subject to these feelings throughout our day to day lives
and we all have our own ways to overcome them. Perhaps you
want to squeeze stress balls, or maybe you can find some way to
take it out on your best buddy.
Regardless of how you choose to do it, controlling your emotions
will often make the difference between becoming a winner in this
game or going home a loser.

My brother has been running a free poker boot camp-style

school for many years. I drop in from time to time to offer
assistance in his online lessons
Throughout the years I've glimpsed hundreds of beginners’ eager
to become professionals but unfortunately the majority of these
people have now failed.
The reason they fail isn't usually because they aren’t clever
enough to do the job, it isn’t because they lack training or
opportunity.
The reason they fail is almost always because they cannot handle
the inevitable emotional strain.
They fall prey to something we call tilt.
Tilt happens when your mind becomes incapable of thinking
 THE LEVELS

through game-related problems rationally.

You lose your concentration due to emotional distress.
If a player is unconfident in their ability, they will tilt often when
the luck factor in the game goes against them.
If a player is overconfident in their ability, they will tilt when the
opponent out-plays them.
If a player becomes angry, hateful or scared easily, they will tilt
often too.
If the player is suffering from cognitive dissonance due to facing
higher Level plays or opponents, tilt will follow them like a
shadow.

Regardless of the emotional issue that caused the problem,

once a person stops thinking rationally while playing any
game they will usually lose
These new losses then magnify the emotional turmoil of tilt and
the player will find themselves in an even deeper hole which quite
often leads to the end of their career.
To contend with this a poker player needs to be well aware that
we will all lose in this game very often regardless of our skill
level.
To win $100,000 profit, we'd have to lose approximately $2
million!
We wouldn’t actually need 2 million to make 100k profit. We're
winning and losing hand after hand all day long and so we'd only
need a few thousand in our bankroll if we're playing online.
Tilt does often prevent players achieving this sort of profit, but tilt
isn’t quite as bad as it seems.

If we’re playing a physical game then we expect to develop

our physical self by straining through training
It would hurt, but we'd continue on regardless because we'd know
that we're getting fitter and more capable of playing.
Poker is much the same but most players don’t see it. Instead of
grinding on through the pain, many give in.
If we are able to work our way around these emotional assaults
YADI JAVADI

we learn far more than how to play Poker better.

We learn how to keep our head while under an emotional assault.
We learn about our emotions and how to deal with them.
We learn to concentrate better.
We become wiser.

I’ve come to realize that every negative feeling that induces

tilt has one thing in common: they're all caused by a lack of
understanding
The angry player can't understand why things have gone against
him, he feels hard done by and so turns to rage. The player who
despairs doesn't realize that the future will become brighter and
so turns to fear. The arrogant player blames everyone else for his
losses and so falls out with his coach or starts presuming that
everyone’s cheating.
These negative emotional states would have all been avoided if
these people consciously understood how to strategize properly.
Which makes me think that all mental discomfort could well be
caused by this same confliction in the mind!

In Buddha’s eyes, ignorance is the primary cause of all our

emotional distress.
He says that if we understand our problems, they will cease to be
problems.

The best way I know to contend with tilt in Poker, is to

understand all the Levels for Poker
It's certainly not a perfect solution to all our emotional problems
at the tables, but learning this formula and the associated thought-
process does help massively.
If we know the Levels and then do make a mistake that leads to
us losing, we’re able to see exactly what we did wrong so won’t
do it so easily next time.

In the same way that negative emotions cause tilt, positive

emotions help defend against it
 THE LEVELS

If you're a loving person you will feel happy for your opponent
when he gets lucky and beats you.
If you're brave you will face your losses with a wry smile.
If you’re confident you'll be aware that you're doing well
regardless of your result.
Unfortunately, almost all positive emotions do still cloud your
mind in a similar way to the negative ones.
They won’t make you give up and go back to a menial profession
but at any given moment they do seem to interfere with your
logical thought process at the tables.
They interfere with your concentration.
The safest way to play is to stay calm. Whether you’re
currently winning or losing, regardless of the game you're
playing, you must remain wise.

My understanding of Level One is way more advanced than

any other poker theorists, but these advancements have
shown me just how much we’re missing
Poker theorists before me will tell you that “Level One players
are only aware of their cards”. These theorists haven’t even
realised that chips come in at Level One. They haven’t realised
that all players have the subconscious ability to use all the Levels.
There are many exploitative factors in this book that is new to the
learned players in the poker world.
I understand this Level more clearly than Poker players before
me, but Buddhist monks will probably know way more about the
self than I do. Buddha seemed to have fully cracked it.
He said that it’s a beings wrong understanding of itself that causes
it to be distressed. He seemed to say that our entire understanding
of Level One is incorrect at its root. He described the entire idea
of a ‘self’ as an illusion. He said that there is no such thing as a
self, neither having a self, nor not having a self. He said that the
whole concept of a ‘self’ is imagined and that this
misunderstanding is a prerequisite for all our emotions. (Except
the peaceful compassionate loving feeling you experience upon
acquiring perfect concentration).
YADI JAVADI

It does seem to me like he solved Level One, but I do not fully

understand how it works in line with everything I have explained
in this section of the book.
Perhaps the truth is that we have power over nothing, and once
we notice, we will enter a state of emotional bliss. Or perhaps we
will realise that there are no rules that bind us, and that we have
power over everything. Perhaps both of things are true. Or neither.
If I had to guess I would say that there are two sets of Level One
laws. There are the physical laws which gives us rules and
attributes, these always appear to be lorded over by the spiritual
laws which gives us goals and manoeuvres. Somehow it appears
as though these two combine to make all that we perceive.
… But I do not know!
I’ve explained Level One in as much detail as I can. For many
reasons this was by far the most difficult section of the book for
me to write.
From now on the topic moves much closer to my beloved game.
I’ll now be able to start describing the thought-process itself. Up
until now all you have had to do is learn the qualities of your
attributes. From now on, I’ll be teaching you what you need to
consider during your decisions.
For at Level Two, the mind awakens.
 THE LEVELS

LEVEL TWO

Level Two relates to our opponent, the “Villain”

At Level Two in Poker we become aware of the opponent. We

become aware of his physical attributes.
In Poker, Level Two is all about our opponent, but for this
formula to work the opponent could be replaced be any object or
any factor regarding anything that exists.
I haven't found anything that we can't consider in place of our
opponent.
We can feed allies into this mental calculator.
We can consider our environment or any situation.
We can consider any attribute of any object too.

The opponent, or the object being considered, is represented

YADI JAVADI

by the square in the diagram

It is our understanding of the opponent that is represented by the
distorted square.
The circle, if you hadn’t guessed, represents us.

To understand the opponent, we need to consider the strength

of his attributes
We need to consider the strength of his hand and the amount of
chips that he holds.
To make a Level Two decision we then compare his strength to
ours and make the play that will lead to us winning.
We weigh up the strength of his attributes against the strength of
ours and select a manoeuvre that will lead to us making the most
chips.
Comparing the strength of attributes and predicting winnings is
reasonably easy in a game like Poker.
All we need to do is look at our two cards and we'll know which
of the opponent's hands we beat. We look to the chips and see how
much we might make.
In other games this is not usually so straightforward. We can’t say
for sure whether a football player’s stamina is more important
than his opponent's speed.
For games like this you need to concoct your own values for the
attributes before you’re able to consider whether or not you are
going to reach your goal.

In Poker, there is only one factor which stops us from being

able to calculate our winnings perfectly accurately
There is only one factor in this game which is unknown to us...
The villain's cards
Any hidden attribute in any game brings with it an impossible
sum. We can only guess as to its real value.
We can only guess as to the strength of the villain’s cards.

At Level Two it is only our understanding of our opponent

 THE LEVELS

This effect is displayed in the diagram by the red arrows.

These arrows indicate the path of causality from the opponent to
ourselves: The path of cause and effect.
If we think that the opponent's cards are stronger than ours, at
Level Two, we’re able to fold.
If we're in a fight and see that the opponent has aimed a punch to
our head, at Level Two, we're able to move out of the way.
At Level Two we are able to react to our opponent.
This enables us to defend.

It's only now that we start to learn what to do with ourselves,

and so it stands to reason that once a being is capable of Level
Two it can start to learn what to do with itself
To be capable of making a Level Two decision the being would
first need to be capable of perception, which is not all that easy a
skill for a rock to develop.
It would also need to learn how to compare its own strength to
that of its opponents, which means that it would have to learn how
to utilise feelings and emotions to separate the value of its own
attributes from those belonging to its environment. The Level
Two being might then feel terror upon seeing an opponent that is
clearly stronger than itself, or it might have to clash horns before
it’s instincts can inform him who is the stronger.
The ability to do all this would develop over millions of years as
the being slowly learns how to best contend with all that nature
can throw at it.
The being would steadily evolve, gathering information and
learning strategies with only one thing on its mind: Making
decisions based on knowledge gained from past experience.

Fortunately, we humans already did all of that

When we play Poker we're already aware of the strength of our
cards, which is Level One.
We're already aware of the person sat across the table from us,
which is Level Two.
To some degree of accuracy, we even know the Level Two
YADI JAVADI

calculations which enable us to compare ourselves to the

opponent, guess our expected profits, and select a manoeuvre.
This gives us a pretty awesome ability.
If you don’t care too much about accuracy and can’t be bothered
to learn any of the calculations for Poker, you can still play Poker
at Level Two pretty happily provided you keep one thing on your
mind:
The villain's range
 THE LEVELS

THE VILLAIN’S RANGE

If we could see the strength of the opponent’s cards Poker would
be a whole lot simpler.
If his cards were stronger than ours and would continue to be so
then we'd usually fold, if they were weaker than ours and would
continue to be so then we'd usually continue playing.
But, alas, we cannot see the opponent’s cards.
Before we're able to compare our strength to the opponents and
select our action, we’re first going to need to visualise as accurate
an interpretation of his cards as we can.
To do this, we put the opponent on a range.

At Level One we've already learned how to consider a range.

We use the same technique to understand how often each
hand will appear in the villain’s range
As soon as our opponent is given his cards, before he's taken any
action, we can accurately put him on a 100% range.
We can accurately say that he could have any two cards.
Then, as soon as he makes a manoeuvre, we’re able to start
breaking his range down. We can start pinpointing the exact cards
that he holds.
By the end of a hand in Holdem, after only very few moves have
been made, we are sometimes able to say the exact two cards that
the opponent holds. But usually the hand will end before that.

At Level Two the way that we pinpoint his holding is by

looking to the past
We use everything we've learned about the opponent, or the type
of opponent, to help us better understand what he is doing with
his range.
If we see that he is only choosing to play around 25% of hands,
YADI JAVADI

and then he plays a hand, we assign him a range containing around

25% of hands. Simple.
If we’ve seen that the opponent only ever raises over our bet
around 3% of the time we wouldn't expect him to do it with a
weak hand. It's only logical to first presume that the more chips
that the villain is choosing to put in the pot the better the hand that
he's holding. If he raises 3% of the time, we would consider the
opponent's range to contain the very best 3% of hands unless we
have seen him do something different.
If this same opponent were instead to call our bet then we can use
that same logic to remove the top 3% of hands from his range as
we expect he would have raised it up with his strongest cards.

Creating a range for the opponent isn't an exact science

Each player will play different cards differently.
We constantly develop our understanding of our opponents and
as we learn more about a player our analysis of his range will
change.
Beginners often play random hands or make random plays and so
for these guys we'd usually give them a hazier range than we
would a Reg.
We can’t say precisely how a beginner will play a certain hand,
but then, he probably wouldn’t be able to tell us himself either.
Beginners don't fully understand what they're doing at the tables
and so they are inherently unpredictable.
This is bad for us, but these guys make up for it by rarely mixing
up their plays. They make the same plays with the same hands
over and over and over again. If we see a beginner raise the
minimum amount one time with the very best of hands, the
chances are that the next time he min-raises he'll probably have
the same sort of hand.
Against these inexperienced players, accurately putting them on
a range leads us to the best profits we'll ever find at any poker
table.

It's very valuable to watch closely for any of these consistent

 THE LEVELS

betting patterns from any players

We have to work out what our opponents are doing with their
cards!. All our moves at Level Two are based on our opponents
strength. The more accurately we understand the strength of their
hand, the more accurately we can select our most profitable
manoeuvre.
And don’t forget, if we know what the opponent does when they
are strong, we can tell when they are not strong.

If possible, you might want to make notes anytime you

recognise how a player is playing his range

Each individual player could have plays they make often,

plays they make rarely, and plays that they never make:
If we see that the player doesn't make a certain play at all, perhaps
he never raises over our bets on the flop, then the player will
probably have a hole in their knowledge of the game.
Holes like this make it far easier for us to play against them as
they have less moves in their artillery.
This is the same in all games as it is in Poker.
If a boxer never uses his left hook then we could constantly side-
step to the right without any fear of being hit.
If a poker player never raises our bets then we can always bet
against him without bothering to consider what might happen if
we get raised.
This doesn't mean that we always benefit if the opponent leaves
plays (lines) from his artillery. He might be choosing to remove
certain plays deliberately which does make it more difficult for us
to pinpoint his strength.
If he never raised over our bet then we will never know whether
he has the best kind of hand or not and so we won’t be able to
remove that 3% of his range which I just mentioned.
It is usually easier for him if he's making fewer types of plays.
It can also massively confuse and frustrate us if we keep seeing
him make the same moves with different cards. And when we’re
confused and frustrated, we make less profit.
YADI JAVADI

If the opponent is instead the kind of player who makes a

specific play more often than makes sense, we do what we
always do
We change our understanding of their range accordingly.
Perhaps the opponent has been betting on every flop?
Perhaps he checks every flop?
Perhaps he calls every time we bet on the flop?
If the opponent were doing any of these three things then the range
we gave him pre-flop would be identical to the range we give him
on the flop.
If we expect him to make a specific play with his entire range then
it stands to reason that his range would not change when he makes
that play.

I think it’s best to use all the different lines

It’s best to be fluid. You calculate each individual check, call or
fold as you come to it, whilst being capable of taking any line.
If your opponent is capable of making any play it usually signals
his strength as a player. This usually shows that the player has no
major holes in his game.
It also opens the game up.

We can use his other attributes, like his chips and his position,
to help us understand the strength of his hidden qualities.
If he's aware that he's in a weak position, we can assume that he
may well know to play with stronger cards than usual.
If he’s in a stronger position, he will probably play more hands
than usual.
If he's about to run out of chips when the blinds reach him, we can
assume that he may well play with any half decent hand.

The most beneficial thing to learn about an individual

opponent is his overall understanding of this formula
If the player has no awareness of a certain aspect from any Level
then we will find it far easier to put him on a specific range of
 THE LEVELS

cards.
We will also know which plays they are not comfortable
defending against.

