A short post on something I'm doing these days

[1800GAMBLER]

[ QUOTE ]
Understand, I play 2 tables and think that playing much more than that is probably a bad choice for the long term development of your game, so I'm not talking to anybody trying to play 12 tables.

[/ QUOTE ]

Just echoing these thoughts.

[stoxtrader]

No hard feelings really, but I disagree pretty much 100%. I'd be very very very skeptical that you could "define how a guy plays" with 1k hands worth of observation better than by using 1k hands worth of data.

I'd also think it might be a bit more time effective to accumulate the data without having to observe. Though most of the sites I play I can only get information on hands I'm dealt in.

My point is that probabilistic thinking for me rules. you can't do sh!t for bayesian analysis with observation unless you are rainman squared.

[B Dids]

but 1k hands worth of data when turned into simple PFR/VPIP/AGG isn't that helpful.

If you sit down and analyze the guy, sure, but 100 or 1K, if you're just using raw numbers, I'm not sure I understand what you're getting at.

[TStoneMBD]

in a low stakes game the majority of your edge comes from mistakes opponents make in preflop error along with chasing poor odds and not extracting value. making good reads only adds to a small portion of your winrate at this level.

at higher limits players start to make considerably less preflop and postflop mistakes and alot of your winrate will come from making good judgments based on your reads. stats will give you a great indication of a player's hand range along with their style of play. that can tell you wonders.

i think taking the time to watch games before you sit in them at 3/6 is fairly silly. you should be learning how to sit in a game and kick the ass out of fish because you play better preflop and postflop, not because you can read their minds. youre costing yourself alot of money like this.

you think that by watching others play and getting reads it will allow you to develop as a player faster for higher limit games. the reads you get on a 3/6 player are far different then the reads you get on a 30/60 player because their level of thinking is so drastically different. in order to combat a 30/60 player you need to learn how to fight fearless aggression which is just not something youre going to learn by watching how a 3/6 player plays.

sit in the games and kick some [censored] ass. thats how youre going to get good at poker imo. trying to scout a game for reads in a low limit game where your edge mostly comes from opponent's natural errors tells me that you arent very confident about your postflop play. you should be trying to develop reads while playing many tables at once as that is a much more valuable quality then being able to read a player after watching him play for several hours.

[stoxtrader]

[ QUOTE ]
but 1k hands worth of data when turned into simple PFR/VPIP/AGG isn't that helpful.


[/ QUOTE ]

au contraire. As an added bonus you even get stealing and defending ranges and showdown propensity.

[ginko]

[ QUOTE ]
but 1k hands worth of data when turned into simple PFR/VPIP/AGG isn't that helpful.

If you sit down and analyze the guy, sure, but 100 or 1K, if you're just using raw numbers, I'm not sure I understand what you're getting at.

[/ QUOTE ]

I totally agree with this. I use PT and I have used those poker programs that display them onto the software. It actually made me worst because I stopped paying attention to my real reads and instead, was looking at numbers that could mean anything.

Maybe you guys just don't understand or realize how a little tiny bit of information lets me imagine exactly what type of player my opponent is, compared to two numbers that can skew your reads considerably.

I'm talking about NL.

[Paluka]

I was pretty surprised at Stox's replies here at first, but I think I know what is going on now. Stox is playing in games where everyone is at least decent at poker, so he is looking for much more subtle places to gain an edge. This sort of stuff is probably easier to find through data. Dids is playing at lower limits where people are more likely to just suck, and make plays that are obviously horrible all the time. Consequently, he can learn a lot just by observing fairly quickly.

[B Dids]

It's a bit of this, and a bit of just working harder to pick up specific player tendencies. Maybe it's stuff that stox can get from data, but it's not stuff that Dids can, or at least is comfortable pulling from data.

This is less about specifically being able to beat 3/6 than it is about just building what I would consider "good" habits as I progress. Even though I don't play often, I approach everything I do at these low limits as learning for some pipe dream when I play higher and not just an exercise in making money.

[SparkyDog]

[ QUOTE ]
I was pretty surprised at Stox's replies here at first, but I think I know what is going on now. Stox is playing in games where everyone is at least decent at poker, so he is looking for much more subtle places to gain an edge. This sort of stuff is probably easier to find through data.

[/ QUOTE ]

So would it be accurate to say that stox would see a "35/25/2.5" and a WTSD of 45% as a fit or fold pounder post flop that can read hands decently at least and exploits position well? Whereas at low limits you don't know if the Villian is just a donk that's overaggressive in all positions and can't read hands for anything, or a better, thinking player (with the former being more likely, obviously). So you may as well use a counterstrategy that exploits his weaknesses of playing too many hands and going to far with them (playing solid poker, basically).

[stoxtrader]

maybe I'm being shortsighted, but I'm really a seller of observed information vs compiled data. I guess the biggest reason is sample size. It's impossible to get more than 2-3 "observations" on any substantial amount of players, so there is a sample/size and scaleability effect their.

secondly, I can't for the life of me see where something you observe could be more valuable than a stat telling his play over a much larger amount of hands....definitely not pre-flop, and surprisingly, even for me, post-flop.

pokertracker really is an amazing tool.

How about this, I want to be proved wrong, and imagine I will be with this challenge, but why dont you come up with a few observations that can prove more valuable to me than I could get from a corresponding PT stat of my choice describing the situation. The objective here is to takeaway information on a player from a previous hand that will help you play better vs him on subsequent hands. So observation better vs, say 1k hands of PT data. or whatever number of hands you choose, because I think any sample size arguement that refutes PT data, can be used against observational information....

but just try to give me examples and I will try to refute, If i cannot I will graciously admit defeat and mend my ways....it may even be in this manner that we do discover there is something different between limits, but I can't see what...