Using the Game TIme Feature in Pokertracker

[themflags]

Not sure if this post makes sense in this forum . . . I guess it seemed so.

My question concerns the use of Pokertracker to evaluate and predict how your opponents will play this hand. I've played a few hands, found some 2+2 guidance on how to categorize my opponents ("PFR<5%, VPIP>30%, must be fish", etc). And then I see the guy the next day. How do I take advantage of the information I now have on this guy? And what about the 5 - 8 other people at the table I've never seen before?

I hope my question makes sense. To put it succinctly, "I've got the numbers . . . NOW WHAT?!?"

Your thoughts are appreciated.

[Kopefire]

Frankly, the numbers you'll get in game-time on PT are rarely very usefull because your sample size is so small.

Once you've got a database of 10,000 hands, maybe you'll havea few hundred hands on some opponents, but still most people will radically under-represented for the statistics to mean much.

What you can do is see general tendancies . . .this guy plays too many hands, this guy is a rock ... but really you should have that information from watching the table . . . so at best it will confirm what you already suspect.

But with only a few hundred hands per player, you'll also see statistical anomolies .. guys that have VP$IP's in the 50's but you know only come in with rock solid hands .. they just happen to catch cards when you're at the table with them ...


So really, the best use of it is to help confirm what you already know.

[bisonbison]

them,

This is one of the hardest things to get a handle on and apply. It's an art and a science, and its influence on your actions is often very subtle.

Here's a hand I played earlier today that illustrates how you can use reads.

The button in this hand is tight-aggressive. In fact he's tighter than I am. The SB is in 80% of his hands.

Party Poker 3/6 Hold'em (10 handed) converter

Preflop: Hero is MP2 with 8[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img], 8[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img].
<font color="666666">4 folds</font>, <font color="CC3333">Hero raises</font>, <font color="666666">2 folds</font>, <font color="CC3333">Button 3-bets</font>, SB calls, BB calls, Hero calls.

Flop: (12 SB) 7[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img], A[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img], 2[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img] <font color="blue">(4 players)</font>

At this point in the hand, there is no way that I am ahead of the Button. He 3-bet me, which for a player who's tight and aggressive generally means a high pocket pair or a good ace. I don't think he'd do this with KQ, and there's no way he'd do it with a worse pair than the one I'm holding. I can check-fold the flop without fear, because he either has an ace or a better pocket pair. In any case, I'm drawing to 2 outs.

Now, if the button had folded and the SB had called, I could say that a large % of the time, I'm still ahead of him. Someone who calls that much will call with a ton of hands here, and it would probably be worthwhile for me to bet into him on the flop and turn and maybe check the river.

[Sheriff Fatman]

I presume that you are using the 'preferences' option in the game time window to auto-input the players at your tables - if not its well worthwhile.

If you download hand histories every 10 minutes or so the player stats for your table will update, including updates for players joining/leaving the table. It doesn't take many hands (say 30-40) for some stats such as VPIP and PFR to be representative of the player in general, so you will very quickly get a 'feel' for how they play. Other stats, as indicated above, take many hands to be representative.

One word of warning, automatically classifying someone with VPIP&gt;30% and PFR&lt;5% as a fish is dangerous. Some good players are quite loose pre-flop but play very well after the flop. A better guide is to look for players over 50% for VPIP. Depending on the PFR% you could be looking at a calling station or a maniac but its more likely they are poor players. 30% is a little too borderline a figure to use.

Also, look at how often players cold-call bets and with what hands (you don't see this in the game time window but its available on the first tab in PT). This is another good indicator of a bad player.

Sheriff