His attributes, his betting patterns, his characteristics and his

understanding of the game all help us make reads on his range
What we’re doing here is building knowledge about a certain
player or type of players to help us select our manoeuvre. We’re
learning by experience.
If we really want to know what the opponent is doing, if we really
want to understand the opponent's range, we need to know why he
does one thing or why he does another.
We need to understand why he makes his plays.
We need to find the reason behind Level Two, which is found at
Level Three.

Using only Level Two we can put the villain on a precise range
by watching the game like a hawk
We aim to understand anything and everything about him.
We look to his betting patterns, his personality and his
understanding of the game to find out as accurately as possible
what it is that he does with the different parts of his range.
Does he always play his strong hands slowly?
Does he always bet big with his biggest hands?
Can he comprehend Level Three?
Every piece of information we gather on them helps us decipher
their range.

Step 5 - Consider the strength of the

opponent’s hand by putting him on a
range.
YADI JAVADI

HIS BOARD
As soon as we're able to concoct a range for the opponent
we're able to see how often that player has hit specific boards

Let’s presume that we're up against a low stakes Reg who's called
our opening bet pre-flop. We see that he plays 5% of cards when
he makes this call, and that he would have raised with 3% -

The range I'd give this person, without any further information,
would contain mostly pocket pairs from 22 - JJ which makes up
around 3.5% of all possible hands. I'd also expect him to hold big
broadway cards too, AQ, AJs. So let’s say that these two hands
make up the other 1.5% of his range.

Now try this yourself. Try to consider how often that range hits
on these three completely different boards:

Flop A =

Flop B =
 THE LEVELS

Flop C =

• The first of these flops smashes the villains range. All his
pocket pairs have either hit the board to become sets, are
over-pairs (pairs bigger than the board), or are draws with
a good chance of improving, and a quarter of his suited
cards have a good chance of hitting a flush. Even his
unsuited cards are over-cards and so he also has a chance
to pick up a big pair on a later street too.
• On the second flop, we can see that the villain most
probably hasn’t hit. There are two Aces on the board, so
we can remove those cards from his potential range and
can see that he has far more pocket pairs that have missed
rather than Ax hands that have hit.
• On the third and final board, we can see that the majority
of the opponent’s range has completely missed. All we
really need to worry about is the rare 44, TT, JJ and AJs
which could have hit.
As we don't know exactly what it is that the opponent holds, there
isn't much point in working out exactly how often his range hits a
specific board. When I see a board I roughly consider which parts
of the opponent’s range has hit or missed and this is usually
enough information for me to see which is the best move.

Once the board has arrived it’s easy enough to see how often
the opponent has hit, but to really understand the strength of
the villains range we need to understand how often the
different future cards will strengthen their hand
To do this we use the same sums we learnt at Level One, except
now we calculate the chance for all the different hands in the
villain’s range improving.
YADI JAVADI

Board =

This time let’s say the villain is seated in an early position and
that he has bet against us both preflop and on the flop
We're likely to have assigned a strong range to him by this point.
So, let’s say that -

- A little less than half of the villain’s remaining range is KQ.

- A little less than half is AJ.
- He also has the odd TJ and Set in there too.

Now we need to consider the chance that he will improve to a

straight, to a single pair, two pair, to a full house or quads perhaps.

• If the villain has KQ then he has 8 outs which lead to him

making a straight. There are 6 cards known to us, so there
are only 46 cards left in the deck. This gives him around a
1 in 6 chance of hitting the straight. If he does have KQ
then he would also have a chance of hitting a K or a Q on
the river which would give him a pair, to hit a pair he has
6 outs and so around a 1 in 8 chance. We then add these
together and see that in total, the KQ has almost a 1 in 3
chance of improving.

• If he has AJ then he has 6 cards which will improve his

hand and so has a 1 in 8 chance of improving.

• If the villain has TJ already, then he has 4 outs to the full

house and around a 1 in 12 chance of improving.

• If he has a pocket pair which has turned into a set, then he

 THE LEVELS

has 10 outs and a 1 in 4.5 chance of improving.

These sums may sound difficult, but when your sat at the
tables you rarely need to calculate them accurately
These are the same sums from Level One reflected here, so there
isn’t much new stuff for you to learn.
I suspect you’re starting to see how things become more complex
as you advance through the Levels. Each new Level works in the
same way. Each new Level is just a reflection of the one before it
which adds a little more to our calculation.

Step 6 - Consider how strong the

opponent’s range is on certain boards,
and how strong it will become in the
future.
YADI JAVADI

ADDING THE CHIPS

Once we understand the strength of the villains range we can
compare the strength of his range to the strength of our hand to
see how often we expect to win. This is called our ‘win-chance’.
Before we can select our play we still have one additional thing
to consider - We need to add chips to the equation.
We need to find out how many chips we will make on average
against the hands in the villain’s range. We need to find out
whether our play will be profitable! Only then can we see our
decision will lead us to achieving our goal in this game. Winning
chips.
There are many ways to make calculate the coming sum, I will
start with the most difficult and most accurate equation and then
I’ll show you easier ways of doing it.

To keep things as simple as possible, let’s expand on the example

in the last chapter so that I can show you exactly how we calculate
what is known to the Poker world as ‘value’ -

Board -

The villains range:

- KQ – slightly less than half of his range

 THE LEVELS

- AJ – slightly less than half of his range

- TJ , Sets – around 1/10 of his range

Let’s say that our cards are:

And that we're facing a bet of 100 chips into a pot of 100.
Let’s also say that the opponent has bet all his remaining chips so
that we’re deciding between just two different plays, calling or
folding.

We need to find out if there is any profit in a call, and if there

is not, we need to fold
To find our expected profits we need to periodically go through
each hand in the villain's range and work out how much we will
win or lose against each on average, we then add the numbers
together to find our average profit.

Let’s start with KQ

The total pot is going to be 300 and we will win 2/3 of the time,
so, against KQ we will win 200 on average. As it will cost 100 to
call, our profit will be 100.
And so... KQ = +100

Against AJ
The pot will be 300 and we win only win around 1 in 15 times so
our winnings is about 20. As it will cost 100, our total losses are
around 80.
AJ = -80
YADI JAVADI

Against sets and TJ we lose every time, so our loses are 100
TJ/Sets = -100

Before we can add these numbers together we have to account

for the fact that some hands will appear more often than
others
We guessed that AJ and KQ both appear 4.5x more often than the
nutsy hands, so if we can give them 4.5 instances for every 1
instance of TJ/Sets we're able to calculate our average profits by
dividing the total number by the total number of instances.
The sum looks like this -

KQ... 4.5 x 100 = 450

AJ... 4.5 x 80 = - 360
TJ/Sets = -100
450 - 360 - 100 = - 10
-10 divided by the 10 instances gives us an overall profit of -1.

This play is pretty much breakeven

Remember, we don’t know how much of the villain’s range is
really KQ, we just guessed. Our profit number is not going to be
perfectly accurate. It is just an estimation.
Using this estimation we can see that for this decision it wouldn’t
really matter whether or not we call.

Using that method is the easiest way to calculate an exact

number for the profit from this play
But as we're never going to be accurate anyway, we don’t actually
need to put a number on our profit.
There is another calculation we can often use, which is a far easier
way of calculating this plays profitability:
We can simply compare our win-chance with the odds given to us
by the price (our pot odds).
In the example, we can see that we are currently beating nearly
half the opponent's range. We are currently beating all the KQ
 THE LEVELS

hands, but, 1/3 of those KQ hands will improve to beat us which

leaves us a total of around a 1 in 3 chance of winning.
And thus, we have our win-chance.
The size of the call in relation to the total chips we stand to win
gives us a price around the same. 2:1.
And thus, we have our pot odds.
(The difference between probability and odds is confusing and so
I feel I should clear it up for you. The probability being 1 in 3 is
exactly the same as the odds being 2:1. Probability is: chance for
and total chance. While odds is: chance for and chance against).
All we have to do to make a Level Two decision, is compare these
two figures to realise that there is no really any profit in the call,
but nor will we lose anything either. We can see that this call is
somewhere near a break even play.
Once you get your head around this simple method, you will
realise that if the price is low in relation to the total winnings
available, you need not beat much of the villain’s range for your
play to be profitable. You’ll notice that if the price is high, you
need to beat lots of the villain’s range.

Both these methods are important to be aware of. They will

both serve you at different times. But you don’t need to
accurately calculate any of these sums at the tables
As always, the more accurate the better, but, this is only Level
Two. Using all the Levels is far more important than calculating
the math at Level One or Two accurately.
Only once you have all the other Levels lodged in the back of your
mind should you should start working on accuracy.

It'd be a minor range related factor which swayed my decision

on which manoeuvre to make on the close decision in the
example provided
If I thought, “there’s a small chance the opponent has some kind
of bluff in his range” then I’d call. If I thought, “the opponent
might have a small chance of holding JK or JQ” then I'd fold.
Regardless of my play I'd not let myself get demoralised if I did
YADI JAVADI

find that I'd made a mistake in this instance.

This was a close call and so even if I do end up losing it really
doesn’t matter very much. On average I won’t be losing much
money by making the wrong play in any situation where the
numbers are so close.

Step 7 – Select your play by either

calculating the chips you will win/lose
from the hands in the villain's range, or,
by weighing up the price of the play
against the win-chance
 THE LEVELS

IMPLIED PROFITS
There is an important factor which I left from that last example:
I made it so that there were no further betting opportunities
available so that we could disregard the Future-Present.

The only time we win or lose chips is when the hand reaches
conclusion
At Level Two we don't actually need to consider our profits
(value) for any given instant. Instead, we only ever need to
consider how much value we stand to win, or lose, by the time the
hand reaches showdown (When the cards are turned over to see
who wins).

To find our profits come showdown, we need to consider our

implied profits
Let’s go back to that last example, except this time let’s say that
the opponent didn’t put in all of his chips. Instead let’s say that
both of us had an extra 1,000,000 chips behind.
Now there are lots of different plays that he could make in the
future and there is loads of extra money active in the pot. Together
this makes it almost impossible for us to accurately calculate how
much we will win or lose in the end. There is no way we can tell
how big the pot is going to be by the time the hand reaches its
conclusion. All our potential profit figures become confused
because they depend on future actions which haven’t happened
yet.
When we start to consider implied profits we find that these
unknown future actions present a real problem. We won’t know
how much money the opponent is going to put in the pot until
after we see them do it.
So, we do what we always do... We just guess
YADI JAVADI

Is he the type of guy that will never bet on any further cards
regardless of his holding? Or maybe she's the type of girl who'll
go mad and chuck in all her chips every time she misses?
To calculate our implied profits, we guess what the opponent will
do in the future with the different hands in their range and then
we adjust our potential price or potential winnings accordingly.

If you’re a beginner, I wouldn’t worry about this stuff yet

Considering future plays and implied profits isn't too important.
Provided you're able to understand whether your current play is
profitable against the opponent’s range you won’t find that the
future decisions will bring along too many changes that will turn
your potential winnings into potential losses.

Step 7.1 - To find your final profit figure

you need to consider how many chips you
will win by showdown.
 THE LEVELS

THE EASIEST WAY

We can further simplify our play selection, but by adopting
this technique we do lose quite a lot of accuracy
What we can do is forget about the chips entirely and concentrate
only on the cards.
The most common phase at which we might adopt such a
rudimentary technique is pre-flop. While we’re at the pre-flop
stage of a hand the opponent’s range is so wide, and the potential
futures so broad, that to find the value of our play by using either
of the methods I described would be impractical.
Instead, we could just select to play hands that are stronger than
the villain’s range.
If we expect that the opponent has AT+ then we don't play any
cards weaker than AT against him.
We might choose to only play AJ+, or if we want to be more
conservative, we could go higher and play only AQ+.
If you do select your plays in this way whilst pre-flop, on average,
the board will make you stronger than the opponent.

At the pre-flop stage of the hand it is still extremely valuable

to consider the chips you might win or lose against the
different hands in the villain’s range, paying attention to your
position, to the different boards that may come, and the lines
that you both might take
Considering the chips and the future moves etc is still massive.
The only time the strength of our hand really matters is when the
cards are revealed at the end of a hand and so it could be deemed
all important to keep the profits made at showdown in our mind.
I’m not saying that you shouldn’t try to make as detailed an
estimation of the entire line before selecting any pre-flop action.
All I’m saying is that the future is vast. You will never perfect the
YADI JAVADI

ability to read what will happen in the future. So don’t worry

about it too much to begin with. Just make a rough guess as to
what your opponents will do in the future so that you’re not easily
surprised.
I usually advise beginners to pay a little attention bet size and
position etc, but mostly to just try to stay ahead of the opponent’s
range while considering what to do before the flop comes down
at Level Two.

If you do decide to adopt this rudimentary technique for

selecting pre-flop cards, then you will need to work from
standardized bet sizes
If I could choose one standard bet size for all pre-flop actions it
would have to be pot size.
To cater for all the equations that we're forsaking we need to then
change our standard sizing depending on the kind of situation that
we're in:
If we're in a good seat, we'd lower the bet size slightly.
If the opponent has a small stack containing less than 100 big
blinds, we'd want to lower our sizing slightly to account for the
implied profits modification that we didn’t bother making.
If the opponent has a big stack containing more than 100 big
blinds, we'd want to raise our sizing slightly for the same reason.

There are infinite number of things that could lead you to

changing your standardised bet sizing
As you develop your understanding of the game you'll begin to
find more and more reasons to adjust your standardized sizing.
However, those same advancements will make it easier for you to
consider future profit figures against the different hands in the
villain’s range too, and so these standardized sizes become less
important as you get better at the game.
In case you’re wondering, if I could choose any standard bet size
for post-flop situations, I would choose 2/3 pot.
 THE LEVELS

Step 7.2 - Whilst the future is at its most

vast, comparing your price to your win-
chance may not be a practical way to
select your play. And so instead, you
could forget about both the chips and the
future cards and concentrate only on
making sure that your hand is stronger
than the opponent’s range.
YADI JAVADI

THE VILLAIN’S BODY/EMOTIONS

Lots of professionals deliberately attempt to put their
opponent on tilt
They try to make the opponent lose their mind so they themselves
can make extra profit.
I am very much against this practice. Especially when I'm playing
against people who are clearly less skilled than myself. Not just
because it’s a nasty thing to do, which it really is. The main reason
I'm reluctant to put my opponent on tilt is because I want the
weaker player to come back and play against me again.
I'd much prefer that a player loses to me with a smile on his face
than to have him walk away hating the game and swearing never
to play again.
Yes, I could probably make more money on a specific day if I
make him go crazy, but on another day, I would make far more
money if the weaker players came back.
Having said that, if I ever find myself facing a guy who gives
everyone an ear-full himself, I do feel justified in destroying his
moral.
I myself don’t want to play against somebody who tries to drive
me insane all day, and I don’t want them ruining the experience
for the weaker players either, so I'll happily make these guys leave
and never return.

