First off, sorry for the length. I had nothing else to do and a session tonight, so I've got a DnD itch and a lot of time. I just got carried away and enjoy writing. It's super close to the comment character limit. :/

Intro

So, how to start DnD. It's good to see how it plays. I find Critical Role to be a good place to start. The DM is Mattew Mercer, who is great and moving things along, and the players are all voice actors, so it's nice to listen to. CR is a bit unusual in how well behaved the players are, if you run the game, expect your players to be more annoying. I recommend starting with episode 14, "Shopping and Shipping" as you can pick it up easily, and everything gets a bit better at that point as the new arc starts.

It's also a good idea to figure out what system to use. 5th edition is the current one. I find it to be fairly simple on the surface, with a lot of extra detail in the supplementary books. It's very flexible in tone and complexity, and a solid foundation I expect to see a lot of extra content piled on top of, with extra classes, rules, monsters, etc, in later supplementary books. 5e is probably the best place to start.

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What you need

First off, you need friends! I know it may seem cliché, but it is true. You want one person to run the game (the DM) and 3 or 4 (maybe 5, but no more if the DM is new) people to play an individual character. If you don't have enough friends to do DnD, you can probably find new friends with something called The Adventurer's League. You also need a set (or a few) of dice, which contain 6 to 7 different dice. You have a 4, 6, 8, 10, 12, and the most-used 20 sided dice. You also have a "d100"^1 which is a d10 that counts in 10s. They're a bit unusual in early play, so don't worry. Last but not least you need the rules. The basic rules can be found here. If you want the complete rules and a few extra books, I'll PM you. Chaotic Good PDFs are frowned upon here.

Finally, you need to actually play is a story and a Dungeon Master. You can get prewritten stories and adventures that give the DM a framework to build around for money, although I have the 5th ed beginner adventure somewhere on my PC. (It's really useful for a beginner DM.) The DM can also create their own, but that needs a lot of effort. The DM acts as an arbitrator. They say how difficult it is do something, what happens when it's done, what the players see when they go somewhere, etc. They also role-play NPCs, decide what actions enemies take, etc. They are less a player and more the world the players are in.

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The two main roles.

The Dungeon Master (Or Mistress)

The DM is often the person that brings the party together, finds people to play DnD, and ties it all together. However, they are not the most important, as that's a bad mindset to have. A DM without players is a person having conversations in their head. It's a symbiotic thing.

Being a DM is very hard, but also by far the most rewarding role if you have the skill and motivation. Being a DM is thinking up the bagpipe gag, is creating a cool city, is roleplaying the city guards who have no time for the player's shit and the shopkeep that warmly welcomes them. It is the role with the most freedom, as you can shape the campaign however you like. (As long as you don't drive your players away.) However, you need to know a lot of the rules by heart (it's easier than it sounds) and a good dose of creativity. The scheming, toying with the players and their emotions^2 all makes it worth it in the end. This is a bit long, but if you fancy the idea of being the DM I'll make a followup "How to DM." comment.

I also fancy the role of the DM myself as it feels like I'm making a world of facades very quickly, faster than the players can notice. The NPCs are fleshed out enough to survive one session without seeming two dimensional, but are not nearly as intricate as the player's characters. Physical locations have enough detail to tide the players over while I make more. However, if the players show particular interest in a character or place, I can build behind that facade to make the thing more and more realistic the closer the players look between running sessions. I also have a lot of pre-made things I can pull up. I might have a general set of bars with different qualities and a cursory list of their stock, with different names for different locations. So if the players go to a seedy bar in a dwarven city, I pull up a seedy bar template and add dwarven flavor to it. I'll also note down any on-the-fly descriptions for later use. If the players start to go regularly, I'll add detail. I'll create regulars with personalities and stories to them, I'll create notable events in the bar's history, etc. That feeling of going from pulling things together quickly to make it seem good enough, then after the session spending hours taking slower more thought out routes to flesh something out.

The Players

This section will be a bit less meaty. The players create a character from a set of races and a set of classes (some books have extra races and classes, and you can take levels in more than one class. So instead of being a level 10 ranger, you could be a level 10 character that is a 3rd level rogue and a 7th level ranger.) They have a sheet that holds the information they need to play their character, that details weapons, spells, abilities, HP, stats, proficiency, what skills they have, etc. Often the player will write a few sentences or paragraphs on their character and their backstory.

You also have personality outlines, which consists of (normally, you can change it up for fun)

• 2 general traits (Like, "I am new to these foreign lands, and have numerous strange but minor customs others may find confusing.")
  
  
• An overall ideal (such as "law keeps society together, those that break it should be punished.")
  
  
• A bond they have (like: "I'm the successor to a major title, but my family was deposed. Some day I'll regain it.") that they will either constantly work on, or be called to fulfill. (like protecting an object from attack.
  
  
• A flaw they have. (Like "I'm quick to anger, and can hold a long grudge." This could lead to a misunderstanding creating long-term animosity between a player and an important NPC.)
  
  These outlines are used to help the player get in the mindset of their character, and to role-play them better. So if the player outlined above is meeting a noble, because the noble's connections could help them regain their land, and they greet them in accordance with their strange customs, the noble remarks unfavorably about them, then the player should role play not liking the noble, but they shouldn't try and attack them, because that's outside the law. Stuff like that is what makes the player characters so much more complex. Also, don't take my talking up of the DM's role to diminish the player, they can have plenty of fun.
  
  Also, there are many types of players, and they often not just co-exist but may even require other types to do well. Some players just want to see what happens and play DnD, whereas others seize the initiative and direct the group. A party with too many of the first will do very little, and a party with too many of the second will do nothing but bicker. Also, some players are recluse and have a hard time roleplaying their character. Other players like playing hard to role play characters, and their willingness to set themselves up for possible failure (in roleplaying) might help nervous players come out of their shell. Some players make super strong characters without thinking about story, and others make weaker ones because all they think about is story. The strong characters will help the party in combat, the story characters will help the drama aspect of DnD that makes it so engaging. Some pay tons of attention, and can fill in those that don't. And so on. Together, you can get one functioning party!
  
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  Buying things!
  

  
  

1. The starter set is great. It has rerolled character sheets, the basic rules, and an adventure that holds the hand of the DM more than others, but also provides plenty of room for growth. Also, it's not even 15 bucks on Amazon.
   
   
2. Dice. The starter set ones mysteriously all seem to be cursed to roll low, so new dice are good. Chessex looks good and is cheap, and Q-workshop are expensive but amazing.
   
   
3. Dungeon master's screen. Hides notes & rolls, looks nice, and has a quick-lookup of stuff on the back. About 10 bucks, I highly recommend it.
   
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   Footnotes
   

   
   ^1 Dice are referred to as d[number of sides.] So a 20-sided one is a d20, and so on. If multiple dice need to be rolled, like with a Greatsword, it's shown as 2d6 + [modifier], where you roll 2 six-sided dice, add that together, then add a fixed modifier. The rules have more detail.
   
   ^2 Randomly rolling dice to make them nervous, evily grinning when the players ask something even if the thing is absolutely fine, having that little smile when the players ask if those bagpipes are silent or not, asking the players if they're totally sure if they want to do something then making them live with the consequences are all ways to mess with them.

Hey, welcome to poker! Yeah, this question gets asked a lot but don't worry, we've all been there! Don't listen to all of the grumpy people on this sub, if every poker player was like them, poker wouldn't be as fun as it is. You should definitely know about our FAQ. It's a little hidden but you'll probably find some information relevant to you (if you dig a little there are actually several links to new player guides).

I'll also give you a few tips:

• Start by making sure you know all the rules. You should also know the hand rankings like the back of your hand. There should be no hesitation as to "what wins, the flush or the straight? 4 of a kind or straight flush? what happens if we both have the same hand?"
  
• Play-money poker is a great way to learn and practice those things, but don't expect to learn good strategy from there.
  
• Once you're comfortable with the previous steps, you'll probably want to start playing with real money. Start small and be warned, there is a steep learning curve. You should probably try out the different formats. Figure out whether you prefer tournaments or cash games, because you'll want to focus on one or the other in the next step.
  
• Now that you're playing real money, it's probably a good idea to learn some strategy. There are tons of resources out there, some free, some very expensive, and some great, some terrible. (so do your research before you spend tons of money on training) Beware of outdated advice. If you prefer tournaments, study tournaments, and if you prefer cash games, study cash games. It's better to be good at one than average at both. You may want to change in the future, don't worry. I used to prefer tournaments as a beginner but I eventually decided I liked cash games better.
  
• Live poker is incredibly fun, but the stakes are way higher than online, so it's not a bad idea to play a fair amount online before you sit down in a poker room with hundreds of dollars in front of you. (Or look for / start some home games)
  
  If you want to learn cash game strategy, here is where I would start:
  
  
• From the Ground Up, a video course that's seriously amazing. It's done wonders for my game. Also comes with one free month of Run it Once Essential, one of the best training sites.
  
• If you're more of a book person, The Grinder's Manual is an excellent resource, by Peter Clarke, the same guy who did From the Ground Up. It's also a good companion to the course, but optional. The course is more recent.
  
  Once you're ready to move beyond that, training sites are the way to go. There are many of them, and a new one pops up every now and then, but Upswing Poker and Run it Once are two currently good (and very popular) ones.
  
  I won't speak on tournament resources because I honestly don't know what the best ones are. I'm sure with a bit of research you'll find what you need if that's the way you want to go.
  
  Feel free to reach out to me with any questions, I'm always happy to help out a new player. Good luck on your poker journey!

Hi there, I'm in a similar position to yourself as I've only just begun learning poker in the past month and I've had to wrap my head around a lot of jargon. I'm a little different in that I've been focusing on learning live tournament play, but I've read a fair bit on learning the fundamental strategies and rules of the game.

It looks like you've got a few classic poker strategy books in your list that I think many people would consider required reading, which is a great start. However, a lot of those books focus on concepts which may be a little too advanced when you're still figuring out basic lingo and rules. I know it may sound silly, but I would actually suggest reading "Texas Hold'em For Dummies" before moving on to more complex books. I know the "For Dummies" series is unlikely to end up on lists of great poker books, but when I was just learning I found that they actually gave an extremely comprehensive and straightforward overview of the basic elements of the game. If you are unsure of where to begin, then I think that book is a nice uncomplicated way to establish a firm understanding of the basics. I think you'll find it an enjoyable read.

Once you have an understanding of basic strategy, then my absolute favourite poker book is "Every Hand Revealed" by Gus Hansen. This isn't just my favourite poker book, it's one of my favourite books period. If you haven't heard of it, the concept is that celebrity pro Gus Hansen came first place in the Aussie Millions tournament in 2007. During the tournament, he kept a meticulous record of his hands and his reflections on all of his decisions. In "Every Hand Revealed" Gus goes through every one of his hands on the way to winning the tournament (over 300 of them) and explains his thought process and decisions for every hand. It is absolutely fascinating in my opinion, and I think I learned more from this book than any other. I haven't seen any other book that gives a similar insight into the mind of a tournament pro.

Hansen's book also features quite a bit of maths which you might find interesting. It's not too complicated, but he frequently factors in pot-odds and hand-odds into his decisions. I am terrible with maths, but even I found this aspect very interesting and useful.

Having said all that, this book might not give you a lot of direct instruction relevant to you. Gus Hansen is a very unique and aggressive/loose player. If you attempted to actually play like him in an online cash game, you would very likely lose very badly. However, if you can take away some of the basic strategies of this book and adapt it to your own game, I think it will be very helpful.

The reason I'm praising this one book so much in particular is that last night i played in my first ever live tournament. It was my first time playing live and my first time playing for cash. I was by far the least experienced player there and I expected to be put out quite quickly. But I actually won! I played solid poker based on what I'd learned from Hansen's book and adapted it to the situation, and ended up beating a field of significantly more experienced players. I had some lucky hands, but overall I used aggression to maximise my results and played solidly. I attribute that success to this book, as it taught me the how essential aggression is in poker. I won a lot of pots with very weak holdings, purely because this book had taught me that if I wait around for the best hand then I won't last an hour.

Another good book is "Phil Gordon's Little Green Book". I'm reading it now and I find it to be well written and very enjoyable.

As for learning jargon, I think Google is your best friend. Any time you come across a term you haven't heard before, google it and you will find an explanation. Most important is to not become discouraged if the explanations you find seem complicated. Just stick with it and don't move on until you have a firm understanding of this concept. I spent literally 45 minutes reading the same two pages of Gus Hansen's book until I was finally able to fully understand a decision he made. It was a bit gruelling, but once I figured it out the lesson really sunk in.

I encourage you to purchase these books instead of downloading them illegally, but if you don't have the money then feel free to PM me and I will send you a digital copy. But if you can afford it, please support the authors.

This is copied from a post I made a few months back in response to basically the same question.

"I have heard some good things about that book but have yet to read it. Here is a small break down of the books I have an what they offer.

