A little guide about notes

[ansky451]

LLoyd...


Sticky this?

[schwza]

agreed, nice post. this doesn't get talked about nearly enough.

a couple of questions:

- how many tables do you play?
- do you have the problem that your notes get too long to make them useful?
- when you're note-taking on bet sizes, do you make any indication of the board texture? my cbets are much bigger on a flop of QT9 2-tone than 773r regardless of what i have.
- how quick are you to believe a bet-size correlation? if one min raise is 97s and one 2.5x raise is AQ, do you put a lot of stock in that? especially if they come from different positions / levels.

and a couple of observations on how i do it...

- most of my notes are very specific. e.g., QJ utg+1 15/30. raise AT MP2 25/50, bet F, chk/call T, chk R board KT438. raise-fold CO 50/100. i think it'd be better to have more general notes sometimes like "opens a lot in LP" or "weak post-flop," because i often have trouble using the info i have quickly trying to sort through what they've done in several hands.

- my notes never mention bet sizes, unless there's something really interesting about them. i should work on that.

- another useful note that i picked up from gumpzilla is dnupo (doesn't not understand fold pot odds). as in, "dnupo fold BB 1.2x behind"

- when i get close to the FT, i make notes on pretty much every preflop action. one players notes might look like this:

lrr/r//yo/dc/arnf
qqwq

/ indicates a new orbit
l limp
f limp/fold
a limp/call
L limp/reraise
r raise
y yes, cbet after raise
n no, there wasn't
c coldcall
d blind d
3 3-bet
o raise-fold ("o crap, someone 3bet me")

in line 2, q is call a raise pre-flop, then check/fold. w is call raise, then put chips in post-flop (gets erased if they show they had a hand). W is call raise, put chips in with a bad hand / no hand.

[EverettKings]

I find that when I try to take extensive notes, I miss hands and lose feel for the table. I also rarely see people again unless it's the same tournament, so most of my notes go to waste. I personally do better just paying close attention to the table, and I think that you need to learn to do this properly before you worry about taking mad notes. Though if taking notes helps you keep active, have at it.

Excellent post.

[schwza]

[ QUOTE ]
I find that when I try to take extensive notes, I miss hands and lose feel for the table. I also rarely see people again unless it's the same tournament, so most of my notes go to waste. I personally do better just paying close attention to the table, and I think that you need to learn to do this properly before you worry about taking mad notes. Though if taking notes helps you keep active, have at it.

Excellent post.

[/ QUOTE ]

i find notetaking helps me pay attention. otherwise i have a hard time focusing enough to remember.

[ismisus]

My notes consist of 2 letters, its hard enough to categorize them into 4 categories.

TA
LA
TP
LP

[scott8]

Something I have used which has been quite effective is noting players that like to pick off bluffs.

These are players who will call big bets at the end with marginal holdings, or even decent hands, but with an obvious scary board.

For these players I am prone to overbet my made hands and get paid because the fool can't lay down his AK to a flush or straight, etc.

-SC

another useful thing to know is that if you play from 2 different computers (like your laptop and your desktop), the notes will not be there from one to the other since they are indigenous to the computer you are using (at least on pokerstars). the information is saved on your hard drive and not at pokerstars site. I apologize if I'm stating the obvious.

[psyduck]

Very nice thread, and I find that I'm doing a lot of the stuff you guys have already mentioned. However, I'm definitely learning new stuff too.

Good thread.

[MrShawn2U]

I did not know that, is there anyway you can copy notes from one to another? There must be a way if its stored on your HDD.

[ QUOTE ]
I did not know that, is there anyway you can copy notes from one to another? There must be a way if its stored on your HDD.

[/ QUOTE ]

That's why I make most notes in Excel, alphabetized.

Great thread btw Heaven!