It’s not often that I attempt to induce a negative feeling from

the opponent, but it is important to understand how the
opponent is feeling to pick up physical reads from them and
help break down their range
Lots of players say that you can get reads on your opponents by
looking at them to see how they're throwing their chips into the
pot, or by watching their eyes to see if they become dilated.
 THE LEVELS

I mostly play online so this sort of thing is usually beyond me, but
I do love it when I find unconscious tells at Live tables; That face
they pull when their bluffing. That look they give you when
they’re strong. It is ridiculously profitable to find a players tell,
but the finding of them usually seems to come as a surprise to me
so in my experience they aren’t worth spending your time
concentrating on.
I personally prefer to look at my opponent to try to see how they're
feeling. This is something we can always concentrate on at the
tables.
Recognising a person’s emotional state is a skill that we all use
every day. We already have the ability to tell if the person sitting
opposite us is happy or sad, and that can be of huge benefit while
facing them at the poker tables.
If the board comes and we see the opponent looks relieved, then
we can naturally assume that he's hit.
If the board comes and the opponent looks angry, we can guess
that it's likely he's missed.
If the opponent becomes excited when that flop comes down,
we’d guess that he has something strong.
Some guys will become so excited that their hands shake, but be
careful, some guys become so scared that their hands shake, and
some people just have shaky hands.

If we're playing on the internet we can't see our opponent and

so taking physical reads becomes more difficult, but it's not
completely impossible
In a similar way we can use timing-tells to help us read the
opponents holding.
Some players will rush their play when they are bluffing, some
will take their time when they are strong. They might make a very
quick ‘snap’ decision whenever they are very weak, many will do
this same thing when they are very strong. Lots of players do this
when they are in a pre-planned situation.
As usual, it's our job to keep a little eye on any timing-tells so that
they can help us put the villain on a range.
YADI JAVADI

All information we can assume to any degree of certainty aids us

when predicting our opponents holding.
Naturally we're able to pick up the odd read on our opponents by
becoming familiar with their emotions or trends, but casual
players sometimes tell us all about their style of play without us
prompting them in any way.
In small games at live casinos the players often spend their time
talking about their own understanding of the game. “I’d always
fold with that hand” or “I’d go all in if I was him just then”.
This is a really big mistake.

I would certainly advise you to talk to your opponents, there

is almost always a lot that you could learn from them
You might eventually find that you have to choose between your
friendship and your win-rate, but that's a decision for you to make
on your own.
 THE LEVELS

LEVEL THREE

Level Three relates to our opponent’s perception of us

Level Three requires empathy.

Normally when people speak of empathy they speak only of
feeling what another person is feeling. At Level Three in the
decision-making formula it's all about the understanding side of
things. It's all about understanding things from the opponent's
perspective.
To do this you need to put yourself in the other person’s shoes.
You need to become the opponent. See what they see. Feel what
they feel.
Once you can do that, you can predict how they will react to
outside influences.
You can predict how the opponent will react to you.
YADI JAVADI

We see how our actions will affect the villain’s range.

If you think back to Level Two, you should remember that our
understanding of the opponent stipulates how it is that we
manoeuvre (the red arrows). All our plays were designed in
reaction to the villain’s strength. We we’re always reacting to his
range by playing hands more valuable than it.
At Level Three we flip this logic around to realise that the villain
makes his plays based on his understanding of us (the blue
arrows). We realise that the villain makes his plays in reaction to
our perceived strength.
We realise that by controlling the way that our actions are
perceived, we gain control over the opponent’s actions.
That new shape on the diagram, the distorted circle, represents our
perceived attributes. The cards that the opponent thinks that we
hold. Our perceived range.
What we do at Level Three is manipulate the opponent’s
perception of us so as to lure him into making a play which is
more profitable for us.
We deceive our opponent for extra money.

Controlling our opponent is extremely valuable but it gets

much, much better
Most poker players are stuck at Level Two and are incapable of
comprehending theory related to Level Three.
I gathered over 40,000 views over two threads that I had placed
on an old poker forum. In those threads I described aspects of
Level Three very clearly. A legendary dude from the community
at that website even helped me explain it.
Yet, even as I finalize this training guide over four years later, the
vast majority of people at that site still refuse to accept that Level
Three logic makes any sense.
This legend and I explained everything in amazing detail.
We gave clear examples.
We showed exactly how to make Level Three plays and explained
why.
We were even teaching for free!
 THE LEVELS

But, alas, these otherwise smart individuals couldn't understand

what we were saying.
Instead of giving us thanks they became abusive.
They got really, really angry.
These unfortunate fellows had developed powerful mental blocks.
Cognitive dissonance was obliterating their minds. They had
almost entirely lost the ability to recognise unknown higher-level
poker logic…
If we can kindly point out all the factors relating to Level Three,
if we can wave the information in front of the faces of these
players without them recognising any sense in what we're saying,
imagine what chance they stand of working out what we’re doing
when they can’t even see our two cards!
At the tables we destroy them over and over and over again.
Low Level Regs have screamed at me for years, “You're a fool!!
You should never have had those cards!”
Sorry my friend but you're mistaken. I deliberately made you
think I didn’t have those cards. I planned the future of my
perceived range and I expected that I could make more money
from your range by making a disguised play rather than a
straightforward one.
You really can explain to them exactly how you made the Level
Three play if you want, they won’t understand.
They won’t comprehend it.
They can’t.
They'll just go mental.

To be capable of the all-important empathy, a being requires

the development of a new ability – the ability to create in their
mind an image of a situation which they have not seen
A Level Three being is able to consider 'fake' Level two
situations. They're able to imagine.
Using this one ability beings are able to imagine what their own
attributes look like from the outside, and thus they acquire self-
awareness.
They learn to imagine things from the perspective of the object or
YADI JAVADI

opponent, and so acquire empathy.

They're also able to imagine different possible futures.

These three abilities are all intertwined with one another

The only one that I can pin to Level Three is empathy.
Self-awareness is clearly an enhancement to our understanding of
Level One but this doesn’t mean it comes in at Level One. All
factors in this formula serve to enhance our understanding of
Level One. Self-awareness seems to replace the need for the
feelings and emotions that were essential for the being to make a
Level Two decision. It seems to come in at Level Three.
Planning the future does crossover into Level Two. At Level Two
we do still need to consider the future to plan our potential
winnings, and the opponent will be considering the future when
choosing what to do with his range.
But all Level Three factors cross over to Level Two in the same
way they cross over to Level One.
The entire purpose of Level Three is to enhance our understanding
of Levels One and Two.
Empathy, self-awareness and future planning seem to be the tools
we use to “Level Up”.
Empathy, and the control that comes with it, is awesome!
However, empathy would be completely useless if we weren’t
able to comprehend potential futures.
The ability to imagine different future scenarios is invaluable to a
strategist.
The future is the only thing that an expert will spend their time
thinking about when strategizing.
When a being develops the ability to predict the future it is no
longer forced to make decisions based on past experiences. It no
longer needs to act on instinct. It no longer has to charge in head
first. Instead, the creature could imagine what might result from
charging in before making any kind of commitment.
At Level Three, you learn to plan ahead.
You can now plan your offensive.
 THE LEVELS

Level Three logic does enhance all Level Two factors

It enhances the profitability of our defensive plays and improves
our ability to read the opponents range.
But, primarily, Level Three is used for attacking
We have two types of offensive plays available to us -
1) We can confront the opponent in a straightforward
manner. (Level Two attack)
2) We can deceive him with a disguised attack (Level Three
attack).
Obviously, we can’t disguise any attribute of ours which is
visible, like our chips at a poker table.
We can only disguise attributes which are hidden.
In Poker we can disguise the strength of our hand.

The ability to make a disguised play is obviously hugely

important for a poker player, but it's equally as important in
most other games too
In Football, a player might fake left then go right. He might step
over the ball multiple times to confuse the opponents
understanding of his plan.
A bowler in a cricket match might curve the ball or he might throw
it straight.
All the same logic applies.
The Levels work the same way in Poker as they do in all games.
If the opponent has not memorised a strategy to counter our
disguised play and he's not consciously aware of how Level Three
works, he will probably experience cognitive dissonance when
confronted with the disguised play and so will often make a
mistake.

It's important to be aware that it’s only useful to deceive your

opponent if it coincides with the final goal in the game
There is no point in curling the ball if the opponent can’t hit the
straight throws.
It would only be worth your army appearing where your opponent
didn’t expect if it was going to help you win the war.
YADI JAVADI

Making a business move your competition doesn't expect is only

a good thing if it's going to create more profit for your company.
In Poker, the final goal is to make more chips and so if it would
not make us more chips from the opponent’s range by disguising
our cards then we would not do so.

All we need to do is look to the potential profit and see which

play we think would make us more money off the villain in the
end
We do the same as we've always done.
Level One and Level Two have not changed.
All we’ve done is recognise the reason behind Level Two.
We recognise that the opponent’s actions are based on his
understanding of our cards. That the opponent is capable of Level
Two.
We're now aware that our actions affect our opponent and so can
pre-empt their reaction to our manoeuvres.
We’ve gained a broader understanding of the game, and so more
options have become available to us.

Sun Tzu, a famous military general of old, clearly recognised

the importance of his image on the battlefield
He often said things like, "Appear where your opponent will not
expect".
He also seemed to back up my logic with this quote:
“There are only two forms of attack, a direct attack, or an indirect
attack.”
He was clearly extremely talented when it comes to Level Three
in respect of war. However, I can’t help but think that his most
famous statement was wrong.
Sun Tzu once said:
“All warfare is based upon deception.”
I would love to ask him how a direct attack is based on deception.
A direct attack wouldn’t be deceptive at all. Deception would
have nothing to do with it. It's exactly the opposite of deceptive.
Our image, the opponent’s perception of us, is way more
 THE LEVELS

important than deception as this is what we use to predict our

opponent’s reaction to our actions. So funnily enough, it’d make
more sense if he had said that all war was based on perception.
But deception??
Level Three manoeuvres are all based on deception. The direct
plays that we’re able to make once acquiring an imagination are
clearly Level Two plays. When making a direct offensive we
disregard the information related to our image (our perceived
attributes) and act solely on Level One and Level Two values.
When we make a straightforward play, we do first have to
consider a deceptive play, so perhaps that's what Sun Tzu meant.
It’s hard to be sure.
There is a chance that I misunderstand the famous strategist in
regard to this statement, but, then, I have come to suspect that he
puts too much stock in Level Three...
YADI JAVADI

OUR PERCEIVED RANGE

Playing at Level Three is very easy for us human beings. Our
amazing subconscious happily takes care of all the hard work for
us. In Poker, all we need to do is follow our perceived range and
the subconscious will happily do the rest.
To be accurate though, you do need to consciously understand
exactly how this new Level works.

Every time our opponent makes a decision he does so due to

his understanding of us
If he thinks our cards are stronger than his (in relation to his price)
he folds.
If he thinks our cards are weaker than his he continues playing.
If we can predict how the opponent’s perception of our range will
change based on our manoeuvres, we can see how to lead him into
making the decisions which we want him to make.

Our perceived range is much the same as any other range

• Our past actions are still key to the creation of our

perceived range
• In the future, we still find the results of our actions on our
perceived range
• And the chance of our perceived range improving is still
the same

We only really add one new piece to the puzzle - We are not
considering the cards which we think we would have. That would
be our Level One self. Our actual range.
At Level Three we need to consider how we look from the
outside.
 THE LEVELS

We need to consider how we look from the villains perspective.

We need to consider the cards that the villain thinks that we have.
We need to see the game through his eyes.

To do this we first need some understanding of the opponent’s

ability
We need to know whose head we’re climbing into before we can
understand how we look from their perspective.
Once we've established, to some degree of accuracy, the
opponents understanding of the game we can start considering
how he may interpret our actions.
We know that he uses the past to make his judgment on us and so
that is how we find out how he perceives us.
If the opponent has seen us raise with a weak hand he will
probably start to think we raise while weak.
Less experienced players will take much more time to recognise
our plays. If an absolute beginner only ever witnesses us raising
with the very strongest of hands then we need not worry about it
because he probably won’t have noticed.
Beginners usually consider far fewer things than a reg. They will
probably notice if you suddenly make a big bet after being asleep
for 30 minutes, but they probably won’t notice if you only ever
raise over bets when you hold a strong value hand.

Regardless of how much information the opponent considers

about us, we can always translate it into a perceived range for
our self
We must always follow this perceived range in order to maximise
our profit. There is no time when it wouldn't be important.
Even if we don’t eventually choose to mislead the opponent, even
if we choose to make a straight forward play, we still need to first
consider our perceived range.
If we didn’t, we wouldn’t be able to tell how the opponent will
react to our play.
YADI JAVADI

We break this new range down in much the same way as any
other range
If we've only just received our two cards and have performed no
action, we can accurately say that our perceived range contains
any two cards.
Every time we make an action from this point onwards we break
down our perceived range making it more and more precise.

At any given time, a beginner could centre on one single hand

for us, they “Put us on AA”
We can certainly take advantage of this kind of conscious
assumption, but we must also be aware that in truth they are
subconsciously considering an entire range for us.
Deep down inside they know that there's a chance we could have
all sorts of hands. What their subconscious is really trying to say
is that AA is a dangerous part of our range.

A skilled player does usually take more into consideration

than a weaker player, but if they are unaware of the higher
Levels, which most are, this skill actually gives us a massive
advantage over them
The more accurate a range a Level Two player puts us on, the
more accurate a perceived range we can create for ourselves.
We then become capable of pretending to show him that we have
exactly the nuts, or exactly a bluff.
We have much, much more control over an accurate Level Two
player than we do a beginner who trusts in his instincts.
The accurate Level Two player only really has one way to battle
back against our abuse - He'll learn how we act in individual
situations and then in those situations he'll take his own play to
the next level. He'll memorise higher level strategies and plays.
When the Level Two opponent witnesses what we do in an
individual situation they'll adapt their understanding of our range
to take advantage of their newfound knowledge.
It’s our job to recognise in which situations each individual has
realised that we're abusing him in. Once we see that he has made
 THE LEVELS

a change to his range to react to our plays we adjust our

understanding of our perceived range accordingly.
If he is starting to think that you bluff often in a specific situation,
simply add more bluffs to your perceived range for that specific
situation. Easy as pie.

The potential for a counter attack from the opponent might

seem like damning evidence against the profitability of Level
Three
If you think that this is the case, I can almost guarantee that are
an experienced player who has not yet advanced beyond Level
Two. You're yet to unlock Level Three in your mind.
There are trillions of situations in Poker and we tangle with
individual players reasonability rarely. The individuals can see
what we're doing even less often.
Learning to defeat a Level Three player one situation at a time is
like climbing a mountain taking one baby step every Christmas.
We're even able to counter our opponent’s defence by creating a
false image for ourselves!
We could spend some time making plays in an extreme way,
perhaps by raise bluffing all our weak hands.
We then watch closely and wait until the villain has recognised
what we’re doing. The moment he adjusts his play to contend with
us, we make a switch over to strong hands.
We pre-plan not only the way he will adjust his play to contend
with us, but also the way we re-adjust against him.
We can apply this kind of strategy over and over again.
There's nothing stopping us from deciding at any given time to
play aggressively with our weaker hands.
We can play around with our image forever, constantly
manipulating the opponent’s understanding of our range to
remain in constant control of their actions.