Full Tilt Tournament Edition: By far the most valuable poker book I have ever read. I think all poker players, online and brick n mortar should read this book. Has statistical information for n/l that you will not find in other books. Also has many pro's who give their "style" of play, including actual situations at the table with a Q&A of "what would you do" type of learning. As well as what actually happened and what the correct play would have been. Also has a wonderful and informative section on 7 card stud as well as Omaha (but also covers the full spectrum of games from Razz to triple draw) Seriously, if you even consider for a second on buying a book, buy this one first. http://www.amazon.com/Full-Tilt-Poker-Strategy-Guide/dp/0446698601

Read em and Reap: If you play ANY live games, and want to get better at reading people then this is the book for you. Yes it may have Phil's mug all over it and filled with his condescending remarks but the information inside from the FBI guy is invaluable IMO. I made twice my money back from what I paid for this book in the first hour of play at the casino, it really was eye opening for me. http://www.amazon.com/Phil-Hellmuth-Presents-Read-Reap/dp/0061198595/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1303257591&sr=1-1

Gus Hansen "Every hand revealed": This book nearly destroyed my game. It is a fabulous book if you want to get a glimpse into the mind of a pro and how they think and tackle each play. Gus actually took a recorder to the Australian Million and recorded each play he made, then wrote a book about the whole thing (he won the tourney for a cool mil) Awesome book but just head my warning YOU ARE NOT GUS HANSEN!! After reading his LAG style of play and then implementing portions of that into my own play it nearly wrecked my game. Although I have found my own style which takes some from him, but its all game theory at the end. Good buck, fun read, won't help you much though unless you are a math stat maniac. http://www.amazon.com/Every-Hand-Revealed-Gus-Hansen/dp/0818407271/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1303257591&sr=1-3

Poker odds and Probabilites: This is the bible of statistics. Do you want to know how well your 78o will do against AKs preflop, flop, turn and river? Then this is the book for you. Super math/stat people will love it. It was a little to much math for me, but is a good book to have around when I want to know a specific answer. It also has a workbook in the back that will teach you positive EV poker. If you are serious about becoming a pro, this will help guide you in that direction. http://www.amazon.com/Texas-Holdem-Odds-Probabilities-Tournament/dp/0974150223/ref=sr_1_4?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1303258209&sr=1-4

I have also listened to quite a few audio books. Like "Little Green Book" by Phil Gordon. "Ace on the river" by Barry Greenstein. "Play poker like the pros" by Phil Helmuth.

And of course, if you have been living under a rock. Super System by Doyle Brunson is still considered the bible by professional poker players. It is old and pretty outdated but most of the fundamental stuff still works today.

The tough thing about poker books is once they are released everyone knows all the ins and outs. Which is why poker constantly evolves, it is an ever changing game and although it has strict rules, it will never be played the same way twice. An old poker adage: "Their are more scenarios in poker then stars in the sky" or "Poker takes a few minutes to learn and a lifetime to master" come to mind. Good luck on your poker readings :)"

This is partially going to be a novel about how I got into poker because of a Royal Caribbean cruise, be warned. :) I was on the Freedom of the Seas during the summer of 2010, and spent a ton of time at the table.

My family had booked a cruise on the FotS during the summer of 2010, when I was 18, so there wasn't too much to do on the boat (can't drink, can't/would feel weird going to "teen" areas). When looking at what the boat had to offer, though, I saw there was a poker table... and I realized I would have something to do besides workout/eat great food/sit in the sun. I had played competitive M:tG for a few years then, and was looking to get into a game that was more socially acceptable (wouldn't have to hide from friends and females). I also knew that several pro M:tG players e.g. David Williams, Jon Finkle, and other lesser-knowns played poker. With nothing more to do on the boat, and coming off the high of winning a 4-person donkament at my friend's house the week before, I decided to dive into the realm of poker. I hadn't read any poker literature at the time besides "only play top 10 hands lolz" articles on poker-listings and other similar sites, but I can still remember a bit of the play that went down.

Anyway, after realizing how "high-stakes" the games were on the boat - 1/2 during the day, 2/5 at night - I quickly realized that I would be out of my element playing in the cash games. I was fine railing though... 500 dollars was equivalent to 10k in my mind. During the day, the table was mostly empty unless you organized a game with the people sitting around the night before. At night though, starting after 9 when the second dinner shift was getting through, the 2/5 game was almost always full. Competition was super, super, super soft. There was a ~50 year-old business man on the cruise with family who I got to know fairly well after sitting at the table so often, and he look at his hole-cards during the hands as I sat there. Details on explicit hands are fuzzy for the most part, but he was playing the standard "2+2 approved" 14/12 style and crushing pretty thoroughly. I remember one hand, where he open raised, went to the flop heads-up, completely missed, but still bet and made the other guy fold. My first exposure to c-betting. Ah, nostalgia. Anyway, real content...

On FotS, they had an electric table. No dealer, no chips. Each player had a touchscreen embedded in the table, with a ~30 inch screen in the middle of the table for the board, pot size, etc. I didn't like it then, and still don't now. It felt too "online-y" to me. Don't get me wrong, I love and most-often prefer online poker, but if it's gonna be live I'd like it to have chips at least. Most people at the table felt the same way. The business man I mentioned earlier said that he had been on one Royal Caribbean cruise per-year with his family over the past 10 years, and that he has never seen an electric table besides on FotS. I'm not sure how standard the electric table is on RC these days, but it's good to know that not every boat has one. If you're on one of the newer boats, though, I'd say chances are higher. Here's the table they had on FotS: http://www.pokertek.com/

As far as gameplay goes, the game was SUPER soft. There were probably 20 tops "regulars" at the table each night, some more regular than others, but only 3 or 4 of them had any idea what they were doing. Definitely softer than an average casino 2/5 game. I didn't think much of it then, but people were shoving with nothing on flops, playing 60% of their hands, and just generally being huge fish. Lots of middle-aged Asian guys who spewed off money, and a few rich-looking old white guys who would sit down with $500 and mention how they lose every night, but "it's been a great learning experience" because they'd never played poker before. If I had been in the game with my current poker knowledge, I would have been drooling. There was a bald Finnish guy at the table every night who would crush - always leaving with over 1.5k. He paid for his entire family's cruise at the table, which I thought was amazing at the time. Oh, and almost everyone buys in short - only a few guys ever bought in for a full 100bbs. The typical buy-in was around 200.

What kind of poker are you most familiar with? If you're used to playing 100bb deep 1/2, you won't feel out of your element. If bringing a 2.5k bankroll for 2/5 seems too steep, just short-stack it and keep all your commitment decisions on the flop. You really can't go wrong playing 14/12, 90% c-bet, take everyone to value-town on later streets poker. For quick tips, if you haven't read this book before, read it. It's basically the rock that every live 1/2 strategy-profile is built upon: http://www.amazon.com/Professional-No-Limit-Hold-em-I/dp/188068540X Also, just read a ton of hands on the Live Low-Stakes No Limit section of 2+2. If you play tight and don't get out of line, you should win. The rake is absolutely killer though - 10%, no cap, IIRC - so watch out.

That's all I can recall for now. If you have any more questions feel free to ask! GL and HF on your cruise.

P.S. - I forgot... I only mentioned cash games because they're what I play now, but there are tournaments on the boat as well. Not very many, though. Once a day they ran a 9-handed sit'n'go where the winner would qualify for a championship sit'n'go at the end of the cruise to compete for all the prize money. Besides a $50 sit'n'go the night that you get on the boat, I think those are the only tournaments they spread.

What? That isn't what happened at all. Shit, now I have to rewatch the video to show why you are wrong. God damn it. Will edit soon.

Edit below:

First hand he says, "I chose to call because I had some aggressive players here and I just wanna be sure there aren't any big cards here."

First off, that is anathema to poker theory. Calling is always the weakest move and he's making a joke by explaining the hand backwards. Inside joke for people who know poker theory. You flush out big cards (especially on a 378 flop) by betting into the pot not by calling. Calling doesn't push anything out. Two spades on the board and calling player has 2nd highest flush draw with QK. One of the worst positions to be in, he loses the hand on the river versus a Jack of spades which is a double slap in the face because its the only card that improves both of their hands. Adds insult to injury.

Second hand "JJ in small blind, this is a great spot to get them." He's not wrong there, but he only calls which pulls the big blind into the hand (he mis-speaks and says, "Oh the small blind called", he meant to say big blind). Flop comes 433 with a potential flush draw but this is a good flop otherwise for JJ with three players in the pot. BB goes all-in in a confusing turn of events as there is no pre-flop hand that he should've called the original raise with. BB hole cards 38 giving him a set of 3's with the flop. Basically big blind was playing stupidly in order to draw someone in (or was just an idiot playing poorly). In either case it fucks the Jacks.

Third hand JJ late position with aggressive players behind you, the player calls and another players (presumably conservative) goes all-in in what the player assumed to be heads up which throws a wrench in his plan. Player calls because he has jacks and gets fucked by the aces. Aggressive player from original explanation folds and isn't even in the final hand.

Fourth hand "Pocket Jacks here, middle position, cash table, low stakes" JJ versus overcard (an overcard is a single card on the table higher than the cards in your hand which may potentially be paired with another player's hole card), this is already looking bad for the player. "That means you bet!" He's right, if you want to detect an overcard you have to bet into it, either they will bluff the card and you'll win, or they have it and you minimize your losses by betting into it and folding. Player bets 50% pot which is an acceptable bet. Note he's playing against the biggest stack at the table, who is likely more willing to call bets which are <1/10 his stack. Second overcard comes out, same as before except now twice as bad because there are two. Big stack bets 1/3 pot, player re-raises 1/4 pot (a pointless raise that anyone would call, bad play), then he gets pushed all-in which he should've expected because he played meekly.

Fifth hand Tournament play, not a cash game. Dealer shoves and Jacks called heads up, perfect scenario and if this happened a million times you'd do the same thing every time. Dealer shows A3, an awful hand. Statistics are strongly in favor of JJ. Post flop only 5 cards out of 45 can save him, then 5/44 on the river. JJ looks in the clear but dealer gets an Ace, two pair wins. Nothing was done wrong on the part of JJ here.

Sixth hand Tournament play. JJ in BB against short stack who is probably on tilt. JJ v JA, JJ has the advantage but not by much. Flops turns a straight draw, only 7 cards in the deck out of 44 can save his opponent. He hits one of those 7.

Seventh hand Cash game. JJ on BB, two overcards on the flop (which sucks, potential fold here). His opponent bets in a way that doesn't maximize on his hand which makes him appear weak. Jacks lose to a hand that was played poorly, but a loss is a loss.

Eighth hand Tournament play. JJ in position again. JJ raises 3x BB, gets raised all-in. Pretty self explanatory. QQ > JJ.

Ninth hand Tournament play. Jacks looking double solid with the straight draw, but there is an overcard on the board. JJ notes that his opponent is aggressive which calls for a change in style of play, you have to confront aggressive players to get them to back down and/or defeat them off the table. Pushes the "idiot" player in, cards turn and idiot has 36 chasing the flush (a very stupid thing to do) hits the flush on the turn and hits his stupid hand. Hands like these are why poker is profitable, the opposing player did a dumb thing and chased a stupid hand that is only profitable approximately 40% of the time, 60% of the time the Jacks would have won so our player did the right thing. Still lost, this is the 40%.

Tenth hand Cash game. Confronts a loose player with JJ in order to get a payout. Aggressive player responds conservatively and disappoints the player.

TLDR: He make a combination of jokes giving bad advice, but generally doing the right thing and shows that no matter how well you play Jacks they will fuck you in the ass.

To reply to /u/Balthanos

>He kept losing because he was not paying attention to his opponent. He was betting when another player went "all in" which usually infers they have something.

When another player goes all-in, there are only two replies.

1. Fold and concede the hand.
   
   
2. Call and confront the hand.
   
   You can't reply with a "bet" when an opponent goes all-in so I'm not even sure what you are saying. If you are saying he was betting before the all-in and the mistake was to call, well that's plainly just not true in most of these scenarios, and if you are saying that he should not have bet before the all-in occurred then I want to know where you keep your crystal ball because I could use it for my poker games.
   
   I WROTE THIS REALLY FAST SO I APOLOGIZE FOR MY GRAMMAR
   
   Daniel Negreanu on Jacks.
   
   Poker theory on Jacks (and more).
   
   ___
   
   If you've made it to the end of this post, chances are you may be interested in poker. I will recommend some resources for you to further your knowledge and perhaps get some new players into the game.
   
   Phil Gordon's Little Green Book is an amazing resource for the beginner and the advanced poker player who has perhaps forgotten some of the basics. Its a nice pocket reference book and a quick read, I have no doubt that it will improve your game.
   
   Harrington on Hold-em this is a TOURNAMENT based book. So if your friends have a game they play on a weekly basis which is a CASH game this book is NOT APPLICABLE. Just be aware that the style of play across Poker is NOT universal. You will play differently in tournaments and cash games and players tend to gravitate toward one or the other. Note on the author, he is an extremely conservative player thus the book is written from that perspective. He does however do an excellent job of analyzing other players and explaining their motivations, using real hands he has been in over the years in real tournaments.
   
   The Theory of Poker another good book for you if you've never read anything about poker.
   
   You might be thinking to yourself, I'm awful with math! I could never understand poker! The statistics, the combinations, the confusion! Well you'd be wrong. The math of poker is not difficult and by the time you've played a few games you've already memorized a bunch of it. Situations repeat often enough that you'll learn to spot them early on and learn to predict the likely outcomes.

I make study programs all the time. I like designing them for myself and testing them; usually they're very effective. It all depends upon how much time you have to spare. Self Study is key; I wouldn't waste my time with a coach, unless you can find a magical coach. I tried one and I hated it.

I'll break everything down by category and include some books.

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Tactics: I'd just use Chesstempo.com for tactics. Don't waste your money on the paid version; it's not necessary. I just imagine that eventually you'd be able to buy a book with the money you waste on ChessTempo and a book is a permanent resource that you could have with you for the rest of your life. When you get really good like 1900uscf+ as far as books go, I'd say try out Paata Gaprindashvili's book, Imagination in Chess.[http://www.amazon.com/Imagination-Chess-Creatively-Foolish-Mistakes/dp/0713488913] It's a complete Titan of a book and the puzzels are EXTREMELY difficult.

------------------------------------------------------

Positional/Strategical play: I usually recommend Jeremy Silman's Reassess your Chess 4th edition, but Lately i've been recommending John Nunn's, Undersatnding Middle Games, because Jeremy Silman's writing is really fun the FIRST or SECOND time you read through it, but he has a lot of jokes and other nonsense he prattles on about, so it becomes really burdensome to read through over and over... Be warned, I only have a Kindle Sample of John Nunn's book, but It looks much more serious and perhaps even superior.

As far as practicing the skills you gain from one of those two books, I'd like to recommend Jeremy Silman's Work Book. I'd probably say Buy Nunn's book and then buy the Silman work book. The workbook has a crash course on "Silman's" imbalances, and I think that'd probably be sufficient.

