How much notes are woth of?

[irishken]

Personally I just cant concentrate enough on my games(2 4 - 5 10nl) to get notes so I just play my hand the way I feel its best to play.
So question to you who take notes of your opponent how much those are actually worth of, and what kind of notes you take? General [censored] like "loose-agressive" or some more specific. I should maybe try to improve my ability of focusing on game..

I know hired a low-roller to railbird the games I usually play and im paying him $1 for each good(telling me everything about how that guy plays) player profile... +ev?

[ZimbuTheMonkey]

I let PokerTracker handle most of the "note-taking", but somethings I do notice personally and put into the player notes.

Some examples would be min-raising. I make sure to note what exactly the villains min-raise with, some do it with small pairs, some do it with mid-high suited connectors and others do it with AA/KK hoping to be re-raised. If I notice a player being particularly weak, passive, agressive, etc... I put that into the notes.

Something like "Can easily be scared off with top pair/good kicker with continued raises"... stuff like that that'll help me play with them in the future.

[Fuchida]

I play 2-4 through 5-10. I have notes on the hands regular players will raise with, call a raise with and limp with in EP, MP and LP. I have notes on whether they will semi bluff and whether they will do it up front, if they will run complete bluffs and if they will specifically bluff with a busted draw on the river. I also like to know if they lead out with sets or two pair or like to check-call or check-raise with those type of hands. Its also useful to know if they understand odds and how much they value overpairs. It is hard to make these notes when you are playing several tables so I usually make a note of the hand numbers of interesting hands and review them later. I also review PT for regular players to find all sorts of useful information. When playing, I combine these notes with Gametime to get a good picture of my opponents. For NL, getting in your opponent's head seems to be the most useful skill of all.

However, after saying all that. When getting the latest Party bonus I play 4 $100 buy-ins late at night when I won't play for serious money and spend my time reading the internet while playing completely solid. I just combine the texture of the board with the Gametime information of the players and take my best shot /images/graemlins/smile.gif I usually make a reasonable amount and also get the bonus.

Fuchida

[Shaun]

I never take notes these days, though I did a little in the past. The reason is this: if you take notes on good, thinking players, there is a danger that you pigeon-hole them as playing in a static fashion when in fact they play diffrently at different times. This can hurt you, so I trust my memory and my intuition more than anythign I write down.

In general though, the reason I don't take notes is that most of the opponents you make a lot of money off don't last long enough to bother. The good players are few, and my memory is enough to have a good idea of how to play against them.

The older greats didn't write down anything about their opponents from what I've read, they just kept the info in their head. Of course they were playing live and not online, but I think approaching the online game as if it were a live game and remembering things the same way you'd have to in the real world is a way to be able to play well in all arenas.

Many players play as a "type" most of the time. If you can identify that type without getting carried away with over-generalizations of the opponents play, you can generally find the correct approach. Because you have limited information, even in the computer age, it is probably not a great idea to get too specific with notes should you take them.

That said there are many different approaches to winning and I know many people swear by notes. Do what works best for you after giving some different methods a try.

[gomberg]

I just take notes during a session to help me remember stuff later in that same session. I usually never look at the notes again, it's just sort of a way that sticks the info in my brain better. Of course, if I see the same person again, I'll read what I wrote down about them but I won't necessarily use it unless I have to (people play differently session to session).