Step 8 - Follow your perceived range.

YADI JAVADI

BLUFFING
Bluffing adds an entirely new revenue stream to this game for us.
Poker is not only about winning chips from our opponent by
having a stronger hand than his.
This game is not only about winning value.
Every time the opponent folds his hand we make money as well.
At Level Three we pretend to hold a stronger hand than our
opponent to get folds from cards which are stronger than ours.
We bluff.

The additional maths equation is very straight forward

provided you understand how to calculate profit from value
If we were to bet the size of the pot and were bluffing with no
chance of actually being stronger than the villain, our perceived
range would need to appear strong enough to fold out at least half
of the villain’s range for it to be a profitable bet.

In order to bluff effectively we need to pretend to use cards

that are in our perceived range
If we pretend to hold cards that the opponent has already
disregarded as a potential holding for us, he will not believe the
bluff and will not fold.
If our perceived range contains lots of hands which have beaten
the hands in the villain’s range, and then we bet, our bet will look
strong and the bluff will likely be successful.

By now you might see that Poker is a battle of ranges

At Level Two it is our cards vs the villains’ range. But by Level
Three we realise that our cards aren’t all important. We realise
that the real battle is between our perceived range and the villain’s
range.
 THE LEVELS

If we can control our perceived range we can control the

opponent’s range by making him think he needs to fold when he
doesn’t. Our actual cards are only important once the hand
reaches conclusion, and so until then, it's all about making chips
from our perceived range.

When we come to consider how the future effects our new

revenue stream we find that we do sometimes benefit by
making the opponent fold hands which are currently weaker
than our holding
We'd do this to stop his hand improving to become stronger than
ours in the future. Essentially, we're bluffing against his potential
strength come showdown.
This type of play is called ‘protection’.
Protection is one of the least significant factors in Poker, but
unless we hold the very strongest of cards there is almost always
some part of the villain’s range which could improve to beat us,
and so protecting is almost always relevant during any poker
decision. However, making a play purely for protection is usually
the wrong move to make. There is almost always something better
that you could do.

The common definition of a bluff is:

"An attempt to deceive somebody into believing we are doing
something when we are not".
Therefore, we don't only bluff by pretending to be stronger than
we really are. We can also pretend to be weaker than we truly are
to get more value from hands which the villain might not have
usually continued with.
Notice that at Level Three we are always attempting to represent
a range which is as far from our actual hand as possible. We try
to make ourselves look either stronger or weaker than we truly
are. This is pretty much all we do at Level Three. Before taking
an action we consider how it will make our perceived range look
so that we can take our perceived range as far from our actual
hand as is profitable.
YADI JAVADI

We never want the opponent to know the cards we’re playing, or

the actual range we are using. If he did, he would play perfectly
against us. So, we deceive him, to take an edge.

It's usually the lower end of our range which would be

worthwhile disguising and it’s usually when we’re at our
strongest that we’d be better off playing in a straightforward
manner
If we have KK and once we make our raise our perceived range
will contain 55 – AA, the villain will continue against our range
with many weaker hands than our KK and so there is little point
in attempting to play slowly with a check or a call instead. You
might aswell raise it up to make the pot bigger to make more
profit.
Whenever your actual hand is at the top of your perceived range
it’s usually be more important to raise the size of the pot rather
than attempt to disguise your hand.
If you are ever at the bottom of your perceived range, then you
are in bad shape. These are usually the best hands to play
deceptively with.
In a way, it is true that our hand does always need to be in some
way disguised, even when we make a straight-forward play like
in the example. If we hadn’t have had many weaker hands in our
perceived range when we raised it up, our opponent would have
played perfectly against us taking away our edge. The weaker
hand in our range hide the KK, and if they did not, we would have
to disguise our play in some other way to hold an edge.

Step 9 - Consider how the opponent will

react to the changes to your perceived
range after you take your action. Will you
look strong? Will he have the price to
call?
 THE LEVELS

PRE-ADJUSTING
In all games there are two ways we can deceive our opponent:

1. We bluff by considering imminent changes to our

perceived range. We pretend to hold cards that are, at
present, in our perceived range which we don’t actually
hold… In war, we feign to go one way and then suddenly
change the direction of our attack.

2. The second way we can deceive our opponent is by

utilising the future present of our perceived range. This is
called Pre-Adjusting.

We induce the opponent to change his understanding of our

perceived range so that during future decisions we can hold a hand
that is not in our perceived range.
In war, we slyly position our troops in a place where the opponent
won’t expect, planning to reveal them at the opportune moment.
In Poker we make a play which induces the opponent to remove
the hand that we truly hold from our perceived range so that after
future changes have materialized we can take advantage of his
wrong assumption.
In short, we mash them up
If I have a flush and the opponent thinks to himself, "Yadi could
have a flush", then he will play cautiously against me.
If I have a flush and the opponent thinks, "Ahh, I already learned
that Yadi does not have a flush!" Then I decimate him.
He might try to represent a flush himself and raise big in an
attempt to make me fold whichever mediocre hand he thinks I
hold. He might call me light, thinking that I’m bluffing when I
raise him for the rest of my stack.
YADI JAVADI

Making the opponent think that you could not possibly have
hit is hugely valuable when you hold a strong hand
In the same way, if we've completely missed the board but the
opponent thinks it smashes our range, it becomes very easy to
convince him to fold.
If we've hit a medium strength hand, and the opponent thinks we
have only a very strong hand or nothing, he will often leave us to
control the size of the pot.
One way or another, if the opponent distinctly believes that you've
already folded the hand which you truly hold, you can make, or
save, lots of extra money against him.

Pre-Adjusting is a far more effective way of avoiding our

perceived range than bluffing, but it is also much harder to do
To successfully pre-adjust we need to consider what our
perceived range will be during our next move and the profit we
might then make. This means that we need to consider all the
different future flops, turns or rivers and consider how our
perceived range will look on these cards as well as the actions that
both we and the opponent will make and how much money we
will then stand to win.
To pre-adjust you need to consider the future-present.
You need to consider how everything will look during your next
move.
This is extremely hard to calculate, but luckily, we humans are
amazing!!
Have you heard of Slow-Playing your hand? It basically does
what it says on the tin: When holding something strong, you check
or call an early street to make yourself look weak so that you can
take advantage on later streets… Slow playing is a very basic play
and it is also one of the moves you make by pre-adjusting!
Everyone can already pre-adjust without even thinking about it.

To make a pre-adjustment post-flop is both easier to do and

less effective than pre-adjusting pre-flop
After the flop comes down it's sometimes worthwhile to make an
 THE LEVELS

action which will induce the opponent to remove the strongest

parts of our actual range from our perceived range, but this is
rarely the best thing to do pre-flop.
Our range is very wide at the early stages of a hand. Our strongest
cards will still be relatively well disguised, so it will usually be
more profitable to play our strength in a straightforward manner.
As usual, the most valuable cards to remove from our actual range
before the flop comes down are the weakest of those in our
perceived range:
We can accurately say that the weaker part of our perceived range
wouldn't make much money by being stronger than the opponent.
So instead of actually playing those cards we replace them with
hands that the opponent won't expect.
This gains us far more value, and by removing the weakest of the
hands that the opponent expects us to hold we even maximise our
profit from bluffing too.

The best way to understand this is to work through a problem

using an example:

A common Level Two re-raising range preflop might contain:

A2s – AKs
A9o – AKo.
KQ
High Pocket Pairs.

In this day and age this is the kind of range that a Level Two
villain might expect us to hold so it becomes our perceived range
against a Level Two player.

Now consider this second range

It's approximately the same size as the first but it'll hit less often...
Think about which one you would prefer to hold when you are re-
raising this Level Two player:
YADI JAVADI

A5s - AKs
ATo - AKo
KQ
56s - 9Ts
High Pocket Pairs

A Level Two player will usually believe that the first of these two
ranges is a better holding in this situation. (Unless he’s memorised
a different strategy for this situation). We’re stronger and so we're
in a better place. Right?... I'm sorry but this is wrong.
Remember back to your Level Two lesson about hand selection.
The opponents will only be aiming to continue in the pot with
hands which are better than ours which makes our weak Aces
almost worthless. The opponents will not be continuing with A2
against our perceived range. He will have already folded his A2
pre-flop because he wants to stay ahead of our range!
The main way that we'd make any money by holding a hand like
A2 is by getting the opponent to fold. And if that is the case, we
needn’t actually hold those cards!
If he's to fold then we'll not see a showdown and so we don’t
actually need to hold that hand.
If the opponents will never see that we held A2 there is no point
in ever having it.
We might as well fold our A2, and replace it with a hand the
opponent won’t expect. We might as well pre-adjust.
If you think back to earlier lessons, you'll also realise that because
we don’t actually have A2 in our actual range we will see more
Axx flops too. We will see these boards more often meaning we
can bluff them more often which will help us get even more profit
from folds than we would if we had played the A2 in the first
place.

If we choose to go for the pre-adjusted range, except this time

the board misses our perceived range, we can also maximise
our Level Two value by showing up with a hand the opponent
doesn’t expect
 THE LEVELS

If the board comes low we'll sometimes reach showdown with a

super strong straight which will take value from even the best
hands in the villain’s range.
If the board comes TTx, 99x, 55x, 56x, or anything similar, will
appear as though we have almost certainly missed but secretly,
we are reasonably likely to have hit. And if we hit when the
opponent thinks we are sure to have missed, we rinse them.
Pre-adjusting enables us to make profit on more boards. By
separating our actual range and our perceived range we get better
board coverage. Not only do we make money when our perceived
range hits, as is standard, we now make money at times when we
would usually have missed.

Pre-adjusting gets even better! Because it’s also a very sneaky

play to make
It's not as easy to read as a normal bluff.
The opponent will find it very difficult to switch up his play to
account for the cards that we've shown him, because, he will very
rarely see what it is that we are doing.
He won't know that we folded our small Ax Pre-flop.
He'll only learn that we truly held 67 after losing a load of money
to it and even then he will fry his own brain trying to work out
what it is that we'd done. When he looks to our range he'll see that
we're playing with the percentage of hands that he expects us to
play with. He’ll rack his brain trying to work out how we turned
up with cards that he didn’t expect! He'll start thinking we’re
cheating well before noticing what we’re really doing.
If he's unaware of how to pre-adjust, which most players are, then
he will usually go completely insane when he see’s you make this
kind of play. He'll scream abuse and call you a fool. “You should
never have held those cards!”
His cognitive dissonance will make it almost impossible for him
to work out the reasonably simple tactic you have employed.
If he does eventually realise that we're making this play against
him without those low Ax hands, and that we're replacing those
hands with the unexpected suited connectors, if he's still not
YADI JAVADI

capable of consciously understanding how to pre-adjust himself

then he will only be able to counter our play in this one type of
situation.

We want to be pre-adjusting in almost every situation

Every single time we make a decision with a future card still to
come we benefit by folding with some of the weaker hands that
are in our perceived range and continuing instead with cards that
the opponent thinks we would not possibly hold.
At Level Three we are always aiming to separate our perceived
range from our range. If the opponent does recognise what it is
that you’re doing in any one situation; it’s your job to notice,
change your consideration of your perceived range, skim off some
of the weakest hands in your re-evaluated perceived range and
then replace those cards with others which he won’t expect; You
pre-adjust.

Pre-adjusting can seem complicated. It is pretty much the most

complicated part of this decision-making method. But it’s real
easy once you get your head around it
All you need to do is recognise how to pre-adjust. Then, with very
little practice, you’ll suddenly realise that you’re adept in its
application.
You’ll be able to apply Level Three far more easily than you’ll be
able to explain it, that’s for sure.

Pre-adjusting is hugely important in all games

We often see commercial businesses competing with one another
to provide the same kinds of product. If you find yourself running
a competitive business like this then you can torment your
competition by applying pre-adjusted strategies.
Any time you introduce unexpected new products you are pre-
adjusting.
Any time you put any plan into action behind closed doors, you're
pre-adjusting.
To make the pre-adjustment as profitable as possible you need to
 THE LEVELS

make it as difficult as possible for the competition to adjust to

contend with you once they realise what it is that you have done.

Step 10 - Consider how your perceived

range will look during future decisions.
This enables you to show up with cards
that the opponent won’t expect.
YADI JAVADI

BET-SIZING
It’s only once we get to Level Three that we find a reason to make
a bet in Poker. If we didn't have a subconscious understanding of
our perceived range we wouldn't be able to consider any
aggressive play.
We need to be able to recognise the hands we’re representing, or
we'd have no reason to make any bet.
The opponent doesn’t fold for no reason. Consciously he might
think that he folds only because he thinks his hand is weak. But
subconsciously, he knows that he folds because he thinks his hand
is weaker than ours and so he will probably lose at showdown.
Subconsciously he even realises that it wouldn’t be worth the
money.
Subconsciously we all use all the levels from the moment we learn
the rules to the game.
All I’m teaching you here is how to recognise the calculations
your mind already makes.

If we're playing No-Limit Holdem we can devise our own bet-

size
At Level Three we concoct this size based on all the factors that
you have learned up until now.
Our perceived range, the villain’s range, the potential profits etc
etc.
Against a low-level villain, if we don’t want him to continue in
the pot with a hand, then we need to design our bet-size so that he
has the wrong price to continue against the range that we
ourselves are representing.
If we do want the low-level opponent to continue with a hand,
then we design our bet-size so that he has the right price to
continue against the range that we're representing.
 THE LEVELS

For us to make an accurate assumption of the range that our

bet-size is representing, our sizing must work in coordination
with the situation that we're in –

Imagine we were up against a player who is not consciously aware

of his perceived range, Level Two or below, and we see a board
which puts both a lot of draws and a lot of value in both of our
ranges.
If we held a strong draw – the opponent will usually expect us
to bet big so that we can make chips from folds whilst protecting
our currently weak showdown hand.
This is a commonly learned play.
At the same time as making money from hands in the villain’s
range that will fold, we'd also be attempting to build a bigger pot
so as to improve our implied profits once we do hit our hand.
If, instead, we held a strong value hand – he's likely to think
that we'd bet just enough to make him feel as though he is getting
the correct price to make a straightforward play and continue on
with his draw.
We can then assume that if we're to bet around the correct price
to make our opponent continue with a draw, we'll be representing
a value hand.
If we bet bigger than this, we'll be representing a draw ourselves
and the opponent might well continue with all kinds of weak
hands.