Links:

1. How to reassess your Chess[http://www.amazon.com/How-Reassess-Your-Chess-Fourth/dp/1890085138/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1406648641&sr=1-1&keywords=how+to+reassess+your+chess+4th+edition&dpPl=1]
   
   
2. John Nunn's Understanding Chess Middle Games [http://www.amazon.com/Understanding-Chess-Middlegames-John-Nunn/dp/1906454272]
   
   
3. The Reassess Your Chess Workbook [http://www.amazon.com/The-Reassess-Your-Chess-Workbook/dp/1890085057/ref=pd_sim_b_3?ie=UTF8&refRID=0HNX7EVVHTZFVJ30BY6A]
   
   ---------------
   Endings:
   
   There are some amazing endgame sources out there, but I'd probably stick with Jeremy Silman's Complete endgame course. [http://www.amazon.com/Silmans-Complete-Endgame-Course-Beginner/dp/1890085103/ref=pd_sim_b_3?ie=UTF8&refRID=1N286TXXYT32NB4SY38C]
   
   If you want a much more serious and a much heavier book you can try Fundamental Chess Endings[http://www.amazon.com/Fundamental-Chess-Endings-Karsten-Muller/dp/1901983536/ref=sr_1_9?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1406648960&sr=1-9&keywords=chess+endgame+books]
   
   
   ------------
   Openings: I'd probably just stick with general openings for now. Studying openings in depth takes up an enormous amount of time. ENORMOUS. If you study them in depth, you'll have no time for anything else unless you literally sit at home for 8 hours a day just doing nothing.
   
   I'd like to direct you to Roman's Lab on Youtube.com:
   
   
4. I have not watched this one, but it's probably just as good as the 1.d4 video series [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c2gZ45qkPCQ]
   
   2.Or you can watch this one(it's the 1.d4 video series), which I used in tournaments vs 1700-2000uscf and was extremely successful [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BX9Ax29jZ1k]
   
   
   
   For black? It's harder, I don't know any good videos like there are for white. You could try wikipedia and play something safe like Caro-kann vs e4 [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caro_Kann_Defense] and vs d4 play something safe and reliable like Queen's Gambit Declined [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Queen%27s_Gambit_Declined]
   
   The only problem with those openings is that it's hard to lose and it's also hard to win, so they're not too dynamic and it may be hard to find a plan as a beginner. Many people say do the Nimzo vs d4 and the sicilian vs e4, but they can be much sharper and a lot easier to lose with if you don't know what you're doing. I always preferred solid over dynamic tight rope walking; it's kind of a pain.
   
   
   ----------
   
   I'd also recommend an annotated chess book, so that you can go over the games and basically round up all the above training.
   I like Franco Zenon:
   
   1.The Art of Attacking Chess[http://www.amazon.com/Art-Attacking-Chess-Zenon-Franco/dp/1904600972/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1406649342&sr=1-2&keywords=franco+zenon+attack]
   
   2.Grandmaster Secrets: Counter-Attack! [http://www.amazon.com/Grandmaster-Secrets-Counter-Attack-Zenon-Franco/dp/1906454094/ref=pd_bxgy_b_img_z]
   
   Both by Franco Zenon. Also great is: "How Karpov Wins." [http://www.amazon.com/How-Karpov-Wins-Second-Enlarged/dp/0486278816/ref=sr_1_fkmr0_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1406649393&sr=1-3-fkmr0&keywords=how+to+win+like+karpov]
   
   Some people also recommend John Nunn's "Understanding Chess Move by move" but i've never even looked inside of it before: [http://www.amazon.com/Understanding-Chess-Move-John-Nunn/dp/1901983412/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1406649416&sr=1-2&keywords=Chess+move+by+move&dpPl=1]
   
   
   Also Check out the Saint Louise Chess Club on youtube. Ben Finegold and Akobian offer the BEST annotations on the games. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qjZiy6FqqyE)
   
   
   ------
   
   Conclusion: well, it's long as hell, but that basically sums it up. As far as applying all these things to study you can do something simple like
   
   Monday-Sunday (this is Mon,Tues,Wed,Thurs,Fri,Sat, AND Sun) Do like 10-20 Tactical puzzles on Chess Tempo, and 2-5 Silman's Workbook puzzles everyday.
   
   Every 2 or 3 days do 1 game out of Franco Zenon's Book or Karpov's or whatever Annotated resource you have. (Studies show masters and the better chess players spent the most time looking at master games)
   
   On Friday-Saturday-Sunday: Study your openings and Endgames
   
   This should be enough to provide you with very rapid and substantial improvement. You pretty much get what you put into it. If you get a coach, all he is going to do is open a book like one of the above mentioned ones and just do exercises out of it, or something very similar. Except you have to pay him like $50-$100 an hour, when you could just buy the ENTIRE book for like $15 or $20 ONCE and you have the ENTIRE information for a lifetime.

I think I understand what you are trying to experiment. You are asking if 2 beginners start playing chess while reading different beginner books, how will their play styles and understanding of the game change? I think this is a very interesting idea, and although I hypothesize that "no matter how different the books are, the difference will be because of the players, not the books" I will gladly suggest some ideas for your experiment.

There are plenty of chess books that are written by classical GMs that many people still find amazingly helpful.

"Capablanca's Chess Fundamentals" is still a very good for learning strong end game and good idea of how pieces work together. His end games are still considered some of the cleanest. He was somebody who could take puzzling situations and make them simple. It's very satisfying to following his games.

"My System" by GM Nimzowitsch is a bit different. Where as Capablanca relied more on classical openings and simplified situations with strong piece control, Nizomwitisch was of the hypermodern school which focused more on challenging the old classical fundamental beliefs and positional superiority.

If both of you start with one of each book, it'd be interesting to see how both of you end up playing. But honestly as beginners, (I'm a low level asshole myself aka patzer) some of the higher level things we're talking about here may not even mean anything for a long time.

Honestly, everybody in life has a certain chess style. Some play for the tactics, some for positions, some for the calculations, while others for the pattern recognition, some play sharp while some play loose, some play meek while some play aggressively. It really depends on you as a player, and I think that in the end, no matter which book you start with, you will end up the player you are going to be anyway.

As for other books that may be of interest for both of you, as they always say in chess "tactics, tactics, tactics": it may be a good idea to supplement both of your books with a tactical book such as https://www.amazon.com/Winning-Chess-Tactics-Everyman/dp/1857443861 or https://www.amazon.com/Chess-Tactics-Champions-step-step/dp/081293671X or this https://www.amazon.com/Predator-At-Chessboard-Field-Tactics/dp/1430308001

and also supplement tactics with mating motifs like this: https://www.amazon.com/How-Beat-Your-Chess-Gambit/dp/1901983056

I hope you and your friend have a lot of fun playing and learning together. I have definitely enjoyed playing with my work mates. If you guys haven't chosen an online platform already, I suggest lichess.org or chess.com. Both are very great sites for playing chess for free. One is absolutely free and offers some very cool features for self analysis and community study material, while the other has paid premium memberships which offer a breadth of learning material in videos and articles.

If you're serious about it, you can find a coach on lichess.org/coach. A good one will guide your study and accelerate your learning.

Start solving tactical puzzles. A lot of them. All of them. As a total beginner, this is the best thing you can do to improve your game. It will take time, but it will yield results.

To learn basic tactics, check out Predator at the Chessboard which is a free online resource. Or get a book like Back to Basics: Tactics, or Judit Polgar's Chess Tactics for Champions, or Reinfeld's 1001 Winning Chess Sacrifices and Combinations. All of them will introduce the major motifs and give you practice with them. Pick one and get to work. You can also find free puzzles at chesstempo.com. Consider getting an app for your phone, like CT-ART 4.0, so you can practice on the go. Seriously, tactics are the big focus right now.

As you start learning about chess, you'll see a lot of people talking about openings. It'll seem like a lot of fun to learn a particular opening and talk about "Oh, I'm an Open Sicilian man," or "I always play the Petrov and here's why . . ." Don't worry about any of that. For now, just learn the basic principles of the opening and concentrate on actually practicing them in your games. Most beginner's books (see below) and lots of videos on youtube will be able to introduce these to you.

There's another book you should get: Chess Fundamentals by José Raúl Capablanca. It'll take you through the basics of the game and will give you a solid foundation on which to build. Make sure it's in algebraic notation. Go through the book slowly, methodically. Make a study for it at lichess.org/study and go over the moves digitally. Go over the positions on a physical board. Take notes. Only move forward when you truly understand what Capablanca is talking about.

Practice what you learn by playing slow time controls. 15+15 games (or longer!) will give you the time you need to think about the moves you and your opponent are making. 5-minute games are fun, but they're not the best way to learn to play well. I mean, play whatever you want--it's a game, and it's meant to be fun. But know that the longer the controls, the more you will learn from your games. For that matter, google "how to analyze a chess game" and then analyze your games after the fact. That way you'll learn to avoid traps and pitfalls into which you fell.

All of this is my opinion, but I'm just some patzer, right? Take or leave this as you like. Or just get a coach and do what you pay them to tell you. Good luck; have fun!

There are reasonably priced original Star Wars movie posters, or even good reprints available online. Another option is a nice framed piece of artwork from one of his favourite games. Vintage Disney cels are another option and can fit pretty much any budget depending on what you want. Other options include monogrammed stationary (if you want to go the fancy old school route) or a well appointed wall map of the world, there are some seriously nice ones online. You could look for a reasonably priced autograph by someone he likes, or an autographed/first edition comic or book that he likes. There are kits for making your own paper clock that are cheap and can even be a fun activity to do together.

Another cool idea to pair with something is a copy of a newspaper from your wedding day! Book or paper sculptures can be interesting and can be found across a huge span of cost, from cheap to exorbitant! You could buy tickets to a concert or event, maybe. Any kind of wall art/print would qualify, I'd imagine. As would gift certificates, which don't have to be impersonal. They can be for an activity you would both enjoy doing together (lessons, massages, etc) or something he would enjoy on his own, like an intro flying lesson or something like that! Depending on the cost in your area, obviously.

Book/comic/graphic novel box sets are also good. Something my parents have always done (and they've been married 34 years!) is reading a book together. They take turns reading out loud to each other leisurely or when the other is doing some mindless activity and read books together this way. You could buy a book or book series and give it to your husband to begin this practice yourselves! A subscription to a magazine is also paper. Another idea is to buy paper packets of seeds and some planting materials to start a little garden, or just some potted plants if you don't have green space! It's a really nice and rewarding thing to do alone or together and watching them grow is wonderful! Bonus points if it's something that will live a long time and be around for years to come (like some kind of tree if you have a yard).

Now I think I am officially exhausted of ideas. My first wedding anniversary is coming up in two months as well, so I've been doing some serious brainstorming! I hope any of these can help!

Grab the 5th edition starter set, it will have a book for your DM on how to run the adventure, 5 pre-made characters so you can just get right into playing, and a set of dice.

Heads up. Like 2 minutes in everyone is going to realize they want their own set of dice rather than sharing one set as a group. They range from $5 to $15. Grab 'em before you start playing.

I'd also recommend getting a DM Screen for multiple benefits. On the inside are quick formulas and name/quest/monster tables and hints for the DM to use. The other benefit is the players can't see what the DM rolls.

The DM's #1 job is to make sure people have the most fun they possibly can. So if he rolls something that would wreck your party, and decides that wouldn't be very fun, he can fudge the roll to something else, and since the DM is rolling behind a screen, the players are none the wiser.

Almost every group starts out rotating the role of DM because everyone wants to have a character. This isn't the wrong way of doing it, but every group eventually comes to the realization that they're better off if one person is the full-time DM.

Here are some good rules of thumb for DMing.

Make sure whoever is DMing is up to the task and understands their job is to maximize the amount of fun for everyone else, not necessarily themselves. A good DM will find enjoyment in his players having fun. He will challenge them, not punish them.

It is not PCs vs DM. To liken it to Skyrim, it's 3-5 Dovakhiin traveling together, and the DM is Skyrim. He is the world and all it's inhabitants. The world isn't out to get you, but if you make poor decisions there will be consequences.

----

>These games take like a week or so to finish.

It took us like 5 or 6 sessions that were 3-4 hours each to get through the adventure in this pack, and we only had 3 players.

The game never really finishes. It's like Skyrim, completing an adventure doesn't end the game, you just move on to the next one.

----

Check out /r/DnD, it's way more active. And for the whoever DMs /r/behindthescreen and /r/loremasters are helpful.

First of all, here is a link to the Basic Rules, which are provided by WotC for free.

To familiarize yourself with how the numbers on a character sheet are created, I suggest that you try to "reverse engineer" the character sheets that come with the adventure (you can download the sheets of the adventure here and you can find additional pregenerated characters here). Say if you have a problem at any point.

>[...] how does a DM know when those other stats are needed? His discretion?

As for how ability checks and skills are used, check out p. 57ff. of the Basic Rules. Yes, it is always the DM's discretion that decides when a player has to make an ability check. The adventure from the starter pack will include many such abilitychecks, and it always says, which ability is used and what the difficulty of the check is. You can take that as a guideline.

>Does the DM get to decide the difficulty of everything like a trap or a boulder the player has picked up?

Page 58 of the Basic Rules includes a short list of "Typical Difficulty Classes" as a guideline for the DM. 10 is easy, 15 is medium, and so on.

>I also sort of assume it's up to the DM to say "roll a stealth check and roll a strength check etc."

That's correct.

>Is there a list of what each monster's AC is and if so where can I find that? The monster's handbook or is there somewhere free?

Every monster that appears in the adventure is described at the end of the adventure that comes with the Starter Set, including its stat block, which its AC is a part of. You can find additional monster stat blocks in the DM-Basic Rules for free.

>Can I buy just one starter set and one player handbook and be set? Or would you also recommend the DM guide to someone who has never DMed before?