Now imagine we’re in the opposite kind of situation, a situation

where the board brought no big hands nor draws to either player.
In this situation, we can't validate a very big bet. There are very
few hands in our range which we would want to bet big. Even if
we held the nuts, we wouldn’t want to bet big because there would
be very few hands in the opponent’s range which we'd expect to
call.
Most competent low-level players would therefore start off by
believing us to be bluffing if we made an expensive play on this
YADI JAVADI

sort of board.
I’m certainly not saying that we shouldn’t bet big on these dry
boards against low level players, I’m only saying that we probably
shouldn't do it while we’re attempting to bluff against these
particular players.

Bet-sizing is a highly un-linear factor in No-Limit Poker

We can be very creative with our sizing.
It can be quite fun to play with our opponent’s understanding of
our range using different bet-sizes, especially when we're against
accurate Level Two players!
I often find times to make small bluffs against these guys to
represent a slightly stronger hand than their own holding. I love
to see them make what they think is a great fold to what they think
is a good value play from a very specific range.
The Level Two players won’t consciously be aware that we
understand the cards that we are representing so we can toy with
them forever and they may never learn how badly we take
advantage of them.

What we’re doing with our sizing is playing around with our
perceived range to make our opponent do what we want him
to do with his range so that we can make the most profit
It’s important to keep those potential profits at the forefront of our
deliberations.
Our goal is always to make profit from the hands in the villains
range.
If we have a very strong hand and we think the villain will
continue with a large part of his range when facing a big bet, this
is usually the best size to choose. (To be perfectly accurate we
would have to consider the future moves so that we could see our
profit come showdown.)
If on the other hand, we are weak and can get him to fold lots of
his range to a small bluff, then that is usually the best size to
choose.
The chips need to be considered in the same way as ever, and so
 THE LEVELS

the smaller we make the bluff, the less of the villain’s range we
need to fold in order for it to be a profitable bet.

There is a lot to be said for standardising our bet-sizes too

If we don't change our bet-size depending on our holding, we
don’t give the opponent any clues as to the part of our range which
we currently hold.
This does restrict the control we hold over the opponent, but it
will also make it more difficult for him to perceive an accurate
range for us.
I certainly wouldn’t use standardised bet-sizes against a beginner
who wouldn’t notice my sizing anyway.
Against this kind of player, I’d usually bet big with my strong
hands and small with my weak hands.
It’s also worth mentioning that it’s of great benefit to make
players familiar with our larger than average bet-sizes so that they
will assign us a broader perceived range whenever we make an
expensive play. We certainly don’t want them to start thinking
we're strong whenever we bet big.

Step 11 - Design your bet-size according

to all factors, whilst paying close
attention to the primary goal - making
more profit on average against the
opponent’s range.
YADI JAVADI

THE STANDARD PLAY MODEL

The standard way to think though a poker play.

In this chapter we combine of all the factors that you have learnt
up to now. We put everything together to give us our Level Three
decision-making process.
At the higher Levels this play model doesn't differ a great deal
from the one which we have here at Level Three. If you're able to
learn this, you will easily be able to adjust it to cater for any play
at any Level.
This decision-making process could be adjusted so that it applies
to any problem in any game.
The physical factors from Level One are interchangeable. You
can replace the cards and the chips with other physical factors
related to your own problem.
Only the rules are specific to each individual game, if they are
changed then our relative physical attributes change along with
them and then that will filter through to all the other Levels.
The formula itself always stays the same.

There are three main stages to the decision-making process:

1. First, we use the past to gather information so that we can

find the present situation.
2. Then we imagine the future changes to the present
situation after we have selected our possible manoeuvres.
3. Finally, we compare our options and make the manoeuvre
that will make our present situation better.

In Poker:

1. We establish the ranges. We also consider the chips.

 THE LEVELS

2. We consider what will happen with the ranges depending

on our possible plays. We also consider what will happen to the
chips.
3. We select the play which will make us the most chips.

Making a play at Level Three is very similar to making a play

at Level Two
Our goal is still to make the most money on average against all
the different hands in the villain’s range.
At Level Three we need to add our perceived range to our
deliberations. As Level Three gives us the reasons behind Level
Two, we need to consider our own perceived range before
considering the villains range.
In this coming example I’ll start by giving you the full calculation
which will enable you to give yourself an exact figure for your
profit. I’ll skip past this full-calculation as quickly as I can, and
then I’ll give you a much easier method which you can use to
calculate your plays at the tables.

Imagine we're pre-flop, and are wondering whether to call,

raise, or fold to a low-Level Reg's re-raise:

Stage 1
(Level 3) ... My perceived range is 99+, AJ+
(Level 2) … Villains range is JJ+, AQ+
(Level 1) … I actually have KK.
He has raised me 15 chips and has 75 left. I have 90 chips. And
there are 35 in the pot.

Stage 2
If I opt to re-re-raise all in...
YADI JAVADI

The price of the play is 90, if he calls the pot will contain 200
chips.

My perceived range will become QQ+, AK.

So, the villains:

AK will call and I'll win around 70% of the time. From the 200 in
the pot, I win 140. The play costs 90, so my profit is 50.

AQ will fold, my perceived range is too strong and the price too
high. So, I will win 35.

AA will beat me almost every time so I lose - 90

QQ loses to me almost every time so I make 200 - 90 = 110

JJ is a little tricky to pinpoint. I don’t know if he will fold or not

as he is getting about the right price to call against my perceived
range. Let's guess that I'll get around 70 in profit from this hand.

AK and AQ will appear around 3 times more often than the pocket
pairs, and so here is the final sum:

(AK) 50 x 3 = 150
(AQ) 35 x 3 = 105
150 + 105 - 90 + 110 + 70 = 345
345 divided by these 9 instances = average profit of close to 40

If I opt to call…

The current price is 15, the pot will be 50.

My perceived range will be TT - JJ, AJs – AQ

 THE LEVELS

… So, against;

AK – I will almost always win provided we don’t see an Ace

which will appear around 1 in 5 times. So, 1 in 5 times I lose 15.
And then 4 out of the 5 times I will not only win the 50, I also win
an extra 25 or so when he makes an inevitable bluff against my
future perceived range. So, let’s say we make 75 when we win.
75 x 4 = 300...... 300 - 15 = 285....... 285 / 5 instances = 60ish
The price of the play is 15 so on average, I will make around 45
against this hand with the call.

AQ - I win even more than I do with the AK because if he hits

any of the Queen's in the future he is probably going to put in all
his money. Those A high boards are still bad though. So, 1 in 5
times I lose 10... 3 in 5 times I win 75... 1 in 5 times I win 110.
3 x 75 = 225...... 225 – 10 + 110 = 325...... 325 / 5 instances = 65
The price of the play is 15 so on average, so we make around 50
from this hand.

AA - I lose, but maybe not a full stack. Let’s guess my losses at

around 70 on average against this hand.

Against QQ - I win about the same as against AA, but he could

bluff me on those A high boards. So, let’s say that I make around
50 from this hand.

Against JJ I win on average, but he could bluff me with it on those

A high boards again. So again, let’s say we make around 50 on
average.

(AK) 45 x 3 = 135
(AQ) 50 x 3 = 150
135 + 150 - 70 + 50 + 50 = 385
We then divide this by 9 instances and we find that we will make
almost 45 chips profit from the call.
YADI JAVADI

Stage 3

In this spot, we appear to make slightly more from the call on

average, and so we call.

*****

This calculation is very difficult to do accurately at the tables.

In this example, I even left out parts of the sum to make it
easier for you to read -
We don’t know if the opponent will bluff us with his missed hand
which would change our winnings.
I haven't accounted for the times the opponent hits his AK on the
river and continues betting. Which would lessen our winnings
with the call against AK.
I haven't accounted for the times the board brings that last King.
I haven't calculated for all kinds of small factors which would
slightly change our winnings.
In this example, with this calculation, we should call, but this is a
very close call and if we were to go into more detail regarding
those future cards and future moves against any specific villain
we may well find that the raise is the preferable play.

The way I would calculate all this at the tables is much easier
I would always omit as much of the sum as possible.
In this example we're clearly making loads of Level Two profit
with our KK and so are not folding. Therefore, all we need to do
is compare our profitable plays to see which is better:
AA beats us about the same regardless of whether we call or raise,
and so we can forget about that hand.
 THE LEVELS

AK gives us about the same profit too, so we can forget about that
hand too.
These two hands are not important to us, because they don’t help
us tell which play is better: The call or the raise. What we need to
do is find the benefits in making each of these profitable plays.
The QQ and JJ in his range are important to us, because we think
we can get more money from them if we raise.
But the AQ will give us more if we call.
We know that the two pocket pairs come up nearly as often as the
AQ, so can see that both benefits are offer similar rewards.
Without three pages full of math we can already guess that both
plays offer quite similar profits!
The full-equations above are important to be aware of, but you
don’t need to do any of them accurately at the tables. As always,
accuracy is useful, but trying to put a number on your profit is
usually a waste of time. That sum is huge, and our mind already
has its own method.
All we do is weigh up our options.
We weigh up our win-chance against the price to see if we can
make any value. We add to the scales the money we gain by
making our opponent fold. If, together, these two types of profit
cannot cover the price, we fold ourselves. If instead we are able
to make profit, we then weigh up one profitable play against
another to see which is more valuable.
We just weigh up everything.
The only thing our mind needs is some weights. Some strengths,
or some values.

In our minds we don’t need a number to tell us that one play

is more profitable than another
In my mind, when I’m playing, I always picture the villains range
and then it’s almost as though I see the hands coloured either
green or red depending on whether I expect to win or lose from it.
The brighter the colour, the more I expect to win or lose from that
hand.
YADI JAVADI

As I trowel through all the different future cards and future moves
I see those hands turning brighter or duller as I start to think they
will be worth more or less.
All I need to do then is weigh up the red hands vs the green and if
I can't get out of the red I fold. The more green I see, the better I
think the play will be.

Instead of calculating the numbers accurately, it’s usually far

more important to consider our opponent and all the potential
future actions more accurately
In this example, if we were up against the kind of opponent who
would always bluff his missed AQ and is likely to be gentle with
his QQ when we saw an Ace high flop, the call will be the play
that I chose.
If I had positional advantage and was up against a player who is
likely to slow play the AA post-flop and thus save me a load of
money then I would probably make the call to keep things cheap.
If the player goes mad with his AK post-flop when he's missed,
then I will probably call.
If the player has some chance of calling our raise with some low
pair hands then I will raise.

If you’re up against multiple opponents you consider

everything in the exact same way
With more players in the pot, there are simply more ranges to
consider, more chip stacks, more future possibilities, etc etc.
Whether you’re in a casino, or playing online, whether you know
lots about the opponent or a little, you always consider everything
in exactly the same way.

To weigh up our options whenever we make a poker decision

is surprisingly easy to do once you get your head around all
the simple steps in this book
I do understand that chapters like this can be confusing, but to be
a great player all you need to do is spend a few minutes making
 THE LEVELS

sense of those calculations and then the rest will come naturally
to you.
After a little practice you should feel confident following both
your perceived range and the villain’s range to some degree of
accuracy.
With a little more practice, you will feel comfortable pre-empting
the changes to those ranges and designing plays that will, on
average, make you money.
The only thing that takes time to learn is accuracy, but accuracy
is something that we will be developing forever.
To be a Level Three player you need only be aware of these
factors to some degree of accuracy, as soon as you can do that
you will suddenly realise that you are comfortable playing Poker.
For the most part, you will have learnt how to strategize in this
game.
You will have completely unlocked Level Three in your mind,
and should easily be able to make money from your poker play.
Provided, of course, you can keep your head.

Step 12 – Select your plays by weighing

up your profitable options against each
other to see which will make you the most
profit. If you can’t find a profitable play,
fold.
YADI JAVADI

OUR PERCEIVED BODY/EMOTIONS

I have no qualms about pretending to the opponent that I, myself,
am under mental distress. This is quite fun, and it’s easy enough
to do, either online or at a casino.
If I've lost a big hand before hitting something strong I will often
pretend that I am perturbed. I might start betting big, and fast.
People are far more likely to put money in the pot with a weaker
hand if they think we're tilting. If we hit some good strong hands
quickly after losing big we can quite often win back all our losses
in mere minutes.

In live games we have far more of an opportunity to deceive

our opponent using our perceived emotions
You need to be somewhat of an actor.
Weaker players are certainly highly susceptible to this form of
deception. We might "Tut" again, or say something like "Oh man,
what a load of *****".
We really can lead players into believing whatever it is that we
want about our range depending on how well we can act it out.

In live games, you have to love doing little fakeys

I’ll sometimes make it look like I’ve completely missed and then
‘accidentally’ go to throw my cards away while the opponent is
still taking his move. If the opponent notices, as planned, I might
well see his face light up as he bluffs away the last of his chips,
followed by the disappointed bafflement when I call and show
him strength.
This type of fake is more effective if you're able to gauge the
opponent’s reaction to it. If he sees that you're giving up but
doesn't get excited and instead looks disappointed we might well
presume that he has a strong hand instead.
 THE LEVELS

We can do other fakeys too.

Another one I like is smoothly making it look like I'm about to bet
before it’s my turn. The opponent then thinks that I'm bound to
make a bet and so he checks to me and then I frown, change my
mind, and sheepishly checking it back.

We can toy with the opponents understanding of our strength

in all kinds of ways using our body language/perceived
emotions, but again, I do still feel it’s important to remind you
that we are entertaining our opponents.
We don’t want our them to walk away demoralized. We want
them to feel exhilarated so that they come back to our table time
and time again.
You do not benefit from humiliating them once you obliterate
them. You do benefit from being a gentleman, or a lady. Just
shake their hand or offer them commiseration with a smooth
confident smile.
We’re already taking their money, it’s only fair to let them leave
with their dignity.

It is fun to mess with the opponents understanding of strength

using your emotions/body language in live games
But if you don’t feel confident doing this, you could use an old
trick to prevent the opponent making any physical read on you.
You could do what they call 'the pot stare'.
If we simply stare at the pot while playing, or concentrate on
making very few movements or signals what so ever, we would
stop him reading anything regarding our range from our physical
actions.
Unfortunately, if we do adopt the pot stare or something similar
we would lose some of our control over the opponent. We also
miss out on all the fun!
YADI JAVADI

LEVEL FOUR

Relates to our opponent’s perceived attributes (The range of

cards he’s pretending to hold)

Level Four is the last Level that gives us an advantage over

our imperfect opponent
At Level Four we realise that the opponent has the ability to
pretend to hold different cards to that which his actions lead us to
believe.
We realise that he could be bluffing.
We realise that he could have pre-adjusted his range.
The way we consider this new development is by considering a
 THE LEVELS

new range for the opponent. A range consisting of the cards he is

pretending to hold.
We can now consider that which our opponent is pretending to
hold alongside our own perceived range to make a more accurate
assumption about what he's actually holding:

• If he's competent at Level Three, and is trying to make

himself look as though he has a strong hand while we look
weak, the chances are that he holds something weak and
is attempting to make us fold.