At the beginning you do not need anything beyond what is included in the Starter Set. It might be helpful to print an additional version of the Basic Rules for your players (which I linked to earlier and and they are also included in the Starter Set). However, while the Starter Set comes with one set of dice, I suggest that you get additional dice sets. For the first session, it might suffice to get one for the DM and one for the players, but ideally everyone has his own set of dice (and the higher the level the players are, the more dice are rolled).

As for the DMG or other books, I would hold off on any additional books until you have a few sessions under your belt, or even played through the adventure that comes with the Starter Set.

>What do you guys use on the back of a DM screen more than anything?

With back you mean the player side? I bought the standard 5e Screen, but you could simply assemble your own screen. You will know from experience which resources you might want to put there the most. I also use the screen to keep track of initiative by placing folded paper with the players'/monsters' names on them on the top of it. For the beginning, a simple piece of cardboard is enough, or you could simply go without a screen at all.
___

Additionally, may I suggest that you check out (Spoilers in the next link) this youtube series by WotC in which an experienced
DM plays through the first part of LMoP with a miyed group of experienced players and newbies.

Your players don't have to be experts prior to the game, but they should read the Basic Rules (p. 57 - 77) at least once,
so they know their options. The Dungeon Master generally is expected to have a better grasp on the game and should read
them multiple times in addition to the adventure they are currently playing, so he knows what is going on. Expect the
game to be a little slow the first time you play, as you have to get familiar with the rules, so basically it is the
same as for any more complex board game.

The Starter Set comes with pregenerated characters, and I suggest to use them (as did my group when we first started). While it is fun to create your own characters, playing a prewritten character allows you to concentrate on the game instead of your character too much.

I'm pretty fond of The 99 Critical Shots in Pool. It goes into some basics and a ton of shot situations with explanation. It's a great resource, imo, for nearly all levels of play.

For the mental game, I'm a huge fan of Pleasures of Small Motions. It's a deep dive into the mental game and talks about concentration vs focus and helps the reader with some mental exercises. Jury is out in this sub whether it's all that valuable, though I have found it to be a great help to my game. IMO, even at an early stage this book could be useful. Frustration can be a big problem for a beginner trying to get comfortable with the game and having some insight to the mental side can be a benefit.

Welcome to pool! I hope you enjoy playing and fall in love with it like we all have. :)

https://www.amazon.com/Learn-Play-Go-Masters-Ultimate/dp/1453632891

You've made a great choice deciding you want to play this game. It's awesome.

The above book (it's a 5 part series) was my introduction and was very helpful for helping me get stronger. See my posts in :

https://www.reddit.com/r/baduk/comments/bed32g/learn_to_play_go_post_brain_tumor_surgery_version/el76mlm/?context=8&depth=9 (click "show parent comments" to see the whole conversation)

Also, I would recommend playing online, you can get more progress by playing (and reviewing) games with real people. I recommend KGS, the Kiseido Go Server, it's a pretty social Go server, so there's almost always people who will review your games with you, if you ask. I'm on there as LeGoSam if you'd like me to teach you, although I'm not too strong. \^\^

Anyway, I hope I can help this way!

>https://www.amazon.com/Learn-Play-Go-Masters-Ultimate/dp/1453632891

>You've made a great choice deciding you want to play this game. It's awesome.

>The above book (it's a 5 part series) was my introduction and was very helpful for helping me get stronger. See my posts in :

>https://www.reddit.com/r/baduk/comments/bed32g/learn_to_play_go_post_brain_tumor_surgery_version/el76mlm/?context=8&depth=9 (click "show parent comments" to see the whole conversation)

>Also, I would recommend playing online, you can get more progress by playing (and reviewing) games with real people. I recommend KGS, the Kiseido Go Server, it's a pretty social Go server, so there's almost always people who will review your games with you, if you ask. I'm on there as LeGoSam if you'd like me to teach you, although I'm not too strong. ^^

>Anyway, I hope I can help this way!

Thanks so much!

I am a filthy casual able to play 3/4 hours per week. It took time but I am three trophies from Platinum. I would strongly encourage you not to give up. All the bosses can be cheesed (look up videos on YouTube) or head to /r/rhutnersbell where many will help you. Get the strategy guide or look up the one true wiki.

Bloodborne is fantastically rewarding when you get good enough to defeat a boss. The adrenaline rush, the sense of achieving something, and the sheer joy of finally getting good is wonderful. No matter if you cheesed, read up, or whatnot: your skill is what got you there! Few, if any, games are like that.

My typical List of OSR style Fantasy games

----------------

Retro Clones

• Swords and Wizardry(ODnD) - almost a direct rehash of the very first edition of DnD
  
  
• The Black Hack (ODnD) A very modern hack of ODnD. Fast and streamlined.
  
  
• Labyrinth Lord (BX DnD) - Almost a direct rehashing of the old BX dnd system. There's a separate Advanced Edition Companion which makes it more like ADnD.
  
  
• Lamentations of the Flame Princess(BX DnD) - this is the current hot stuff. Dark and Mature with a great ruleset. Lots of the best supplements coming out are based on this system. Veins of the Earth was built with this system in mind.
  
  
• Basic Fantasy RPG (BX DnD?) BX dnd with race separated from class.
  
  All of these have complete free versions on their websites(usually minus art)
  
  
• I would also recommend the Rules Cyclopedia as one of the most complete versions of dnd ever created. It's now available as print on demand!
  
  New Stuff
  
  
• Dungeon World (Great for 1 shots and short campaigns. I'd also recommend the supplements Freebooters on the Frontier and the Perilous Wilds)
  
  
• World of dungeons (1 page OSR-like Dungeon World hack)
  
  
• Maze Rats (Small Booklet, Even if you don't play it, get it for it's amazingly useful tables.)
  
  
• Shadow of the Demon Lord (Starts with a basic Character and then builds in complexity over time. My favorite class system.)
  
  
• Dungeon Crawl Classics (Beautifully done. Every class feels really unique.)
  
  
• Godbound (High powered OSR style game by the same guy who made Stars Without Number)
  
  
• Stars without Number (Possibly Best Sci-fi RPG you can get right now)
  
  
• Index Card RPG (What it says on the Tin)
  
  ------------
  
  One of these don't stand out to you then i'd recommend Microscope. It's a timeline building RPG that makes worlds and histories. Lord of the rings was done with this one, you'd produce something like the silmirallion. If you don't know what to play, play this and get some inspiration going. once you have a better Idea of the style of game you want come back and we can give you a more focused RPG suggestion.
  
  Someone also suggested Chuubo's Marvelous Wish Granting Engine. If the idea of playing in a Ghibli film excites you, this is the way to go.
  
  Someone suggested you might be looking for Video games. This is the wrong place for that but I'd recommend Divinity Original Sin , Pillars of Eternity, The Original Fallout, Planescape: tides of Numenera, Supergiant Games products (Bastion, Transistor, Pyre), Dark Souls, Shadowrun: Dragonfall, and Darkest Dungeon.

One part where your friend is absolutely correct is in Skill and Power selection. 4E's tactical combat is really quite good, and the storytelling elements are not really supported by the rules. Therefore, when choosing a power on Level-up, you would be a fool to not pick the power that confers the best tactical advantage. Do you want the ability to add 15 to your athletics roll, or to be able to shift your speed and make 2 attacks? By taking powers that improve chances of good storytelling, you are actively weakening your character in combat. Ideally, you shouldn't have to choose.

Asside from that, 4E rules do not do anything to prevent or hinder storytelling. They just do absolutely NOTHING to assist in it. At it's heart, D&D is a tactical combat game. Look at the stories here, a lot of them are about noteable fights.

Unfortunately, the skill system in D&D encourages you to only do things you are good at, and kind of locks you in to a set path of expertise. If you wanted to become better at a certain thing, you would have to house rule it. People are extremely attached to their characters, and you only get experience for conquering challenges, so there is no rules supported incentive to have bad things happen to your character, which unfortunately makes for REALLY good storytelling.

If you're looking for games that encourage good storytelling, there is a genera called "Story Games". Check out Microscope. It's kind of a world building game where you go through a series of vignettes. Characters are really impermanent, which frees them up to be actual characters who are able to follow their hopes and dreams, instead of walking combat engines.

It was more historical research on instrumental theorems in Set Theory. It was about the development, statement, and eventual proof and its consequences. Started at Cantor, then to Hilbert, and eventually Godel which was the focus. It was mostly fueled out of people misunderstanding the implications of the proof. Popular culture surrounding Godel's theorem is 90% wrong and atrocious, even with famous and influential books like GEB.

As for your research, no offense but it seems daunting. Proving that a statement is undecidable is incredibly hard work. It's easier to create an undecidable statement then it is to prove a statement is undecidable! (The proof of Godel's Theorem utilizes this idea).

And based upon your last statement I highly, HIGHLY, recommend reading this book: http://www.amazon.com/Godels-Theorem-Incomplete-Guide-Abuse/dp/1568812388
It's a great read and will clear up a lot of misconceptions about the theorem.

Since you are dealing with modeling you more than likely are going to be dealing with computable systems and while related to Set Theory you'd probably want to look more into NP-Completeness and Cook's Theorem. Not as complete an answer considering P=NP is possibly the biggest open question of the day, but proving something is NP Complete may have very similar results to what you are looking to do, and IMHO is much easier to do than proving a statement is undecidable. For instance here is a book of NP Completeness proofs: http://www.amazon.com/Computers-Intractability-NP-Completeness-Mathematical-Sciences/dp/0716710455
and was compiled and written shortly after Cook's Theorem was published.
whereas proving that the Continuum Hypothesis was undecidable took 63 years!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continuum_hypothesis

So as I was saying, it is hard to prove something is undecidable.

So I tossed about a third of my PC together today.

Pulled most everything out of the boxes, tossed the PSU in, attached both my 2.5 SSD, and 3.5 HDD into the brackets (leaving them out of the case for now) attached all my Motherboard standoffs and started getting my cables into the right spots. I also didn't cut my hand open on the IO shield! Gotta finish prepping my MoBo (unfortunately I've got to send my CPU cooler back because the bracket doesn't fit) but I've got to mount my CPU, toss in in my memory, screw the MoBo in and graphics card, and then start plugging in cables.

First build is coming along easier than I expected, the only big hurdle for me left is to make sure I mount the CPU and Heatsink properly, pretty confident in everything else.

I'll post some pics tomorrow, it won't really be much to look at until I get the MoBo in though. I've learned a hell of a lot about PC's already, and looking forward to picking up more as I go along.

I also got a surprise delivery in the mail, my Bloodborne Strategy Guide came in the mail finally. Preorded it back in April, and this thing is fucking amazing, just over 550 pages with every little statistic and number you ever wanted to know, plus trivia, concept art, as well as quotes and insight from Miyazaki all in a beautiful hardcover book. Will edit with a few pics when I get around to taking them. A must buy for big Bloodborne fans.

Anyway, tangent aside. Have any of you built a PC before? Have any funny stories or tips to share?

When I was first learning, Logical Chess Move by Move was a huge eye opener for me. It explains every single move in the game in detail while going through full games. You get introduced to opening ideas, middle game planning, and endgame technique. The book is a very effective primer on a lot of key chess principles and it really teaches the beginner the importance of a single move since you get to read all of the ideas that go into every move.

When I was a low intermediate level player (I'd guess around 1300-1400), I read Silman's How to Reassess Your Chess and that had a huge impact on my playing level once I start to assimilate the knowledge. His coverage of the thought processes for middle game planning, move selection, and looking at material imbalances really opened my eyes to how I should be thinking about positions.

I've read probably 15-30 books in part or entirely over the years. Those two stand out the most to me. Beyond those instructional books, I think books of games collections are good to go through. My favorite were How Karpov Wins by Edmar Mednis (I am a Karpov fan) and Bronstein's Zurich 1953 book (one of the most highly regarded books of all time). Alekhine's Best Games was also a fun read, but it used old style notation I believe, which was a chore for me to learn and go through at the time.

Other special nods from me:

• Pawn Power in Chess is a good book to learn about pawn structures. I only skimmed the chapters on openings I was playing at the time, but I liked the content.
  
  
• Secrets of Modern Chess Strategy is a more modern book on chess strategy. Not as impactful to me as Silman's book, but it's more advanced and I remember it helping me go from 1800ish level to 2000+

If I remember Godel's theorems correctly, then we can not provide such examples. There are some accompanying statements to (1) and (2) above, that go something like

(1) If there is an unprovably true statement A, we can not ever prove that A is unprovably true.

and

(2) If there is a provable but false statement B, we can not ever prove that B is provable but false.

It is extremely handy to know these when faced in debate by someone who has only read very hand-wavy accounts of Godel's theorems. A fallacious argument based on Godel's theorems is "Statement A seems to be true, but I have no logical proof. But, Godel tells me that many things that are true can not be proved to be true. Therefore A." One response might be "Godel also tells us that unprovably true statements can never be known to be true, so if A is unprovably true, we can never logically conclude that it is true. Thus your statement is fallacious."

Honestly, I haven't run into this argument in use that often myself, but I don't spend a lot of time reading New Age drivel. Visit the Amazon page for the book Godel's Theorem: An Incomplete Guide to Its Use and Abuse . I have not read all of this book myself (just a selection), but it should provide a broader answer to your question than I have given here.

First, you're young enough to become very strong at chess, especially if you're competitive. For best long term results, I would really recommend you join a chess club and start playing OTB, because that's where you'll learn real chess.

Now as for training, a very important part of chess is pattern recognition : the patterns are the words you need to 'talk chess'. The more you know, the better speaker you are.

First set of patterns are 'tactical patterns' - you can learn them through a tactics book (better than online training because of the structure). Just go over it 2 or 3 times. There are a couple of tactics books of similar value, such as Polgar's Tactics for champions, or Seïrawan's Winning chess tactics.

https://www.amazon.com/Chess-Tactics-Champions-step---step/dp/081293671X/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1467101252&sr=1-1&keywords=polgar+tactics

https://www.amazon.com/Winning-Chess-Tactics-Everyman/dp/1857443861/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1467101274&sr=1-1&keywords=seirawan+winning+chess+tactics

/u/pierec already mentioned Fiasco, which is great, plays fast, and requires very little setup -- and the setup is just as fun as the play.

Another option that I can't recommend highly enough is Microscope. Microscope tends to be less gonzo than Fiasco, and relies even less on external inputs for play (Fiasco games rely on free playsets you can get on the Bully Pulpit webside). Microscope also rewards (but does not require) a dedicated group coming back to the world they create over and over again.

Note that both of these are more like collaborative improv-fiction exercises than proper games, in that there's no winner or loser -- the point is to make an interesting story. But they're wonderful with the right group.

Indie Press Revolution is a great source for indie story games like this, if you want more.

I post a variant on this comment whenever this question gets asked. Still think the Grinders Manual is an amazing place to start even though I'm thinking some of the 3b strategy is a little dated (iirc)

free

I wrote this guide with my coach. It's a decent place to start, though it is quite long and will take you some time to go through it. I think for beginners the UTG range might be slightly loose as ATo could be better as a fold

http://playonlinepoker.ie/how-to-play-poker-microstakes

Free with KU trial, otherwise 10 bucks

You can download Kindle Unlimited free trial and borrow "The Grinder's Manual", which ends up being free as long as you cancel trial, or else its about 10 bucks a month

heres a link (not affiliate) https://www.amazon.com/Grinders-Manual-Complete-Course-Online-ebook/dp/B01GBFF890

More expensive ($10-$100) Training sites

If you have money to spare then one of the best training sites is upswingpoker.com for beginners as it walks you through a progression from starting hands to post-flop.

If you can't afford Upswing then try Run It Once essential and post in r/poker asking which videos to start with, people are generally pretty helpful

For YouTube content, I'm a fan of Alec Torelli and Doug Polk. They are both charismatic and entertaining with their discussions. Of course there's the (unofficial) World Series of Poker channel with a lot of mirrored videos from the WSOP.

On Netflix there's a few interesting documentaries. If you're a fan of Daniel Negreanu, Kid Poker was a nice watch. Otherwise there's All In, also on Netflix last time I checked.

For entertaining poker reads, I was very impressed with Gus Hansen: Every Hand Revealed. For more serious "step up your game" books, there's a post or three a day about those - just take a look through the history on this sub and I'm sure you'll find some great recommendations.

Since no one has tossed out this idea yet, I would look into Janice Kim's books as well http://www.amazon.com/Learn-Play-Go-Masters-Ultimate/dp/1453632891/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1372733697&sr=8-1&keywords=janice+kim. They are well organized and concise. More appropriate for you if you're just looking for broad points about the game. If you've decided to get compulsively stronger though, then you will definitely need other books.

And if you're feeling overwhelmed by all the suggestions, my question to you is how serious you are about the game. If this is just for fun and casual play, definitely start with Janice Kim's book. Most of the other advice given is for players looking to become as strong a player as possible.

If you have any other questions, please feel free to contact me.

For tournament play:
Gus Hansen's Every Hand Revealed

I'm a tight-aggresive player who wanted to learn what goes on in the mind of a good maniac tournament player like Gus. I use to blind away to often and rarely built large stacks needed in tournament play. This book changed my perception of tournament play and opened me up to new ideas. The book covers every hand Gus played in an Aussie millions tournament that he won.

http://www.amazon.com/Every-Hand-Revealed-Gus-Hansen/dp/0818407271/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1342041880&sr=1-1&keywords=gus+hansen


For low limit hold'em:
Small Stakes Hold 'em: Winning Big With Expert Play

It's a great guide on how to crush the low-limit no fold'em hold'em game.

http://www.amazon.com/Small-Stakes-Hold-Winning-Expert/dp/1880685329/ref=sr_1_11?ie=UTF8&qid=1342041767&sr=8-11&keywords=poker+low+limit

The Chessmaster program is indeed awesome. Fritz is better for serious play, or so I've been told, but there is all sorts of helpful stuff on Chessmaster for beginning/intermediate players.

My personal favorite chess book is Reassess Your Chess by Jeremy Silman. You won't find any "White to move and mate in 3" business. You won't find a bunch of sparsely annotated GM games, either. Instead, it gets into good depth on the tactics and strategy of the middle game. I really suggest it, it offers very useful methods of understanding the foundations of chess, recognizing imbalances, creating plans to exploit those imbalances, that kind of stuff. Fair warning, though, beginners might find it useful but I've found you need to have your feet a little wet to get the most out of the book.

Well, without getting into too much detail, once you get down to 12ish big blinds, you need to start aggressively stealing blinds and going all-in preflop to double up, or else the tournament will pass you by. A good rule of thumb is that once you have bet 10% of your stack, you are "committed" to a hand. Occasionally, if you know your opponents well and you have a suited connector in late position and you just want to see if you hit the flop in any way, you can limp and then push the flop. But generally in tournaments, you never want to be in a situation where you need to double up twice just to get back into the thick of things.

It's all about position. I agree that weak aces are frustrating hands to get when you're short stacked, but if it's folded around to you in late position, you need to go with it.

One nice thing about pushing with 10BB as opposed to 2BB, is that you have a lot of fold equity still. People are pretty much going to call a 2BB raise with almost anything (esp. the big blind), but if you start shoving when you have more money, they are much less likely to call, and the blinds/antes are a huge win for you.

This book is awesome, and although it's not specifically about tournaments, all the concepts apply: BOOK

Most of what I mentioned is covered in the book.

It covers everything in Arthas' life really, pre-WC3 through WC3 and Frozen Throne, and ends where he wakes up at the start of the WotLK cinematic.

Wrath is definitely worth leveling through once, but it is also my favorite WoW expansion (also cuz Arthas is my favorite WC character), but with my DK I really enjoyed leveling through Wrath.

I was recommended this book by a poker loving friend

https://www.amazon.com/Harrington-Expert-Strategy-Limit-Tournaments/dp/1880685337

It's tournament focused, but a lot of the basic principles are the same. I'd totally recommend reading it with a friend and challenging each other on the questions.

But really, practice. Find a group of good players to join. You'll be donating your money to the table each session, but learning a lot.

Why should you only play 100bb? It's probably the most difficult stack size to play. That's why casinos use it as a standard and many people tell noobs to play it. It's certainly easier to play 40-50bb or 200bb+ although you have to play your stack size of course.

Read Professional No-Limit Hold 'em if you're interested to read more. It's one of the best cash game poker books ever written in my opinion and it deals extensively in this subject, how you should adjust your bet and raise sizes depending on your (and your opponents) stack size and commitment thresholds.

Your post has too little context/content for anyone to give you particularly relevant or specific advice. You should list what you know already and what you’re trying to learn. I find it’s easiest to research a new subject when I have a concrete problem I’m trying to solve.

But anyway, I’m going to assume you studied up through single variable calculus and are reasonably motivated to put some effort in with your reading. Here are some books which you might enjoy, depending on your interests. All should be reasonably accessible (to, say, a sharp and motivated undergraduate), but they’ll all take some work:

(in no particular order)
Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid (wikipedia)
To Mock a Mockingbird (wikipedia)
Structure in Nature is a Strategy for Design
Geometry and the Imagination
Visual Group Theory (website)
The Little Schemer (website)
Visual Complex Analysis (website)
Nonlinear Dynamics and Chaos (website)
Music, a Mathematical Offering (website)
QED
Mathematics and its History
The Nature and Growth of Modern Mathematics
Proofs from THE BOOK (wikipedia)
Concrete Mathematics (website, wikipedia)
The Symmetries of Things
Quantum Computing Since Democritus (website)
Solid Shape
On Numbers and Games (wikipedia)
Street-Fighting Mathematics (website)

But also, you’ll probably get more useful response somewhere else, e.g. /r/learnmath. (On /r/math you’re likely to attract downvotes with a question like this.)

You might enjoy:
https://www.reddit.com/r/math/comments/2mkmk0/a_compilation_of_useful_free_online_math_resources/
https://www.reddit.com/r/mathbooks/top/?sort=top&t=all

hey there the bridges conference is about your research topic. Here is a really cute video displaying some of the pieces, which there are descriptions of on the site.

This youtube channel also has a lot of other maths inspired art such as this sculpture and a cute little video on symmetry in music.

Good luck with your project!

e: also thirding the mc escher suggestion :)

e2: also if you're interested here is an accessible book (pdf)on symmetry in mathematics, which as you can imagine, ends up being a relevant topic for thinking about art.

Well, I did all of that first. Then I read Bob Fancher's The Pleasures of Small Motions. I won't say it was like a light went off in my head, because there's just so much in that book about the mental game, but faking it until you make it is a great way to get past some of the mental blocks we set up for ourselves. Such as you convincing yourself that you aren't as good as you think you are. Truth is, if you're paying attention to your fundamentals and practicing, you're probably much better than you think you are. Trust your gut more, and just roll with it.

If you're aiming to compete, try doing all of the following if you can:
 

1- Find a chess teacher. A rating above 2000 is preferred
 

2- Get Chess books that teach the basics of tactics, strategy, and endgame.
 

3- Make an account on Chesstempo.com and start solving tactics
 

4- Play many rapid games online. Chess.com allows you to play for free
 

5-For book recommendations : Endgame/
Middlegame
-As for opening, you really need a mentor to guide you in choosing the best opening for you. If you want to learn some opening, this is a good basic book

Both books crickets mentioned.

The Mathematics of Poker by Bill Chen and Jerrod Ankenman

Personally I've enjoyed Professional No-Limit Hold 'em by Matt Flynn, Sunny Mehta and Ed Miller

THE best forum for poker is 2+2

If you decide to go into playing, and not only studying this game, contact me.

Good luck.

ok, so it's not like you are stuck at 20k after playing a few hundred games. This is really just about learning the fundamentals and practicing.

Personally, I like Janice Kim's "Learn to Play Go" series. http://www.amazon.com/Learn-Play-Go-Masters-Ultimate/dp/1453632891

They are simple, easy to read, and cover the information in a clear, progressive way. Most times I teach people, I have them go through the whole series twice while playing a few practice games a week and doing go problems. Usually by that time they are mid teen kyu and starting get grasp the strategy.

I also use Goproblems.com a lot. You need to learn strategy and tactics. Strategy you get from studying high level games, reading, watching videos. tactics you get from practicing, and goproblems help a ton here!

Good luck!

I would highly recommend reading the book Pleasures of Small Motions. This is an amazing book that teaches you how to find your true skill level and get past any mental barriers. Youll improve quickly! Keep playing and have fun doing it!

Wow, this is a fantastic list!! One book that I had been considering is Go For Beginners. There has been a lot of debate between that and Janice Kim's Learn to Play Go series. I'll be checking out a lot of these from the perspective of a completely new player. If you'd like, I can check back in with you periodically and let you know how they've worked for me, so you can know which ones to recommend (and not!) for any other new players you come across. Thank you again for the extensive list, this is a huge help!

• Take a break. If you play every weekend, maybe take a weekend or two off. I've always found that I get "burnt out" when I play too much, and my interest level and motivation to play suffer dearly. I end up getting bored and frustrated, which makes me play worse, which makes me more frustrated ad nauseam.
  
  
• Play a different game. If you mainly play 8-9 ball, try 14.1 or one-pocket. If you have access to a carom table, try playing 3-cushion (or straight billiards if 3C is too hard).
  
  
• Play somewhere new. Go to that pool hall on the other side of town for once, see if you can drum up some action with someone new.
  
  
• Study! I've learned quite alot from reading about the game and watching professional matches. For your particular issue, I'd suggest Pleasures of Small Motions, which is entirely about pool's mental game. Someone here on /r/billiards suggested it in a thread maybe a month ago and it's honestly one of the best books on the game that I've read (it's short too).
  
  
• Start a pool journal. This is ripped straight from the book I just suggested, but tracking your progress really is key to accurately assessing your own skill. Our egos can tell us that we're great before we have the skills to back it up, leading to frustration. Plus, it'll give you concrete, attainable goals to work towards (i.e. "I want to hit 5-diamond stop shots with a success rate >90%" rather than just "I wanna be better").

We are starting regular tournaments for this subreddit, you have missed out this time but in a few weeks we will start afresh, you should join in, we have several beginners taking part, plus you will get your games reviewed.

Also join your local club, it'll work wonders for your interest.

As for books this series are great for getting your head around the first concepts, if you buy why not share with your friends to lower the costs?

I'm on the same road. I'm not really good, but I'm working on it.

Read books such as Reassess Your Chess. Watch/listen to some great commentary at [Killegar Chess on YouTube](
http://www.youtube.com/user/SeanGGodley). Play different people frequently (online chess is great for this).

Any poker math is kind of situational; you need to have a good understanding of poker in order for any of these sources to be interesting. That being said, I love poker and also maths, and reading that I've enjoyed have been:

GTO Range Builder Blog: http://blog.gtorangebuilder.com/

Applications of No Limit Hold 'Em: https://www.amazon.com/Applications-No-Limit-Hold-Matthew-Janda/dp/1880685558

If you're just trying to learn poker, there are some great youtube tutorials and The Grinder's Manual (https://www.amazon.com/Grinders-Manual-Complete-Course-Online-ebook/dp/B01GBFF890/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1482117534&sr=1-1&keywords=the+grinders+manual)
is an incredible introduction, although a bit pricy.

I really enjoyed one of the Northrend lore books - Arthas. It is one of my favorite wow books. The Quests will lead you through the lore pretty well also! http://www.amazon.com/World-Warcraft-Arthas-Rise-Lich/dp/143915760X

The advice given by most decent chess players is to learn the basic rules (which you've done) and then focus on tactics. I see you have used chesstempo, which is excellent. I'd say to focus on that. Recognizing common tactical patterns really is the best way to improve and there are many, many sources for this sort of training. This book by Laszlo Polgar (for many basic mate examples) and this one (to explore the various tactical ideas) by his daughter are quite good imho.