• If this same player is trying to make himself look weak

while we look weak ourselves, we'd expect that he's
attempting to make value off his strong cards.

Very few opponents are consciously aware of their perceived

attributes so we don’t often need to go into much detail
regarding Level Four while sat at the Poker tables
However, all our opponents are naturally capable of deception,
and so Level Four is potentially always a factor

Before considering what the opponent really holds, we can

now consider both our perceived range and what the
opponent is pretending to hold
The range which we would have previously assigned the
opponent at Level Two now becomes his Level Four range;
He has now become aware of it.
He knows what it looks like he’s doing.
This known range no longer represents what we think the villain
really holds, instead it represents what the villain's pretending to
hold.
We then consider for a second time what it might be that the
villain really has.
This is easier to understand when matched up to the diagram
The first of the distorted squares, our standard perception of the
opponent, has moved up a place and has become known to both
YADI JAVADI

players.
This range becomes the villain’s pretend range.
It is then replaced with the new shape, our new presumption of
the villain’s actual range which has extra layers of distortions
brought about by the extra range that is required for its creation.

These new developments don’t change our game plan a great

deal
This pretend range is usually very similar to the villain’s actual
range, so you don’t have to concoct a whole new range in your
head for Level Four. All you need to do guess how this range will
differ from the villains Level Two range.
The opponent may still be playing his cards in a straightforward
manner if he thinks it's the play that will make him the most
money. He might be making a straight forward play. They won’t
always be trying to decieve us, but, in every situation most players
would try to bluff/pre-adjust with some part of their range

Now that we're aware that the villain is capable of bluffing we

become capable of inducing his bluffs which adds yet another
dimension to the profits we can make in the game
We can now lure the opponent into bluffing us by making our
range look weak which will make us extra value.
Or we can lure him into pretending to be weak with his strong
hands which will help us keep the pot small in a situation where
we expect we could lose more.

Even though it appears there are additional chips to be made

once we can consider Level Four, there are actually less
We have found more ways in which we can make money from the
opponent, but we have also realised that the opponent is capable
of a higher Level of thought.
At each Level of the opponent’s development we lose potential
profit.
Gradually, as the opponent becomes more proficient at the Levels,
we lose more and more of our advantage over him.
 THE LEVELS

Another thing that holds back our profit is the fact that the
game has become more complicated
There are more factors to consider. There are more twists and
turns in the theory. There is another layer of logic attached to
everything.
Writing a chapter on Level Four is insanely difficult!
The best theorists before me could write little more than one line
on Level Four, and even this would usually be twisted crazy talk:

“At Level Four you consider what you think the opponent thinks
you think that he holds”

Huh!? Before I came along this is how they describe the Level
Four range! I’m the first to realise that this is the range the
opponent is pretending to hold.
(If you don’t believe that cognitive dissonance is obliterating the
minds of poker players, have a think about that last point.)
This chapter contains extremely advanced theory. I do hope that
it sounds simple, but it is not! This Level is complicated, which
makes it difficult to consciously breakdown.
I haven’t fully cracked Level Four. I suspect that this Level is
somehow tied into future-present but I can’t work out the details.
I can’t work out exactly when you need to think through the Level
Four factors; I think that to do this you need to add a new
dimension to the entire thought-process.
What’s weird is that we can all naturally make these calculations
easily. Once you become capable of considering the additional
range, what the villain is pretending to hold, you'll be able to
explore all the possibilities for yourself as you create your own
counters to your opponent’s deception in real time whilst you
play.

I will explain to you how Level Four logic effects our most
simplistic hand selection
This will give you a better grasp of the changes that will occur
YADI JAVADI

once you become capable of calculating this penultimate level:

• At Level Two we're playing hands that are stronger than

our opponents.

• At Level Three we split up our actual range adding hands

which the opponent is unaware of.

• At Level Four we need to create an extra split in our range.

We need to play the cards which take value from the cards
which the villain is playing that he expects we are unaware
of.

If the opponent is slyly playing 56s – 9Ts, then we might add

hands like 55 and 66 to our actual range. Perhaps TJ or TQ.
It’s completely up to you and depends on the range the opponent
is using, what he’s like, how many chips he has, what he might
do in the future etc, etc.
Everything depends on everything.

You might be interested to hear that Level Four is nowhere

near as profound as Levels Two and Three
Even if you're an experienced player, when you come to recognise
the importance of this Level you won’t notice that enlightened
feeling as intensely as you did for the other Levels.
We don’t come to realise anything as profound as empathy or
awareness here, and so Level Four isn't nearly as exciting as the
lower levels.
Having said that, when we recognise Level Four we do acquire
one significant skill.
For the first time we're able to see the pattern that exists between
the levels.
Once we reach Level Four, for the first time, we become capable
of understanding all the Levels.
We become capable of understanding all Poker
It was only once I'd recognized this Level that I was able to
 THE LEVELS

separate the first three into their proper groups.

I hadn’t pinpointed Level One prior to recognizing Level Four.
Level Four holds all the keys to understanding all the laws that
separate these Levels..
Once you become aware of this Level for your specific game you
can see for yourself how the Levels co-exist and this makes you
capable of breaking down any play at any Level.
Once you reach this Level, you're fully ready to play against
anybody. All the Levels become unlocked and you’ll have very
few problems consciously using the minds strategic formula
whenever you are playing your game.
Strangely, at this point, we suddenly begin to see the Levels all
around us.
Which really is rather surreal…

When I read through all the statements in Sun Tzu's famous

strategy book ‘The Art of War’ I was instantly able to match
up each piece of strategic advice with its corresponding Level
After completing this task I actually re-read the entire book more
carefully as I felt that it'd been way too easy.
But sure enough, after the second time through I came to the exact
same conclusion – Sun Tzu, the greatest strategist of all time, only
recognized as high as Level Three.
To be more precise, he reached a Level Three understanding of
war and then he attempted Level Infinity. He missed out Level
Four.
If you've heard of Sun Tzu you will probably think I'm being
arrogant. I thought so myself!
And so I went over the evidence again and again.
I discussed it with others.
I searched outside the box for a solution thinking that perhaps
something had been lost in the translation.
Yet still I found nothing to contend with my first assumption.
I could only conclude one thing – Sun Tzu was a Level Three
player.
It’s quite clear to see.
YADI JAVADI

He doesn’t mention any factor in his book that relates to Level

Four, which isn’t damning evidence, but he also made a clear
mistake. A mistake that a Level Four player would never make.
He appears to have been suffering from cognitive dissonance
when he wrote it out. It’s almost painful to read. It’s like you can
hear the groan of his tone. He sounds troubled, (perhaps due to
losing troops in the past). He sounds unhappy with his own
advice.
Even a beginner can see the flaws in his logic yet he himself was
unable to comprehend it.
See for yourself.
The mistake I’m speaking of is in this statement:
“If the enemy leaves a door open, you must rush in.”
Do you think we could destroy Sun Tzu’s entire army by leaving
a door open that led off a cliff!?
The answer is obviously no.
The reason why the answer is no is because Sun Tzu would
subconsciously be capable of Level Four.
He would quickly realise that we had deceived him, he would see
his mistake in this situation and would not force his army to jump
to their death.
I do wonder though, how many times I could leave different doors
open before he realised that his logic was flawed.
Any situation where he faced a door would allow us an advantage
over this man in a battle, but there are many more situations
possible in war than are possible in Poker.
For each individual situation we could apply Level Three logic or
above against Sun Tzu and we would eventually obliterate him.
Just like we would at the poker tables.
All warfare is based on deception… Hmmm… Sounds to me like
Sun Tzu had too much pride.

Step 13 - Consider the cards that the

villain is pretending to hold.
 THE LEVELS

LEVEL FIVE

Relates to what the opponent thinks we’re pretending to hold

Now that both we and the opponent are capable of understanding

all the different factors relating to both of our perceptions of each
other, we finally become capable of knowing one another.
There is no longer any advantage to be gained from applying a
higher level of thought than the opponent's aware of because we're
both aware of all levels of thought.
We are both fully aware that the other is capable of deceiving us
and so the deception we once relied on suddenly dies.
YADI JAVADI

We both now know what we are both capable of.

When two excellent players square off against each other
anything can happen. The whole game opens up. There is literally
so much that each person is capable of doing!

Level Five adds to our deliberations the standard changes that

we come to expect from a higher level
In the diagram, our Level Three range moves up a place and we
consider an extra range.
Our own pretend range.
We also gain an extra level of bluffing capability. We now know
that the opponent is aware of our perceived range, so we can now
pretend to bluff rather than actually bluff.
(If we’re against an opponent who is competent at Level Four he
will be completely aware that we're capable of this and so the
advantages are minimal).

Once we reach Level Five the thing that becomes most

valuable is accuracy
Not only in our mathematical equations but also: How accurately
we understand the opponent. How accurately we visualise
ourselves from the opponent’s perspective. Etc Etc.
Every single factor I've described in this book becomes a platform
on which we utilise all our strengths or weaknesses as a person to
gain or lose accuracy.
If we have a keen attention to detail then we'll find it easy to notice
subtle differences in the opponent’s plays which will help us
break down his range.
If we’re creative, we'll be able to design more effective lines.
If we're arrogant we'll often be misled.
Every player needs to deal with emotions on a day to day basis
and so wisdom becomes very important by the time we reach this
Level.
No matter how skilled he is, no matter how well he knows us, if
he's easily frustrated then he will not be able to calculate all that
he must in order to defeat us. If we are the cooler player, we will
 THE LEVELS

hold the advantage.

At Level Five the strategy we use to select our plays changes

for the last time
For the first time, we find reason to play the same hands in the
same situations but in different ways.
We now benefit from adopting a mixed strategy with our range.
Sometimes we play our hand one way, other times we benefit
from playing it a different way.
Our opponent understands all our moves and so we mix up our
plays to make it as difficult as possible for him to know what we
hold.

In regard to our basic hand selection, we now need to add an

extra split in our actual range
We do this in the same way as we’d come to expect from the other
Levels except now we would also mix-up our strategy with
individual hands.
Sometimes we'd raise our AA, sometimes we'd call with it.
By the time we’re capable of this Level we realise that we, or the
opponent, could be playing any reasonable hand in any way at any
time.
It's no longer a matter of whether or not we think the
opponent would have chosen to play a certain hand a certain
way, but rather the chance that he might have chosen to play
it that way
The likelihood that he would hold certain hands depends mostly
on the strength of those hands.
He would obviously still be certain to play AA pre-flop for the
value come showdown, but now we don't know which way he will
choose to play it. Now theres always some tiny chance that he'd
choose to play 72 as well. Of course, ordinarily, it is extremely
unlikely that the opponent would ever select to play such terrible
cards. If the situation was ideal and the field of opponents perfect
he probably still wouldn’t play them often if at all.
The thing is - By the time we're aware of Level Five we don’t
YADI JAVADI

really need to worry about making mistakes anymore, because we

know that the opponent could well hold anything at any given
time.
We don’t just play random cards. The other levels still haven’t
changed. We’re still trying to beat his range using our cards, our
perceived range, etc etc.
It’s just that there is no longer such a thing as a correct way to
make a specific play anymore.
By the time we are aware of Level Five we will have learnt exactly
how to play Poker in its entirety and so from then on we are free
to just play.

In actual fact, the thing I find most profound about this Level
has very little to do with Poker
I presume it's at this Level that the mind becomes capable of
completing its original task -
At Level Five we truly become capable of understanding any
object in its entirety
That doesn't mean that if you can consider an object at Level Five
then you completely understand it. Rather, it means that once
you're able to consider anything from a Level Five perspective
you become capable of understanding it.
All factors relating to all objects exist within levels Two to Five
Level Six does still exist but nothing changes. There are no new
factors to consider aside from those which we already expect from
a higher Level.
I can only guess as to the real profundity of this information.
Perhaps the people out there who are creating artificial
intelligence will find it fundamental. Perhaps psychologists will
someday realise that it's revolutionary.
As for me, I'm simply aware that this is where the importance of
the exploitative Levels ends.
The entire purpose of creating these Levels was so that we could
understand the effects of our interactions with an unknown object.
At Level Five we truly become capable of it.
 THE LEVELS

Step 14 - Consider our own pretend

range. The cards the opponent thinks
we’re pretending to hold.
YADI JAVADI

THE FAMOUS CONTINUATION BET

I think it’ll be nice to end the exploitative levels with a play,
and there is no play more important than the Cbet

(Now that we've reached Level Five we can add all our bluffs and
the villain’s bluffs to our deliberations. In this coming play, I
could add a description his Level Four range, and we could add
our Level Five range too, but that would be very complex and
would make my lovely page look all messy, so instead, I will
choose an opponent who isn't consciously aware of these factors
so that they won't be much of an issue.)

Let's imagine that we're sat on a 6-seated table and are the first to
act pre-flop when we receive;

We open betting by putting in 4 big blinds, and then we're called

by the button -

The player on the button is very tight, he always plays at these

same $50 cash tables, he's not very creative, he seems to play with
a set strategy pre-flop and mostly for value once the flop comes
down.
(This is easily enough information to tell us that we are most
probably facing a weak Level Two opponent - He doesn’t change
 THE LEVELS

his plays in the early stages of the game, which is weak, and he
doesn’t seem to know how to do anything but shoot for value,
which is Level Two. Most low Level Regs are Level Two! And
this guy is too dull to be aware of Level Three. Any bluffs he
makes will be memorized plays.)

And then the board comes;

Our perceived range: A5s+ (ATo+) , KTs+ (KJo+) , 22+ - 67s+

Villains range: ATs+ (AQo+) , TJs + (KQo+) , 22 - JJ
Chips: 96 each, 11 in the pot.

If we bet around 1/2 pot -

Our perceived range: KTs+ , 33/QQ/KK/AA , Bluffs like AT/TJ

Our perceived range has smashed this flop. Loads of our hands
have hit it. If we now opt to bet this villain will usually think that
our range is strong.
He might also think that we're bluffing with the odd draw.

Villains range:

His ATs and AJs will most probably fold to the bet, and we take
the pot.
All those missed pocket pairs are almost certain to fold to the bet,
and we take the pot.
TJ will continue, and I think we will most probably lose to it in
the future. He will probably bluff us off our hand even if he misses
YADI JAVADI

his draw.
KQ will continue also, and obviously there is the rare 33 too.
His AK, which he might well have raised preflop, and his AQ are
an annoying part of his range. They will probably just call against
our perceived range and then eventually beat us.

I can't see many reasons for us to put any more money in the pot
on any future card other than the 5, which only comes one in ten
times, and so implied profits don’t look much different from our
current profits.

To summarize - It looks like he is going to fold to our bet with

almost half of his range, and, as the price of the play is 2:1 we are
making money!

If we don't bet -

Our perceived range may contain a Queen, but mostly, it looks

like we've completely missed and are scared that he has hit. We’re
not attempting to protect our medium strength hand. We’re not
attempting to take value with a strong hand. We look like we have
a weak pair or air.
His entire range will destroy our 55 with all his future plays. If
we check, even this guy will realize that he can bluff us if he needs
to.