In addition to good bankroll management, read The Mental Game of Poker. If you're playing stakes outside of your bankroll now and playing hyper turbos when you normally don't, this will happen again even after you get better at the game and build up your bankroll. I also think The Mathematics of Poker won't help you much. I've read it and basically applied none of it to my game so far. I'd read something like Ryan Fee's 6 Max Guide, Verneer's Moving through the Micros, Easy Game, or The Grinder's Manual which came out last April and is very good.

Did you know Amazon will donate a portion of every purchase if you shop by going to smile.amazon.com instead? Over $50,000,000 has been raised for charity - all you need to do is change the URL!

Here are your smile-ified links:

The Mammoth Book of the World's Greatest Chess Games

Understanding Chess Move by Move

Zurich International Chess Tournament, 1953

Tal-Botvinnik 1960

Alekhine My Best Games of Chess, 1908-1937

---

^^i'm ^^a ^^friendly bot

Poker is a fun hobby, and it becomes more fun the more you learn. Don't listen to these guys trying to discourage you from playing live. Have realistic expectations: don't expect to make a lot of money, remember that you'll only cash some of the time, and do not gamble with money that you can't afford to lose.

For these kind of small stakes live tournaments I think Harrington on Hold 'em will give you a basic understanding of tournament play that should give you an edge on the field. Good luck!

There is several examples in the DMG that I would write down or print as they are easy to forget. If you haven't bought the 5e DM screen yet and plan to use a screen, I would recommend this one. It does have some information on it that is facing you at all times that give you trap/danger values and how to roll certain things that are easy to forget. Its saved me from having to look up values.
https://www.amazon.com/Dungeon-Masters-Screen-Accessory/dp/0786965630/ref=s9u_simh_gw_i17?_encoding=UTF8&fpl=fresh&pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=&pf_rd_r=P1XQ93X0KMV8094SRZQ4&pf_rd_t=36701&pf_rd_p=1cded295-23b4-40b1-8da6-7c1c9eb81d33&pf_rd_i=desktop

Don't worry about openings for now. You can have perfect opening knowledge and still get killed by weak players with a basic grasp of tactics and an ability to find threats. Those areas are the starting point.

To that end, assuming you know the rules already, and can read chess notation, start with a VERY simple book on tactics. Go through "Simple Checkmates" by A. J. Gilliam (Amazon link) seriously at least seven times--preferably about 10 to 20 times--until you can instantly see the right move in each diagram.

Learning chess is all about building up your knowledge of basic patterns, and I've yet to find a book that gives such a good grounding in the most fundamental and important of these basic patterns.

More advanced (but still cheap) books that are good for learning to see patters in chess would be 1001 Brilliant Ways to Checkmate, by Fred Reinfeld (ignore any books of his that don't consist of just diagrams, though) and the excellent Chess Training Pocket Book: 300 Most Important Positions, by Lev Alburt.

I found Winning Chess Strategies, by Yasser Seirawan helpful as an introduction to strategy when I first started out, but some people think his writing style is more suitable for kids.

How to Reassess Your Chess: The Complete Chess-Mastery Course, by Jeremy Silman or The Amateur's Mind: Turning Chess Misconceptions into Chess Mastery, also by Silman are big touchstones for chess learners in the late-beginner phase. A less-known author that I highly recommend is C. J. S. Purdy. He wrote quite a while ago, but he's incredibly insightful in teaching amateurs to break bad chess habits and generally understand how to think in chess. Here's an Amazon search result for his books. (By the way, I don't necessarily endorse Amazon as the best place to buy chess books, but the links are convenient.)

Main thing is, get the basics down. Build up the basic patterns. Go over the simpler diagrams over and over until you know them cold. Then move on to strategy, more advanced tactics and endgames, then worry about openings.

Read anything written by Ed Miller.
Here's a good one to buy.
Hunter Cichy does a good job making videos using Flopzilla.
Here's one example.
For $16/month you can subscribe to RedChipPoker.com. Both these guys do coaching videos here along with other pros. It's well worth the money.
If you're still a beginner, you can subscribe to James "Splitsuit" Sweeney's YouTube channel: The Poker Bank. He teaches a lot of good basics geared towards newer players.
I've got more resources too if you're interested beyond this stuff.

In no particular order:

The Mammoth Book of the World's Greatest Chess Games

Understanding Chess Move by Move

Zurich International Chess Tournament, 1953

Tal-Botvinnik 1960

Alekhine My Best Games of Chess, 1908-1937

Botvinnik Best Games trilogy

If you don't have any already, a good card game like Uno or Fluxx might do. That's technically paper, it's something your friends/family can do when they visit, and as your child(ren) grow(s) they can play too.

And if you want to sex it up, you can play as a couple with the rule that when someone wins a round, the other person has to remove an article of clothing.


Another option might be a paper clock: http://www.amazon.com/Make-Your-Working-Paper-Clock/dp/0060910666 That's something you and your husband can put together as a project.

These aren't novels, but I really enjoyed these books around that age:

The I Hate Mathematics Book

Math for Smarty Pants

They taught me a lot of fun math puzzles and concepts for the first time (prime numbers, perfect numbers, basic combinatorics, math magic tricks), each with a bit of a story attached.

This book blew my mind time and again growing up. Though 13 may be a little old for the book, it's certainly a great read for children who show a love of math.

So much reading on this subject. Although I only perused it, this may be useful in your quest.

http://www.amazon.com/Every-Hand-Revealed-Gus-Hansen/dp/0818407271

Statistical juggling I'm not so sure about. Certainly not as interesting to me as the psychology...

You may want to look into Backgammon...many poker professionals started out playing it.

Good luck!

If you play pool, you'll know the sensation you get when you KNOW you won't miss a shot you're attempting. What's happened is that your brain has all the information that it needs and has fed it to your subconscious, which is what actually controls your muscles, and that feeds back and tells you you're ready to take the shot.

The key is your subconscious. This is what controls your muscles, not the part of your mind that "speaks" to you. Giving it all the information and letting it do its thing without getting in its way (i.e. thinking with your conscious mind) is what you need to do to perform. Screwing up is often (as long as you've practiced enough to commit the notes and rhythm to memory) just your conscious mind engaging when you should be letting your subconscious do the work. In sports this is called "being in two minds". The act of going consciously blank and letting your subconscious do all the work is most commonly called being "in the zone." It sounds like voodoo but it's actually possible to train yourself to slip into the zone, and as long as you go with it and don't engage your conscious mind you can stay in it. I recommend the book "The Pleasures of Small Motions" for a billiards context. There's probably something similar for musicians but I'm not aware of it.

The traditional gift for the first anniversary was paper, and the new one is clocks.

So, here you go: http://www.amazon.com/Make-Your-Working-Paper-Clock/dp/0060910666

Do it together, draw a heart on it, write the date in the heart.

Wow, I wasn't even aware of the /po/ board, thanks!

It looks like the clock came from this book, https://www.amazon.com/Make-Your-Working-Paper-Clock/dp/0060910666 , but there's plenty of other good stuff available on that thread to work on :-)

Edit: I take it back, the clock came from http://guru2.karakasa.com/pendulum_clock/pcp_e.html , but the design is very similar to the book

That reminds me of a book that could be perfect for a course like this:

http://www.amazon.com/The-Symmetries-Things-John-Conway/dp/1568812205/

It discusses the idea of symmetry in great mathematical depth, but in a way that is much less formal and pedantic than a traditional math text. For me, there is something beautiful in the extraordinary variety available in the forms of symmetry explored in this book.

I am about 1600 USCF, with about 100 chess books. However, most of mine are biographies/historical.

My favorites are:

Zurich International Chess Tournament, 1953 by David Bronstein

Soviet Chess, 1917-1991 by Andrew Soltis

Endgame: Bobby Fischer's Remarkable Rise and Fall - from America's Brightest Prodigy to the Edge of Madness by Frank Brady

Aron Nimzowitsch: On the Road to Chess Mastery, 1886-1924 by Per Skjoldager and Jorn Erik Nielsen

Garry Kasparov on Garry Kasparov (3 volumes) by Garry Kasparov.

My new years "chessalutions" (if you will) was to do more study and play more. Unfortunately I have not done the latter as much due to work but I am hitting the books more and enjoying reading through Understanding Chess Move by Move by GM Dr. John Nunn. May look to do more tournaments but for the time being I am focusing on my job (I am a hotel manager so it is pretty busy all the time 24/7) and once I get that under control I can focus my attention on chessing.

In my experience it can be tough to get ahead no matter how easy/boring it is for you, because if you take the time to actually learn the material in advance the class will become even more boring for you. I have a few suggestions:

1. Try to find an accelerated program somewhere or talk to your math teacher to see if you can do independent guided study. It helps for things to still be coordinated.
   
2. Explore other kinds of math and problems outside of your math class. Book stores carry math books that are actually designed for reading for fun (no problems at the end of chapters, so they don't work in classrooms). A book I really enjoyed was Math for smarty Pants. You could just head to a book store and browse the math section until you find something interesting to you.
   
3. Try some math competitions like the AMC 8 or Math Olympians wiki. You can either sign up to take them, or just browse old tests looking for fun and interesting problems you want to learn how to do. Many come with solutions online too.

Here you go.

IMO, just posting a capture onto reddit isn't the way to go. If you like 5e, you should show it by giving wizards money so that they will keep making 5e stuff.

Now, if you want to come up with your own "stuff happens" table, feel free to post it.

More tables are always nice.

Gödel's incompleteness theorem is a technical statement concerning a possible formalization of mathematical reasoning known as first-order logic. There are a million variations, but basically it states that if you start with a set of axioms which is finite or even merely enumerable by some mechanical process (Turing machine), and if these axioms are consistent and contain a very minimal subset of arithmetic, then there is a statement which is "true" but you cannot prove from those axioms with first-order logic (and, in fact, it gives you an explicit such statement which, albeit "true", cannot be proven; if your axioms contain a not too minimal subset of arithmetic, one such statement is the very fact that the axioms are consistent, suitably formalized; another variant, due to Rosser, is that even if you allow for your axioms to contain false statements, there is still going to be some statement P such that neither P nor its negation ¬P follow from your axioms).

So, in essence, no matter what axioms you use to formalize arithmetic or any decent subset of mathematics, unless your axioms are useless (because they cannot be enumerated, or because they are inconsistent), or the axioms aren't sufficiently powerful to prove that they are consistent. Even if you add that as an axiom, there is still something missing (namely that with that extra axiom, the axioms are still consistent; and if you add that, then again, etc.). Interestingly, a theory cannot even postulate its own consistency (one can use a quinean trick to form a theory T consisting of usual axioms of arithmetic + the statement that T itself is consistent, but then the theory T is wrong, and inconsistent).

This is all really a technical statement concerning first-order logic. But trying a different logic will not help: another variant of Gödel's theorem (due to Church or Turing) tells us, essentially, that there can be no mechanical process (again, Turing machine) to determine whether a mathematical statement is true or false; so there can be no mechanizable, coherent and complete, logic which attains all mathematical truths, because if there were, one could simply enumerate all possible proofs according to the rules of that logic, and obtain all possible truths. All these variants of Gödel's theorem are variations around Cantor's diagonal argument: in the original variant, one constructs a statement which says something like "I am not provable" (intuitively speaking, at least), whereas in the Church/Turing version I just mentioned one would appeal to the undecidability of the halting problem.

But one thing to keep in mind is that almost every attempt to draw philosophical or epistemological consequences from Gödel's theorem has been sheer nonsense. Explanations àla handwaving such as "every formal mathematical system is necessarily incomplete" or "formalization of mathematics is inherently impossible" or whatever, are perhaps nice for giving a vague intuitive idea of what it's all about, but the actual mathematical theorem is not so lyrical. (For example, I have used the word "truth" in quotation marks once or twice in the above. This is because I don't have the patience to write down all the caveats about the meaning of "truth" in the mathematical sense in this context. So while what I have written is correct, attempts to draw metaphysical consequences from it will not be. :-)

For further reading, besides what others have already suggested, I believe Torkel Franzén's book on Gödel's theorem (destined for a general audience) is excellent.

The Chernev book is awesome, one of my favourites.

In a similar vein Nunn's Understanding Chess Move by Move is brilliant.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Understanding-Chess-Move-John-Nunn/dp/1901983412

Also CT-ART 4.0 (android and iOS) is cheap and imo the gold standard for thematic tactics training :).

Other books I own and like.

Fundamental Chess Openings (covers a lot of ground explaining the goals of each without reams of variations).

Laskers manual of chess (oldie but goodie - get the new edition).

Positional Decision Making in Chess Gelfand).

Try not to buy too many books until you've read and got what you can from each, also revisit them once in a while because as you improve you'll find stuff you didn't see/understand first time around.

I bought a copy, I'm excited to put it together. As an aside, have you ever considered making a clock, like in this book?. It would probably turn out pretty cool looking

The best book ever How to Reassess Your Chess. This is the best book to learn or refine your chess. Order the workbook too and when you're done you'll be able to compete at a much higher level.

You can sign up and play on these websites.

1.chess.com

2.lichess.org

3.chess24.com

​

Watch beginner videos on youtube. You can subscribe to these channels and watch their videos regularly. Many of these channels are not entirely aimed at beginners. You can watch them for entertainment and learn chess history too.

1.https://www.youtube.com/user/AGADMATOR

2.https://www.youtube.com/user/ChessNetwork

3.https://www.youtube.com/user/STLChessClub

4.https://www.youtube.com/user/wwwChesscom

5.https://www.youtube.com/user/RosenChess

6.https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCqLLqbclDQ6IQg39Wsgy-4w

7.https://www.youtube.com/user/PowerPlayChess

8.https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCWRXqVXhkHYp9HU9gJATgJA

Check out these books that are great for beginners and intermediate players.

1.https://www.amazon.com/Bobby-Fischer-Teaches-Chess/dp/0553263153/

2.https://www.amazon.com/Chess-Tactics-Champions-step-step/dp/081293671X/

Read this book. It's honestly the best pool book I've ever read. I have applied the lessons learned in this book to other sports as well.

There are several papercraft clocks that tell reasonably accurate time. I've built this paper clock by James Rudolf a couple of times. The book seems to only to occasionally in be in stock, but it looks like Amazon has it currently. It's a fair bit of work - and there are a couple of small errors in the book that are worth looking up online. But, with patience and lots of time with an x-acto knife, the clock will make a nice tic-toc and keep time.

Danica McKellar (Winnie Cooper from the Wonder Years, Elsie on West Wing) has written some books about math for girls. I haven't read them, but they've received a LOT of press, so it might be worth it. http://www.amazon.com/Danica-McKellar/e/B001JP7Z7G/ref=ntt_athr_dp_pel_pop_1

As a kid, my favorite was Math for Smarty Pants

Play [Microscope] (http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0983277907/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?qid=1420205184&sr=8-1&pi=AC_SY200_QL40) with your players. I cannot reccomend this enough. It's an rpg where you build. A fictional history from scratch. Things get weird, unique, and awesome quickly. All you need are index cards and a pen. The book is pretty thin, and 2 quick read throughs will learn you the rules. The guys that made it deserve the money, though.

The I HATE MATHEMATICS! Book

Math for Smarty Pants

I remember picking up both of these books at -some- point during elementary school book fairs. I have always really liked math, but they do have some interesting topics and random facts. The topics are always pretty short - I remember quite a few on statistics in various forms. I'm not sure they would 100% work for what you are looking for but they might be able to form springboards for projects?

Though I haven't read them, the first things that popped to mind were RPG related books like the Nagash Trilogy from the Warhammer world, and the book World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King.
You might also like the Forgotten Realms book Promise of the Witch King (note it's not the first in its series though). RA Salvatore is good and Drizzt is always awesome.

Check out this list. It includes most if not all books mentioned here.

From more to less advanced, generally:

• Geometry by Gray, Esplen, and Brannan
  
  
• The Infinite in the Finite
  
  
• A Geometrical Picture Book
  
  
• 99 Points of Intersection: Examples-Pictures-Proofs
  
  
• Lines and Curves: A Practical Geometry Handbook
  
  
• The Heart of Mathematics
  
  
• The Symmetries of Things
  
  
• A Mathematical Gift, 1: The Interplay Between Topology, Functions, Geometry, and Algebra (Mathematical World) (v. 1)
  
  A Mathematical Gift, II
  
  A Mathematical Gift, III: The Interplay Between Topology, Functions, Geometry, and Algebra (Mathematical World) (v. 3)
  
  Note the first three volumes are cheaper as a set.
  
  Intuitive Topology (Mathematical World, Vol 4)
  
  Groups and Symmetry: A Guide to Discovering Mathematics (Mathematical World, Vol. 5)
  
  Knots and Surfaces: A Guide to Discovering Mathematics (Mathematical World, Vol. 6)
  
  
• A Beginner's Guide to Constructing the Universe
  
  and 5 activity books in the same style
  
  
• Going beyond books, but visual, manipulative, and tactile, the Zome Tools

If you're looking to play cash then I highly recommend The Grinder's Manual. Does an excellent job of covering the default strategy of most situations you will encounter and explaining when to deviate from those defaults.

Man softcover from approved retailers is really hard (no sarcasm), so many good games only come in hardcover. If you give me more information about his preferences I could help you narrow the list down.

https://www.amazon.com/Esoterrorists-RPG-2nd-Robin-Laws/dp/1908983523/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1494289945&sr=8-1&keywords=Esoterrorists

https://www.amazon.com/Blue-Rose-AGE-Romantic-Fantasy/dp/1934547743/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1494289980&sr=8-2&keywords=Blue+rose+rpg

https://www.amazon.com/Microscope-Ben-Robbins/dp/0983277907/ref=pd_rhf_dp_s_cp_9?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_i=0983277907&pd_rd_r=Z3RJ2JPXJQYDRYA06S2Y&pd_rd_w=hHGH4&pd_rd_wg=W5G5p&psc=1&refRID=Z3RJ2JPXJQYDRYA06S2Y

https://www.amazon.com/Bully-Pulpit-Games-BPG-005/dp/1934859397/ref=pd_sim_14_3?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_i=1934859397&pd_rd_r=JBAWXXB309ERX5KH0PXT&pd_rd_w=Eunmp&pd_rd_wg=OTd2y&psc=1&refRID=JBAWXXB309ERX5KH0PXT

https://www.amazon.com/Monster-of-the-Week-EHP0009/dp/1613170920/ref=pd_rhf_dp_s_cp_2?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_i=1613170920&pd_rd_r=WFVTZB7V8R3S7S8F462W&pd_rd_w=HYjgo&pd_rd_wg=K0zZT&psc=1&refRID=WFVTZB7V8R3S7S8F462W

https://www.amazon.com/Evil-Hat-Productions-EHP0002-Accelerated/dp/1613170475/ref=pd_sim_14_8?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_i=1613170475&pd_rd_r=JBAWXXB309ERX5KH0PXT&pd_rd_w=Eunmp&pd_rd_wg=OTd2y&psc=1&refRID=JBAWXXB309ERX5KH0PXT

https://www.amazon.com/Urban-Shadows-Softcover-MPG007-Truman/dp/1987916166/ref=pd_sim_21_2?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_i=1987916166&pd_rd_r=DKP8DTTM0N8MT2HDRFPZ&pd_rd_w=i0nmQ&pd_rd_wg=KPg28&psc=1&refRID=DKP8DTTM0N8MT2HDRFPZ

https://www.amazon.com/Kingdom-Ben-Robbins/dp/0983277915/ref=pd_rhf_dp_s_cp_13?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_i=0983277915&pd_rd_r=A9ZZTCT4BD1KY3DA9ZYW&pd_rd_w=jRFtT&pd_rd_wg=biDau&psc=1&refRID=A9ZZTCT4BD1KY3DA9ZYW

https://www.amazon.com/Bully-Pulpit-Games-Durance-Playing/dp/0988390906/ref=pd_sim_14_26?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_i=0988390906&pd_rd_r=T0HFDYG416QT8CZBM6C7&pd_rd_w=ljUZO&pd_rd_wg=hK410&psc=1&refRID=T0HFDYG416QT8CZBM6C7 (I think)

Character playbooks for pbta might be hard to print off.

https://www.amazon.com/Havenshield-Complete-RPG-Rulebook-Myers/dp/154258356X/ref=sr_1_7?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1494291018&sr=1-7&keywords=Rpg (this seems like its worth a look)

Arthas is VERY good. I also really enjoyed Beyond the Dark Portal.

SECTION | CONTENT

--|:--
Title | Bloodborne, Let's Talk Lore #19: The Fishing Hamlet (w/ Jerks Sans Frontieres)
Description | See below for navigation timestamps, links, and references: 0:01:20 – Intro ends 0:02:10 – Valtr, Beast Eater? 0:06:30 – Adeline 0:09:00 – Lumenwood Gardens 0:11:20 – Lady Maria of the Astral Clock Tower 0:19:15 – Rare Gehrman dialogue 0:27:50 – Fishing Hamlet 0:55:15 – Brador, Church Assassin 1:10:25 – Parasite Farm 1:28:00 – Orphan of Kos 1:42:00 – Gehrman’s suffering 1:47:20 – Whale worship and Kos 1:50:00 – The Great Ones as “sympathetic in spirit” 1:58:20 – The Surgery Altar 2:04:38 – Menstrual blood debunked? 2:08:00 – Temporally-distinct Grand Cathedrals 2:11:57 – Bloodletting explained in depth 2:28:30 – Who are the Church Servants/Giants? 2:33:40 – Maria’s picture frame 2:40:31 – Do Great Ones have genders? 2:52:25 – “Fear the Thirst for Blood” vs. “Seek the Old Blood” Bloodborne, Let’s Talk Lore series playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLZ17Wuu7rVt7ytbFGwAHZSzq2kZKqRlfw Supplemental NPC dialogue courtesy MoonlightButterfly: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCI_QectaF7CrE7iIzq-7G1g/ Aegon of Astora. “Bloodborne Cinematic Lore: Gehrman, the First Hunter”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2DWE_vle6HE JSF’s YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCutDYNaok6TxG_bTE26YJmQ Aegon of Astora. “Bloodborne: The Old Hunters (SPOILERS): That sounded awfully familiar ...”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0tmS1BDflCE Jerks Sans Frontieres. “Addendum: Accurate Astral Clock Face”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O_eVlDQFSIY Wikimedia Commons. “Prague Astronomical Clock Face”: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Czech-2013-Prague-Astronomical_clock_face.jpg Redgrave. “The Little Things in Yharnam: Oedon”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wjpcKIQyK5I Wikimedia Commons. “Bishop Fish”: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bishop-fish.png Monster Brains. “Thing That Drifted Ashore (Scanlation)”: http://monsterbrains.blogspot.ca/2010/12/junji-ito-thing-that-drifted-ashore.html Junji Ito Wiki. “Thing That Drifted Ashore”: http://junjiitomanga.wikia.com/wiki/The_Thing_That_Drifted_Ashore Adamkranz. “A Closer Look at Later Areas”: https://www.reddit.com/r/bloodborne/comments/3vke54/dlc_spoilers_a_closer_look_at_later_areas/ Redgrave. “The Little Things in Yharnam: The Hunter’s Origin”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dUqtL-MS76I U.S. National Library of Medicine. “Johannes de Ketham - Fasiculo de Medicina”: https://www.nlm.nih.gov/exhibition/horse/ast_ketham_p06.html Wikimedia Commons. “Points used in bloodletting”: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Feldtbuch_der_Wundartzney,_newlich_getruckt_Wellcome_L0031659.jpg Redgrave. "The Paleblood Hunt (Definitive Edition)": https://www.reddit.com/r/bloodborne/comments/3vaq4r/the_paleblood_hunt_finalized_and_revised_with/ https://docs.google.com/document/d/1JL5acskAT_2t062HILImBkV8eXAwaqOj611mSjK-vZ8/edit Future Press. “Bloodborne Collector’s Edition Strategy Guide” (non-affiliate link): http://www.amazon.com/Bloodborne-Collectors-Edition-Strategy-Guide/dp/3869930691 Future Press. “Bloodborne The Old Hunters Collector's Edition Guide” (non-affiliate link): http://www.amazon.com/Bloodborne-Hunters-Collectors-Edition-Guide/dp/3869930721/
Length | 2:57:04






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Buy/Torrent and then read these 3 books. They'll give you a pretty fantastic grounding of cash game strategy.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/1880685000 (read this first, however it's not strictly a NL Hold Em book, it's just important to read)

http://www.amazon.com/No-Limit-Hold-Theory-Practice/dp/188068537X

http://www.amazon.com/books/dp/188068540X

When I was younger, I had Math for smarty pants. It was a very good introduction to a lot of different topics presented in a fun way.

http://www.amazon.com/Brown-Paper-School-book-Smarty/dp/0316117390

It is pleasing to use Gödel's theorems metaphorically when speaking of the unknowable but Gödel's theorems actually make very specific statements about formal mathematical systems that are not really applicable in this context.

If you are interested, I suggest Gödel's Theorem: An Incomplete Guide to its Use and Abuse. This goes for the OP as well.

One of my favorite recent mathematics books - and one that offers a nice continuum between 'pure' mathematics and a specific application of it, as well as a nice spread of mathematical sophistication from pop math to some research-level depth, is The Symmetries Of Things by John Conway, Heidi Burgiel and Chaim Goodman-Strauss. It's an exploration of 'discrete' symmetries of the plane and of space - and of the tilings, polyhedra, etc. that they give rise to - as well as an introduction to some aspects of Coxeter groups and a (slightly out-of-place) chapter on the number of finite groups of various orders. I can highly recommend all of Conway's writing, but this is perhaps the finest instance available right now.

For visual beauty, it's hard to beat The Symmetries of Things (2008) by Conway, Burgiel & Goodman-Strauss.

The MAA review says, "The first thing one notices when one picks up a copy of The Symmetries of Things is that it is a beautiful book."

Amazon link for "Math for Smarty Pants" by Marilyn Burns, with a "Look Inside" feature to see some of the book.

I didn't read this book until around 1995 or so, well after the book was originally published. I picked it up again at my university library for kicks - it's still a pretty amazing book! If you know a kid in the later years of grade school who's into math, you should definitely get them a copy of this.

EDIT: Obviously I was inspired by this thread, but this book is aimed more towards 9-12 year olds I feel.

http://www.amazon.com/Professional-No-Limit-Hold-em-I/dp/188068540X
http://smallstakesnolimitholdem.com/


These are two of the best books you can buy. You can find them both on several torrent sites if you don't want to pay. (I definitely wouldn't pay for SSNLH, $100 is fleecing the market.)

For an entertaining read and some aggressive tips I would recommend "Every Hand Revealed" by Gus Hanson.

My 2c : How about just asking the question "why do you subscribe to the PhilosophyofScience reddit?" and then give the prize to the comment with the most upvotes? Ties being decided by you.

EDIT : I will throw in a copy of Godel's Theorem : An Incomplete Guide to its Use and Abuse as another prize.

Warcraft 3 is exactly this. Although if it's a book you want, the story is available as Arthas: Rise of the Lich King. Haven't read the book but the story in the game is one of the best in the Warcraft universe

The Symmetries of Things is a wonderful book about geometric group theory, which in particular leads the reader through a classification of wallpaper patterns. You could try to work through it with him. Also, Burnside's lemma lets you answer some nice counting questions (such as the one on the Wikipedia page).

My general advice is to avoid formalism like the plague. Come up with questions that a lay person can understand without introducing any notation or definitions.

A fine book that hasn't been mentioned yet: [Understanding Chess Move by Move] (http://www.amazon.com/Understanding-Chess-Move-John-Nunn/dp/1901983412/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1376777162&sr=8-3&keywords=John+Nunn), John Nunn - Chess is a game of ideas, and this book does a fine job of explaining how top-level chessplayers think. One of his best books...