Solution is simple. We bet.

*****

The Continuation bet is among the first plays that any

professional player learns
If we're the last player to raise up the price before the flop, when
the flop does come down we will be the only player at the table
whose standard perceived range contains all those AA type
monster hands. If we are to then continue betting, it scares many
 THE LEVELS

an opponent into folding more than they should.

The Cbet is a very common play, and so many opponents do have
ways to play back against it, but not many know how to play back
well.
If they don't understand all the poker theory that I have described
then they are sure to make loads of mistakes.
Most players don't read boards properly - they don't consciously
consider how often any particular range hits.
They don’t change their plays against at individual players.
They don’t follow the ranges properly.
Etc, etc, etc…
You’re going to walk all over all of them.
Usually your opponent will have simply memorized specific
situations where they can play back against your Cbets. They will
memorize boards which they can attack. They will memorise
specific plays. If you can figure out which plays he has
memorized for which situations you can destroy him even more
efficiently than usual.
YADI JAVADI

LEVEL INFINITY

The dark Level.

In 1950 a man called John Nash discovered a mathematical
solution known as 'The Nash Equilibrium'. From this equilibrium
he could derive a strategy for games that is unbeatable.
Nash had found Level Infinity.
We poker players were quick to adopt the strategy and over the
decades we've gradually refined our understanding of it.
Nowadays it’s known to the poker world as GTO. Game Theory
Optimal.
Sounds awesome...
To calculate a play at this Level, to calculate a GTO play, we need
to follow a range which I haven't really highlighted yet; Our
actual range. All the hands that we could actually hold in any
given situation.
Unsurprisingly, every single one of us is already familiar with this
new range. We use it often.
Anytime we consider any general strategy. Anytime we think, "I
will play more aggressively”, we are designing a strategy using
our actual range. Anytime we design a strategy against a specific
player, we concoct it using our actual range. Any work we do off
the table, analysing players to create strategies is all completed
using our actual range.
To use the exploitative knowledge in this book you don’t need to
consider your actual range at all. You will be using your actual
range to do these off the table deliberations, but none of that is
essential. It’s a complete waste your time to look at your actual
range in detail whilst making an exploitative decision. When you
 THE LEVELS

look down at AA, it’s a waste of time to work out what you would
do if instead you had JQ, or QK! To an exploitative player,
considering the actual range whilst playing is madness.
GTO players do need to consider their actual range in order to
concoct their strategy. Because GTO is just a general strategy like
any other.

Except this one's different. John Nash came up with a strategy

that could not be beaten
Using the exploitative theory as I‘ve described it, you can see
what he worked out.
He basically realised that as the Levels advance the actual hands
selected for the plays become more and more balanced between
strong hands and weak hands. He then noticed that the natural end
point is where each player would have as close to an equal amount
of strength and weakness in their actual range as is possible in any
given situation.
What Nash had realised was that if we hold an equal amount of
strength to weakness at any given time there is literally nothing
the opponent can do to beat us.
Imagine it like this.
Imagine the opponent tells us exactly what his actual range is
going to be.
Yet instead of telling us that he will have a strong range or a weak
range he tells us that he will have exactly the same amount of
strong hands as he does weak regardless of what we do.
There becomes nothing we can do.
On average, we can't bluff him with any benefit to ourselves; we
can’t play for value with any benefit to ourselves.
The only thing that we can do is exactly the same as that which
he is doing. We are forced to balance our own range.

This wouldn’t be the end of the world if GTO were as good as

it sounds, but it is not
The way it works is by sucking all the profit out of the exploitative
Levels.
YADI JAVADI

If it’s us that is applying this strategy our opponent can gain no

advantage by applying Level Two, which does sound amazing,
but, there is a MASSIVE drawback: If we’re applying this
strategy then we ourselves can't gain any profit from Level Three!
We throw all our deception out the window.
We lose all our control over the opponent.
If either myself or my opponent is applying Level Infinity then all
the potential profit from all the other Levels disappears for both
of us.
The only way any profit could be made is when one player or the
other diverts from equilibrium and even then, the profit margins
are minimal.

GTO is only supposed to be used a defensive strategy, a base

strategy, which is only supposed to be employed when there is
no opportunity to exploit
But even in this they've got it wrong.
There is always an opportunity to exploit.
No human is capable of perfecting a GTO strategy in No-Limit
Holdem. There are too many situations that could arise, too many
different factors you’d need to consider. Nobody can perfect this
strategy which means that we can always exploit even those who
try.
Every GTO player I ever met claims that the best time to use this
unbeatable strategy is when you first sit at a new table. They say
that when facing new opponents you will not be able to exploit
them because you have no history with them... (If I have taught
you well, you will see which Level these guys are neglecting)…
The truth is that when we first sit at a table it’s an awesome time
to exploit, because when we first sit at a table the villain doesn’t
know anything about us! These GTO guys clearly don’t properly
understand Level Three.
GTO players have all kinds of reasons for justifying the use of
their strategy and all of their reasons are wrong. They only seem
correct to the player due to the player neglecting some part of
exploitative theory. If anyone understood how to exploit
 THE LEVELS

perfectly, if they understood how to use these other Levels

perfectly, they would never use the GTO strategy.
They would be capable of it, but in any given situation GTO is
always inferior to an exploitative strategy. GTO makes less
money. The only time this perfect player would ever want to use
it is if the opponent were using it, and even then it’d be a waste of
their time as they would make no profit.
There is absolutely no point in ever attempting to play using an
equilibrium strategy. Instead of attempting it, we should spend
our time attempting to exploit.
If we use the exploitative theory as I have described in this book
against a player who is using GTO we would quickly find
ourselves using the GTO strategy. We wouldn’t need to do any of
the GTO calculations. We wouldn’t need to consider all the
different hands that we could hold, we wouldn’t need to think
about our actual range. It wouldn’t matter if we’d never even
heard of GTO! We would still use the same strategy because that
is the best strategy against the villains range.
There are no benefits in attempting to play at GTO.

I can see only two reasons that you might want to learn GTO
I’ve already mentioned that if the opponent is using GTO we need
to use it ourselves or we lose, so, with it being extremely popular
nowadays there is obviously some benefit to understanding what
an equilibrium strategy looks like. It’s useful to know as much
about the opponent’s strategy as you can before sitting at the table
against them.
You could also use GTO as a reference point when designing your
exploitative strategies, but this is by no means essential. It only
helps slightly by giving you short-hand calculations.
These two reasons are minor. And neither of them lead to you
actually applying this strategy. You would still be aiming to avoid
GTO like the plague.

Almost every professional player from my generation tries to

learn GTO and tries to use it as their base strategy
YADI JAVADI

Nowadays most of these guys have absolutely no idea what

they're doing. You see, to make a GTO play in this day and age
you don’t actually need to know how to make a GTO play.
If you did want to calculate your GTO play you would have to
consider your actual range and balance the strength, weakness and
draws in accordance with the price for continuing. Not only that,
but you’d also have to consider all the future changes that may
arise and anticipate the future strength of all your possible hands
so that your range would continue to be balanced as best as
possible regardless of what might happen.
This is not easy to calculate! It's so difficult that the Nash solution
to No Limit Holdem has only recently been discovered. Well,
technically, it’s not true to say that they've found the Nash
solution to the most popular version of Poker, but by using an
obscure equation they seem to have gotten so close that they
might as well have done.
Since then, computer programs have been developed which allow
the users to compare their plays with the GTO play.
These programs enable players to memorise GTO plays without
learning the first thing about Poker theory.
As the player memorises more and more Level Infinity solutions
to different situations they slowly learn to balance their actual
range.

If you’re fully aware of the exploitative Levels I can see no

reason why memorising GTO plays would have any
unpleasant side effects
But if you are not fully aware of each Level, memorising these
plays will quickly make it more and more difficult for you to
approach your missing pieces of theory.
Not only would you have knowledge of plays blocking your
understanding of the Levels, you would have extremely
trustworthy knowledge blocking you. Extremely trustworthy
knowledge that is perfectly completely wrong.
A GTO play is the one and only play that we would never want to
make. Using the exploitative Levels you will always find a reason
 THE LEVELS

not to use GTO which means that it always causes conflict with
the natural thought-process. This makes GTO consistently a
reliable refuge where players can hide from their exploitative
shortcomings.
Basically, if we build trust in Level Infinity plays before
understanding the other Levels, it is catastrophic for the mind!
Cognitive dissonance goes into turbo mode.
If you speak to a Level Two player who has spent many years
memorising unbeatable GTO plays, you won’t be able to mention
Level Three factors without them ripping off your head and
spewing down your throat. They themselves are missing out on
all the profit from Level Three, but if you try to teach them, they
go mental. They turn on you.
These guys can’t even comprehend the control they're forsaking
by memorising thousands upon thousands of unbeatable Level
Infinity plays! In their ignorance they are ruining their entire
poker career and they are ruining the game for all of us. By
applying GTO when it’s clearly not needed, these guys are
minimizing the potential profit on the table as a whole.
Not only are they themselves missing out on a shedload of cash,
all the players at the table are missing out on cash.
The casino’s are missing out.
The entire Poker market has its feet swept from under it.

These GTO based players often become abusive when you try
to teach them, but they are also calculated in their approach
Their primary goal here isn’t to hurt anyone’s feelings. What they
are doing is trying to reassure themselves that GTO is superior
than the specific section of exploitative theory that they are
personally missing. Their goal is to discredit the problematic
exploitative theory.
They will often disagree with one-another about what the
problematic piece of theory is, but this doesn’t stop them ganging
together to promote GTO and beat down anybody who disagrees
with it.
What makes speaking with these players extremely surreal is that
YADI JAVADI

they have no idea what they are doing. I can see as their own
minds exploit their own mental weaknesses in an attempt to
discredit what I teach them. I see how they concoct complex
twisted arguments which only serve to discredit the one specific
piece of theory that they are missing. When they can find no
problem with the logic, I understand as they turn to attack me.
It’s like their possessed! They come up with crazy complex
reasons to discredit this logic without even realising that that is
what they are trying to do. They are almost completely unaware
of any bullying of exploiters. Most of them don’t even realise that
they are promoting GTO!!!
I swear it's like invasion of the body snatchers out there.
Everyone is singing the praises of GTO to everyone, beginners
are applying it before they even know what GTO stands for. And
if you dare to mention anything in any way advanced about
exploitation then everybody turns on you.
They even call GTO plays "correct" plays!! The majority of them
do know that GTO plays are never the best plays, yet they will
forcefully tell you that these plays are “correct”! It’s madness.
In the very lowest stakes games almost all the regs are attempting
to play with a balanced preflop range nowadays because they've
learnt from some book somewhere that this strategy is correct.
None of these books explain that making this play will massively
decrease the amount of profit that the player stands to make, and
that it will massively complicate everything to boot. The reason
they don't explain things like this is because most of the authors
are all mad on GTO too!
It's literally everywhere.
These GTO players have even changed the definition of a bluff so
that it works for their deception-less style. Which is something I
plan to amend as soon as I can.

Many of the GTO players themselves know that their style is

sucking their own profit from their profession
But they can comprehend no other way to make their plays and so
learn more and more GTO plays.
 THE LEVELS

GTO is a very hard habit to break.

And it’s not only the poker players who are using it.
Game theory is huge nowadays and equilibrium strategies are a
fundamental aspect of it.
Stock brokers, economists, businessmen, strategists of all kinds.
All these rather important people use game theory nowadays and
I would bet a pretty penny that many of them are accidentally
spewing our society away.
If these guys are learning Level Infinity strategies before
understanding the other Levels then I expect they will play at
Level Infinity needlessly even if they know full well that it is
killing their particular profession.
I don’t know these other industries well, but I did read an
economics textbook meant for university students in which they
described the exploitative players as arrogant fools.
I suspect that GTO is a huge problem in the financial world of
today.
Level Infinity is like The Anti-Game.
It relentlessly consumes the life blood of games, spreading from
player to player eating up all the potential profit until there is none
left.
It rapidly decays everything it touches, and by teaming up with
cognitive dissonance it even corrupts the players to increase its
own growth rate.

Fending off John Nash's beautiful mind and educating the

world regarding the true effects of his equilibrium strategy
has been among my primary goals over these last few years
Surely Nash himself must have seen that this thing was dark??
If you’ve seen the movie you will know how dark the
circumstances surrounding his discovery were. He came across
one piece of the puzzle whilst witnessing a woman being attacked.
Another piece of the puzzle he discovered whilst trying to seduce
women. And all the while he had been getting support from what
turned out to be apparitions!
Nash is a legend, amazingly impressive in all kinds of ways, but
YADI JAVADI

WHAT THE F***! It was a crazy person who gave birth to this
madness which is now sweeping the globe silently destroying
everything it touches. An ingenious madness that exploits a
players weaknesses luring them into secretly defending its
existence! What in the hell!! This belongs in a movie. Not in real
life.
I wish I could have discussed all this stuff with Nash himself, but,
on the day I finalised the diagram that carries this book, the
remarkable John Nash and his wife died in a car accident.

If the unbeatable strategy has dominated over a game, there

are three things that we can do;
1) When GTO took over online chess, the players stopped playing
and played something else.
When it took over backgammon, the players stopped playing and
played something else.
When you play tic-tac-toe, (noughts and crosses), equilibrium is
quickly realised by both players and it isn’t long before every
game ends in a draw. So what do we do? We stop playing. We
play something else.
The most obvious way of overcoming this equilibrium is to stop
playing the game. Pull out our assets and move them over to a
different game.
2) The second way is to teach players how to exploit. This will
widen the gap between a beginner and GTO which will improve
the games potential for profit and thus extend its lifespan.
3) Or, finally, we can introduce new rules. These will extend the
lifespan of games, but more importantly, they can also be used to
take control of GTO.

Now that GTO has been deciphered it isn’t very hard for a
casino to ban the players from attempting to use GTO
This new rule will instantly make the unbeatable strategy
obsolete.
I suspect that a similar rule will trigger the next major
advancement in the professional world of Poker. As soon as it is
 THE LEVELS

introduced a new generation of Poker player will find their games.

We will all be able to continue playing the game we love without
programmed players ruining it for us all.
GTO will be a thing of the past. And we’ll all make loads of profit.

When I think about the financial world, I can't come up with

any reason to continue using money (trade)
We should stop playing this silly game. We should pull out our
assets and play something else. We should find some other way
to reward each other for our efforts.
I'm not talking about communism or socialism, I'm talking about
capitalism without the money. Otherwise known as paradise.
Instead of a system based on debt where everyone is owed for
their efforts we can easily flip it all around and make a system
based on generosity.
A central database that records everyone's contributions to society
as well as their requests from society could well replace trade all
together. To promote generosity, we simply rate everyone’s
contributions, and when a contributor trades with another, their
overall rating goes down.
Simple. I reckon this will work far more effectively than our
current system.
I might well make it into a website myself, but that does seem
beside the point. I’m not a web developer. In this new world it
will be a web developer who contributes the website.
If you currently make websites for a living, or are into branding,
then please do move forward with this plan. Once your sites up
and running I’ll put up my contribution and I’m sure it will earn
me many a reward.