A nice slow(-ish) introduction to Go is from Janice Kim and Soo-Hyun Jeong:
Learn to Play Go: A Master's Guide to the Ultimate Game (Volume I) (Learn to Play Go Series). It was the book that helped Go click for me.

There's a book about it, and it's actually quite good. I highly recommend reading it.

https://www.amazon.com/World-Warcraft-Arthas-Rise-Pocket/dp/143915760X

Hey this is a lot later lol but I found the old dm screen on Amazon used for like 20 bucks here's the link for the listings D&D Dungeon Master's Screen (D&D Accessory) https://www.amazon.com/dp/0786965630/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_i_t6qnDb2T2G8YR

https://www.amazon.com/World-Warcraft-Arthas-Rise-Pocket/dp/143915760X

This novel is probably most in line with what you're asking for. Warcraft 3: The Frozen Throne ends with Arthas putting on the Helm of Dominion for the first time. Most of the story presented in the game is of him as a death knight in his campaign through Lordearon.

Basically, if you're looking for the story of his journey there, WC3/TFT has it, but if you're interested in the mental aspects of 'becoming the Lich King' after donning the helm of dominion and beginning to interact with Ner'Zhul, then the novel is what you want.

That, my friends, is Arthas Menethil. It’s actually a fairly entertaining book.

I skimmed the comments to see if anyone mentioned this related book:

Gödel's Theorem: An Incomplete Guide to Its Use and Abuse

I recently checked it out of our math library. Pretty heady stuff for a small fry like me!

Best guess is January 20th, 2015.
Based on when Amazon say's they'll get it to me.
LINK HERE

Despite Amazon saying the reprint of the Collector's Guide will be release on April 30th, Lobosjr has stated it's at the beginning of May, FYI.

Here are the Amazon Smile links:

Collector's Guide &

Official Artwork

Dan Harrington's "Harrington on Hold'em" Vol 1 & 2. Don't bother with Vol 3.
These are written about multi-table tournaments, with Vol 1 about the early stages, and Vol 2 about endgame (final table). Volume 2 is also very helpful for sit-n-go's, which are essentially final tables.
Volume 3 is a waste because it's basically a bunch of tests instead of new info. I think the first 2 were so successful that he knew he could make a good buck on anything new with the same title.
I hesitate to even spread the word more about these books because they are so good, and who needs better competition?
http://www.amazon.com/Harrington-Expert-Strategy-Limit-Tournaments/dp/1880685337/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1375465357&sr=8-1&keywords=dan+harrington+tournament

I heartily recommend Silman's Reassess Your Chess - it focuses on recognizing and imbalances and making plans to create or take advantage of them.

In general, if your opponent reacts during the opening in a way you didn't expect, you should spend some time figuring out why their move was 'wrong' - what imbalance it introduces, and why it is not part of the book.

I like it!

There's also some nice printable ones here: https://www.reddit.com/r/DnD/comments/2j5qlg/final_version_of_my_5e_dm_screenplayer_cheat_sheet/

Or, I'd be willing to buy you one and send it to you. Unless you live someplace where shipping it would be insane.

Like the official one on Amazon.

Come on my man. You made it this far into the internet, surely you can type grinders manual into google and see what comes up.

However this time I'll do you a favor since I can't get on your case then NOT help you.

https://www.amazon.com/Grinders-Manual-Complete-Course-Online-ebook/dp/B01GBFF890/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1542815341&sr=8-1&keywords=grinders+manual

also, Harrington on Holdem is a great teacher

Ben Robbins - Microscope

This is literally the perfect thing you are looking for. It's basically collaborative world history generator where you can zoom in and zoom out of various parts of history to see how things unfold. Matt Colville can vouch for it's usefulness.

If you're really looking to make your own clock from scratch, you might want to check out this book. It shows you how to make your own clock out of paper. It's pretty tedious because for instance, to make a gear, you have to cut the two sides of the gear out and then wrap a third thin strip of paper around each tooth. The book has you cut out the parts and assemble them, but you could trace them and cut them out of some pretty thin wood.

As far as the self-immolating feature, this pendulum clock is gravity fed, so you could just make a mechanism that would be triggered by the weight. Just lengthen the string so that it gives you 7 days of non-stop clockage.

Hey, if the string is a fuse, you could have the weight slowly lower itself into a flame :)

Puzzle above is a variation of a puzzle from Susan Polgar's book Chess Tactics for Champions (Link here: http://www.amazon.com/Chess-Tactics-Champions-step-step/dp/081293671X). I recommend that book for people who like to just sharpen their tactical combinations as it offers many puzzles for you to train on.

If you have a game shop around they should have some. You can also get the "official" screen on Amazon. Either way they cost more than they're worth in my opinion. You can make your own that will work just as well, out of cardboard, duct tape, and some printed-out information.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0786965630/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?qid=1458580204&sr=8-1&pi=SY200_QL40&keywords=5e+dm+screen&dpPl=1&dpID=51btvDVPo-L&ref=plSrch

That's the link for the same screen the other user posted on amazon. I use This screen for 5e, and I particularly find the status conditions to be very useful on it.

If you’re interested, they cover it well in the Arthas book.

I'm a big fan of Janice Kim's Learn to Play Go series.

http://www.amazon.com/Learn-Play-Go-Masters-Ultimate/dp/1453632891

I second this, especially if you find you're rushing your later shots.

Stand up, chalk up, and take a trip around the table. Look at the way everything's laid out, and give yourself a chance to relax before you shoot. Unless you're taking a really long time between each shot, nobody should give you any grief.

If you're looking for some great reads about this, check out Zen in the Art of Archery and The Inner Game of Tennis. I've also heard good things about the Pleasures of Small Motions, but I've yet to read it myself.

Godel's theorem: An incomplete guide to its use and abuse

Anyone who thinks Peterson's statement is anything more than pseudo-intellectual gibberish, please get a copy of this book and educate yourself. It's aimed at a non-technical audience and is very well written.

Misuse of Godel's work is a substantial topic. I highly recommend Torkel Franzen's book, Gödel's Theorem: An Incomplete Guide to Its Use and Abuse.

How to Reassess Your Chess - If you can only read one book this is the one to read. Third edition is insanely cheap, but if you want to fork over the extra 20 get the 4th edition.
https://www.amazon.com/How-Reassess-Your-Chess-Chess-Mastery/dp/1890085006/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1483020174&sr=1-2&keywords=how+to+reassess+your+chess

Chess and the Art of War is a fun read. Easy and precise.
https://www.amazon.com/Chess-Art-War-Ancient-Wisdom/dp/0785832815

Also, scoring a fold by flipping the scalpel over to the non-bladed side and drawing it against the metal rule gives a very sharp neat fold. I've been assembling this thing lately.

Bronstein, Zurich 1953. Easily one of the top five chess books ever written.

The 5e official DM screen doesn't come out till January, I believe.

http://www.amazon.com/Deluxe-Screen-Accessory-Wizards-Team/dp/0786965630/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1406924495&sr=8-2&keywords=dm+screen

A friend of mine is working on a custom 5e DM screen, when he is finished with it, i'll have him post it on this reddit so you all can print it out and make your own custom screen.

dm screen you are pretty groovy

http://www.amazon.ca/D-Dungeon-Masters-Screen/product-reviews/0786965630/ref=dpx_acr_txt?showViewpoints=1

seems like a lot of the more 'useful' tables are missing. Useful is relative though I suppose.

there is a really good book on the subject http://www.amazon.com/The-Symmetries-Things-John-Conway/dp/1568812205

Smith's Introduction to Godel's Theorems is very good. So is Franzen's Godel's Theorem

http://www.amazon.com/Bloodborne-Collectors-Strategy-Guide-Future/dp/3869930691/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1426763346&sr=8-1&keywords=official+guide+bloodborne

>IMPORTANT UPDATE
=> The page count is increased from 400 to 528 pages.
=> The Collector's Edition guide is delayed to include important game changes applied through the Day-One-Update, ensuring that it will be up-to-date and that online-only elements are covered.

>Thanks for your patience and understanding.

Here's a link to the Arthas novel on amazon: http://www.amazon.com/World-Warcraft-Arthas-Rise-Pocket/dp/143915760X

Here's a link to Arthas' wiki page for quick reference (spoilers): http://wowwiki.wikia.com/wiki/Arthas_Menethil

I had a similar problem when I was starting out. I read [this](https://www.amazon.com/Learn-Play-Masters-Guide-Ultimate/dp/1453632891/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1518124564&sr=8-1&keywords=learn+to+play+go
) book and found I had a much better grasp of the game and was able to progress.

I would recommend these books:

• The Theory of Poker - the classic.
  
• Easy Game Volume 1 & 2 by Andrew Seidman
  
• Elements of Poker by Tommy Angelo
  
• Kill Phil Everyone
  
• Professional No Limit Hold 'em Volume 1
  
• Applications of No Limit Hold'em
  
  
  There are a lot of other books and videos too. I try to read as many as I can, including books that might be considered out dated.
  
  
  

I'm surprised no one has mentioned How to Reassess Your Chess by Jeremy Silman yet. I've linked to the previous edition, which is much cheaper (since you mentioned you didn't want to spend a lot more money). I found this book tremendously helpful in figuring out what to be thinking about when faced with a position on the board that doesn't have an obvious tactic or hanging piece.

Essentially, if you really want to get better at planning, there is simply no substitute for playing and analysing several games (as others have said). Chess is exceedingly difficult and requires significant effort; there's no way around it.

The Arthas book is really good. I think anything that Christie Golden has done is amazing.

http://www.amazon.com/Christie-Golden/e/B001IGLPJK

Except for the Jaina one, hated that one.

I really like this book.

https://www.amazon.com/Symmetries-Things-John-H-Conway/dp/1568812205/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1493910460&sr=1-1&keywords=symmetries+of+things

Interesting, I have not heard it called that, and don't seem to be able to find other references. I do know that Conway calls the structure Hexasticks (or hexastakes if the pencils are sharpened, which changes the symmetry group). It is discussed for example in The Symmetry of Things. My understanding is that the design comes from George Hart, though I do not think he claims to have invented it.

Yeah I preordered the collectors edition from GAME - they're really reliable for release day delivery.

Wondered about getting this guide book as well, but cannot find out more about it:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/aw/d/3869930691/ref=mp_s_a_1_3?qid=1426463372&sr=8-3&pi=AC_SY200_QL40&keywords=bloodborne

Has anyone had a guide book from this publisher before and If so what sort of quality are they?

Pool player here and I also agree.

Edit: more about muscle memory and billiards here:

http://amazon.com/Pleasures-Small-Motions-Mastering-Billiards/dp/1585745391

Oh I see. Well you can read Kill Everyone [here] (http://www.lasvegasadvisor.com/samples/KillEveryone2sample.pdf) which is a pretty good/short read. If you're set on a physical book then HoH is a good choice.

http://www.amazon.com/Harrington-Expert-Strategy-Limit-Tournaments/dp/1880685337

Looking for PDF download copy of

https://www.amazon.com/Grinders-Manual-Complete-Course-Online-ebook/dp/B01GBFF890

$1 PP. USA only please.

EDIT: closed

regular D&D screen is good and cheap

edit: oh 3.5, sorry I'm not too sure then.

http://www.amazon.com/Bloodborne-Collectors-Strategy-Guide-Future/dp/3869930691/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1426085934&sr=8-3&keywords=bloodborne

Its Amazon exclusive

Check out Rise of the Lich King by Christie Golden. Highly recommended.

https://www.amazon.com/World-Warcraft-Arthas-Rise-Pocket/dp/143915760X

The Official WotC 5E Screen is good for new players, but for more experienced DMs you might prefer a different one. It's high quality material, too, very thick and wide.

well actually, in the book, Arthas defeats Ner'Zhul in a dream and gets full control, so he becomes the Lich King iirc.


Link to book: http://www.amazon.com/World-Warcraft-Arthas-Rise-Lich/dp/143915760X

Official website: http://www.lamemage.com/microscope/

Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Microscope-Ben-Robbins/dp/0983277907

If you ever seriously get into it and play online/offline, I heavily suggest Dan Harrington's books.

https://www.amazon.com/Harrington-Expert-Strategy-Limit-Tournaments/dp/1880685337

The Grinder's Manual: A Complete Course in Online No Limit Holdem 6-Max Cash Games https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01GBFF890/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_i_BZYlDbE3KE9TY is considered a good starter book.

http://www.amazon.com/Bloodborne-Collectors-Strategy-Guide-Future/dp/3869930691/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1450294143&sr=8-2&keywords=bloodborne+guide

Is it this one? Thread made me want a copy.

> Kurt Gödel in 1931 with his incompleteness theorems demonstrated mathematically that only the simplest of arithmetic calculations can be complete [6].

Well, you sort of can say that in broad strokes so CSW lovers won't say I'm nitpicking, but it is not the calculations what matters but the system and axiomatics. For instance, presburger arithmetic is decidable, unlike peano arithmetics, and it is weaker than PA, it doesn't have multiplication operation, only addition and equality. But one can express multiplication using only addition, this is by the way essentially what a computer does!

> Science is all about models. We like to believe we can know it all, but this grasp of unbounded knowledge something that will always lie outside our grasp. Gödel proved that.

Gibberish, gödel didn't prove such thing. I suggest u/craig_s_wright reads this book: https://www.amazon.com/G%C3%B6dels-Theorem-Incomplete-Guide-Abuse/dp/1568812388

ps: TIL -- roughly speaking, gödel's formal system (or PA if you like) becomes decidable with the addition of transfinite induction.

That kind of sounds like Microscope (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0983277907/ref=s9_simh_gw_g14_i2_r?ie=UTF8&fpl=fresh&pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=desktop-1&pf_rd_r=15EKZT6HT67DQBPD8JQ8&pf_rd_t=36701&pf_rd_p=2437869742&pf_rd_i=desktop)

http://www.amazon.com/Make-Your-Working-Paper-Clock/dp/0060910666

https://www.amazon.com/Brown-Paper-School-book-Smarty/dp/0316117390