Final Step – Learn strategies and plays.

From books, from coaches, and most
YADI JAVADI

importantly, from your opponents.

If you feel the need to learn GTO, first
ensure that you fully understand
everything else in this book.
 THE LEVELS

ONE LAST THEORY

Buddha said that all physical things are manifested by the mind.
If we’re going so far as to say that this formula holds an
unrecognised yet fundamental place in the manifestation of all
physical things, it wouldn’t be much more of a stretch to say that
by analysing this formula we could work out how and why all
things are manifested.
Everything I’ve learnt about the Levels matches up to what I
learnt through Buddhism. As you learn one, you are learning the
other:
Buddha said that from ignorance comes trust in wrong
knowledge, from this trust comes all our pain and suffering. It’s
the same in Poker.
Buddha also said that to understand the truth is to have no
suffering. If we are able to understand nothing more than the self,
then all our pain will disappear.
YADI JAVADI

As we advance through the Levels our mind develops new

abilities-

• At Level One we learn about our strength and our

capabilities.
• At Level Two we learn about our opponent and how to
defend against him.
• At Level Three we learn about our image and how to
attack.
• At Level Four we learn how the Levels work, and how to
counter our opponents attacks.
• At Level Five we become capable of matching any
opponent.

All of these advancements have an interesting goal in common.

They all serve to help us understand Level One.
Our self.
A new secret regarding our self is revealed at each new Level and
then by the end we learn what to do with ourselves.

The second I noticed Level Infinity I was surprised to see that

it held one last Level One secret
A strange secret.
This is not completely unknown to the poker world. Many
professionals have already heard of it and they don’t think it
particularly profound.
To me though, it made too much sense…
Level Infinity, seems to be, completely identical to Level One
If a person were to play Level Two perfectly they'd need to be
capable of playing all the other Levels perfectly as well. If a
person was to play Level One perfectly they'd not need any of the
other Levels, they would simply be playing at Level Infinity.
One and Infinity are the same…
And that got me thinking. What if the object, our opponent, was
 THE LEVELS

What if the opponent had all possible attributes and performed

every manoeuvre perfectly.
What if our opponent were some kind of God.
This is obviously the best opponent we could pit ourselves against
but to see the full potential of the minds formula we would also
need to consider ourselves starting off as nothing.
So…
Nothing vs Infinity.
0 vs 1 perhaps???

When I fed these entities into that diagram it seemed as

though I could see a story emerge
A story of how a non-existent entity becomes an infinite being.
From a grain of dust to a living thinking person.
All so that someday we would become an equal to some kind of
Infinite ‘thing'???
The next number in this sequence, (representing Level Two) would be
the number 1.
0 1 1…. The first three numbers in the Fibonacci Sequence… This
story was starting to make way too much sense.
The Fibonacci sequence is a numerical pattern which currently
befuddles scientists. Perhaps you’ve heard of the golden ratio,
which is basically the same thing. The entire universe was made
with this golden ratio in mind but nobody knows why this has
happened.

The number sequence goes like this…

0 , 1 / 1 , 2 , 3 , 5 , 8 , 13 … with no end.
The line / that I added shows the divide between the real and the
imagined if we were to feed this Fibonacci number sequence into
the minds formula.
That which is on the right would be the mind’s way of making
sense of that which is on the left. The numbers on the right would
be an imagined reflection of those on left.
The number 0 would relate to nothing.
The number 1 would relate to everything, or infinity.
YADI JAVADI

The number 2 relates to two infinities, as the mind divides infinity

into bitesize chunks.
And the number that we normally call infinity would be the
imagined reflection of 0, as infinity is divided into nothing.
Perhaps this is how numbers should really be understood?
Perhaps all numbers are equal to infinity?

I then laid the newly filled in diagram over Pascal's Triangle,

another fundamental numerical pattern, and found that the
numbers matched up to give you an image
An image which I honestly believe could be an accurate
interpretation of the mind.
I compared the different images generated as the mind advances
through the Levels and it honesly felt like I could see the stages
of the minds evolution as it gave birth to all things in both heaven
and earth.
I honestly now believe that the mind could be accurately
perceived as a pyramid inside a cube.
In light of this revelation, I decided to completely abandon this
line of study before I went completely insane! All of it was based
on a guess that was vague at the best of times. I’m no
mathematician. I don’t know if the number One could be identical
to Infinity. I don’t know if all those numbers could be imagined.
All I have to go on is this voice in my head telling me that all of
this makes sense alongside everything else I have come to believe
is most likely true.
If nothing more, crazy theories like this show us just how far the
applications of this formula might stretch.

The mind is everywhere, it's in everything we see and

everything that we do
Maybe the real goal for life is to become an equal to some kind of
infinite being.
Perhaps all the trust we're putting in science is actually blocking
us from recognising our true cognitive capabilities.
Rules that we've come to know, like gravity and time, might be
 THE LEVELS

restricting our true potential.

Maybe, if we quiet our mind, we will realise that cause and effect
don’t work the way we think they do. That time is not
omnipresent.
We might then notice that all existence is imagined.
That there is no difference between ourselves and every other
object.
That we already are at one with everything and just haven’t
realised it yet!
Maybe all the emotions we experience every day are caused
by cognitive dissonance because in truth, our God-like mind
already understands all the things that we cannot yet
comprehend
Maybe the bibles and those prophets got it right.
Maybe we’re all the same Adam, sitting under a tree, wondering
why we’re perfect.
Maybe Buddha really did crack it all.
Maybe he became an equal to a God… or… maybe he didn’t.
We mere mortals can but guess.
Everything effects everything else, so the only way we can be
certain of anything is if we are certain of everything.

In this book all I have done is describe what I’ve learned from
a simple mind game
When I started writing I wanted to teach players how to better
exploit, hoping to release the stranglehold GTO has over the
market. This would be great for all players, but the GTO masses
didn’t see it that way.
They waged war with me.
They stalk me to this day. They attack my every sentence. They
run every forum. They advise every casino. They edit all Poker
magazines. They are the bane of my life.
It’s not the GTO players themselves that are the problem, they
clearly have no idea what they’re doing. I can watch as their
subconscious minds twist up the exploitative logic into crazy
complex ramblings. I can see their frustration as they try to make
YADI JAVADI

sense of what I say. I can see that it is not these people that is the
problem, it’s what they are suffering from that’s the problem.
When I set out to teach Poker I did not expect to run into this! A
collective aggressive secret madness opposing my every
sentence. What the hell! I thought my lessons would be well
received by the masses, I did not expect to be wading into war
with the Devil himself.
Funnily enough, my name translates to “Hands of God”!!! Aswell
as being awesome for a poker player, this name also fulfils both
Buddhist and Muslim prophecies for a westerner who will
eventually defeat the devil and bring peace to the world.
You couldn’t make it up! You never know, we could be in a
prophecy right now!
For many years the Poker world has watched as a war waged
between GTO and exploitative players. We’ve always thought of
this as a battle between two styles of play. Not many people
realise that this same struggle is being reflected in all sections of
our economy. This is a global struggle. And the two sides don’t
just represent two different strategies, they also represent two
different strategic thought-processes. This is a battle between two
different mindsets.
One of which is a masterful web of lies that exploits our
weaknesses to destroy any game in which it’s applied. The other
promotes growth, leads to pleasant mental states, and consists of
nothing but the simple truth.
After all the crazy stuff I’ve come to realise over these years, I
wouldn’t be surprised if the poker world were witnessing some
kind of weird battle between the good and evil within our minds!
If this is the case, then we good guys are getting our asses
whooped!!
GTO is thriving now more than ever before.
My logic has stood strong through all assaults but the sheer
number of GTO players suffocate me. I’ve not been getting
anywhere, and nor do I expect to. Not by myself.
I need allies.
Once you are using these Levels at the tables, once you’re making
 THE LEVELS

a killing applying this information, I hope to finally gain support

as a new generation of poker player is born.
With an army of exploitative players tearing up the games beside
me, these exploitative theories will quickly sweep over the poker
world. Once we establish a foothold, we can easily force the GTO
players into following our way of thinking. From that day on, we
all live in bliss.
With your help, the knowledge contained in this book stands a
good chance of destroying GTO and putting an end to this
madness once and for all.
I know this is hard to believe, but there is a madness that plagues
our society. A madness that is bringing industries like the poker
market to their knees.
The poker market is dying. The entire industry is being stripped
of its potential for profit. Poker related businesses are dropping
like flies. Professional players are thinning out, going back to
other professions.
The market is dying, but, what this really means is that GTO is
burning itself out. It means that all my competitors are stepping
aside and leaving the entire market ripe and ready to be plucked!
Poker is still popular! It’s just GTO that’s ruining everything.
I’ll create new forums where GTO is banned. I’ll make table
games where GTO is banned. I’ll make books, courses,
magazines, everything. The entire industry needs rebuilding from
bottom to top ensuring that GTO is taken under control.
I do very much hope that I’m not the crazy one here, because if
I’m not, we are going to rinse it! If you understand the logic in
this book you will help save the poker world from certain
annihilation by just playing, but, if you also recognise this
massive opportunity and would like to get involved in any kind of
next-generation poker business, do drop me a line!
If you are psychologist and would like to further explore any of
this content then please do contact me too. There are loads of
psychological issues that the knowledge in this book has helped
me understand. For instance, Narcissists pre-adjust
subconsciously when causing trouble. If they consciously
YADI JAVADI

understood this thought-process they will realise what they are

doing wrong…

I don’t know what’s going to happen over coming years

I do hope this book won’t get slated until it’s stomped into the
mud.
I hope that some among you can take the baton from me and can
take this formula further.
I hope that with your help the knowledge in this book will spread
around the world eventually leading to the end of GTO.
I don't believe Poker is on its way out
It looks to me like it’s just getting started.
If we do replace money in the years to come, I expect games like
Poker will rise from the dirt.
They will be seen in a completely different way.
The professionals wouldn’t be known as reckless gamblers.
Players would play for pride, to have fun and to learn.
With this in mind, it even seems possible that games like Poker
could eventually be revered.
Maybe one day we'll see monks wandering the land carrying only
a deck of cards and a sack of chips as they challenge one another
to battles of the mind.
That would be something.
That would be change.
That would be progress.
And that’s what we all want.
 THE LEVELS

ABOUT THE AUTHOR…

Growing up with three brothers and six sisters is as hectic as you’d
imagine. Without a TV to drain our attention we would play
endless games. Scores of score sheets would flutter around the
house as we continuously wrote lists of points, winners and losers.
We would play and play. Winning, losing, learning.
Carl was the eldest of us, so was the keeper of the pride. I was the
third child, and as the second son I felt it my duty to challenge my
elder brother at every given opportunity.
We certainly did not lack in opportunities. In our house you had
to fight for a space on the breakfast table! We were never savage,
we didn’t maul each other. We were very well-disciplined and
well composed kids, but, we were always at war.
In our youth, Carl and I battled our way up to black belts in Tae
Kwon Do and if we two ever met in a competition it was always
epic. I’d almost always lose, but any time I landed a blow we both
knew it was worth more than one of his. He was top of his class
at school, had three years on me and half a foot of reach, so I
didn’t stand much of a chance at pretty much anything.
Over the years I took my fair share of the wins and so did
everyone else. My army of sisters certainly didn’t sit quietly in
the shadows. Perdi, the eldest of the sisters, was generally my ally
back in those days but if we did ever find ourselves facing one
another it would usually be me who walked away with my tail
between my legs. The next sister down the line is away in Alaska
racing huskies as I write this now. She’s a blackbelt too. Right
this second she’s probably wrestling a polar bear to save some
baby seals.
Anyway, my elder brother always loved strategy games, he was
always a big favourite to win. He left our hometown when he was
18 to live with our father. This is about the time when online
YADI JAVADI

Poker arrived in cyberspace and it wasn’t long before he was

playing it ferociously. As was I, of course.
Living in different countries we were both learning the game in
very different ways. He was studying training guides and working
with international coaches while I played constantly and learned
from my opponents as I taught myself.
One day my brother called me and explained that he was living in
Bulgaria playing and teaching Poker. He said that he was making
a killing and I wanted in.
I left my job and went to see him.
Although I didn’t understand it at the time, after a few months in
a professional environment I was playing at Level Two. It took
me around a year to reach Level Three and by then I was making
an average of £50 per hour.
Money was something I’d never had and now it was rolling in. I
moved back home to England and started living the successful
lifestyle.
I reached Level Four as my daughter and I moved into the flat of
our dreams. Real wood floors, tall ceilings, loads of space, great
location. It was awesome.
And then something unexpected happened.
Exposing my opponent's weaknesses had always been a skill that
I was proud of, but something was different now. As soon as I
noticed a player’s weakness I found myself feeling really bad for
them! Taking their money suddenly seemed wrong! It didn’t seem
fair as these guys didn’t really understand how to play. The
weakest players literally didn’t stand a chance. So I began to feel
sorry for them.
Losing at the poker tables isn’t fun, and now I wasn’t enjoying
winning either!! Reaching the highest skill level had made me so
confident in my ability that I ceased to enjoy making my living
from playing anymore.
I had always been competitive and ruthless but now I kept finding
myself rooting for my opponents. I wasn’t in the right frame of
mind to play, I had lost my drive, and so started to back away
from the tables.
 THE LEVELS

This is around the time I stumbled across Buddhism. Through

Buddhas lessons I came to believe that I would be better off
teaching Poker rather than playing.
I took on a couple of practice students, I taught/discussed theory
on online forums and I also continued teaching my elder brother.
When I had reached Level Four, Carl was still stuck at Level Two.
I was confident that I understood my game and I explained it to
him very clearly and very often. He was desperate to match my
win-rate but no matter how I approached it he always refused to
accept that Level Three made any sense.
He was a clever man. Well versed in Poker. Strategy games were
his forte and he had spent a long time learning this particular
strategy game, but his mind blankly refused to accept anything
above Level Two.
He would even get particularly irate with me anytime I mentioned
anything to do with the higher levels.
This seemed very strange, but it wasn’t this that really baffled me.
It took me two long years to teach my experienced brother all the
Levels, but I’m able to teach a beginner in a matter of minutes.
I hope with this book that I have managed to teach you. Comment

Yadi, 2018
YADI JAVADI
 THE LEVELS

I’d like to give a special thanks to my editor Mitch.

Mitchelwicking@gmail.com
He asked for nothing to work on this book. He is a man who
truly loves his work. What a legend!

A huge thanks to my family too. For helping in a hundred

different ways over the five long years it took for me to
complete this extremely difficult project.