When you are playing live, what do you keep track of as far as the other players go? How do you measure how tight/loose, aggressive/passive people are? Are you keeping counts in your head (or on a phone/etc) of the number of times people call, raise preflop, etc? Or it is more feel-based?

I noticed when I was writing up a hand I played yesterday that I really didn't have a good read on the guy I was playing against, so I couldn't even post accurately about his tendencies, even after playing with him for a couple hours. Then I noticed that I don't have a good system for even keeping track of that information. I'd love to hear what you guys do for this live, or maybe you can point out another thread where this has already been discussed.

I'm new to the forums and it is already helping me a lot just reading your comments and listening to how you analyze hands. I have been in Vegas for a long time (7 years now) and basically failed at trying to play poker seriously in the past. I'm trying to get back into it the right way, by really thinking about my game and posting/reading here at 2+2. I appreciate any feedback you have.

I tried doing that, there are some phone apps...but it's just ALOT of work...
instead u can watch hands u r not involved in, and try to range them, hope it gets to s.d and take mental notes of how they played preflop, flop, turn and river

U can't have a HUD for live poker, i wish they had one

I've seen people use notebooks but really it relies on your head and memory.

play at the same place every time

i try and play at the same room. i know how all the regs play.

Even with memory though, what exactly are you trying to memorize? I agree a lot of it is probably in your head and takes practice. I'm just trying to figure out where to start as far as what statistics I'm trying to memorize. Or maybe statistics isn't the right way to think about this. Thanks for the response!

I'm terrible at this as well - I pay attention the best I can, definitely identify those that are super super tight and those that are in everyother pot. But I agree that have trouble with the rest of the players...and then I end up relying too much on how they 'look'. New goal next live session is to pick one player per half hour. Really watch them every hand, see how often they fold, see if they seem to have positional awareness, if they fold to c-bets...all that stuff. I feel like one guy I could get a good grasp on, but watching the game as a whole I struggle. After studying a single player, I would then feel confident enough to make notes regarding them in my phone just as a refresher. Hopefully once I am able to do this well...I can study 2 players at once, and expand my reading skills. Again, I haven't done this yet...but just thought I'd throw my thoughts out there.

Feel based.

Got to watch a little more, though. What are they raising with? Are they always calling down draws? Are they opening from EP just as much as from LP? Etc.

This may seem simpleminded but too many players waste the time when they are out of the hands to observe the actions. This can be important to follow especially when you get to see hands at showdown. So come to play poker even when you have folded LOL Also since the turnover at lower stakes is so constant it is a difficult process. I would consider finding a room you like and stay with it. Lots of the same people will be back, even in a tourist heavy place like LV ! Live is so different than online with all the aids you can hook up. GL to you sir

Ok, first and foremost, it is extremely important to be constantly reevaluating your table. If a new player sits down, try to imagine how this new player might change the game (as well as how the exiting player might affect the game).

Every single hand, you should be trying your very best to pay attention to the table. It's really nothing more than focus. I'm not writing anything down. But I am watching every single hand. Is it boring? It's painful. But this is your edge. This is how you beat everyone at the table: you achieve the highest understanding of the table's dynamics. The goal is to literally understand 'what is going on' better than anyone else at the table. You have the reads; you know who has the best hand in a mucked pot; you know who is being overly aggressive; you know who is just starting to become a little gambly/tilted; etc.

So to answer your question, the way to keep track of player tendencies is to just watch and pay attention to the game. It's a terribly bland answer, but it's the truth.

Also, reads are not static. Someone who played extremely solid yesterday could be tilted and having a bad day today. Someone who was crushing the game 4 hours ago could now be the table donkey, paying everyone off.

Reads are changing every single moment.

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/17...-terms-792337/

Download poker cruncher, and just run random equity calculation. You will realize the mistakes your opponents are making.

I would say, it takes practice memorizing everything. I don't need tools at the table. The pace is so slow. You have plenty of time to accumulate reads on your opponents.

Just calm down and relax op. Use the showdown hands and review their lines mentally.

I have a pretty effective trick that I use which I owe in part to Phil Helmuth's book, "Play Poker Like the Pros".

In Phil Helmuth's book he has a section on type casting your villains and he had animal pictograms denoting everyone's play: Eagle, Jackal, Fish, Mouse, and a couple of others I can't remember right now.

Anyways, what I do is I notice a player's tendency and try to match that tendency with a characterization and verify my observations during a showdown. Once I have a correlation, then I mentally label that player. I have a series of mental pictures that I use and I assign a pic to various aspects of a player's play.

My pics/characterizations are: TAG, LAG, Donk, Maniac, Aggro, Passive, Kamikazee, Semi-Pro, Internet player, Nit, Super nit, Mouse, ABC, Rock, Unreadable, Fish, Calling Station, Fit-or-Fold, Level I, Level II, Level III, Level III+

Now, the above can work individually or in combos.

I try to apply the various labels to different categories. First I start off with broad categories such as:

Preflop, Flop, Turn, River:

Then I try to focus in on specific tendencies: C-bets, Double Barrel, Value Bets, Draws, Stack offs, Folds, and bluffs

Okay, so putting it all together. Lets say a player raises from the CO, and we are in the BB and have 99 so we call.

Flop(6bb): J 7 2
We check, CO bets 3bb, we call

Turn(12bb): 3
We check, CO checks

River(12bb): Q
We check, CO checks

CO shows AT, we win with 99

Now, this is a key hand with lots of information. CO's pre flop raising range is TAG, he fires one cbet on whiffed board so he is TAG on the flop, but when he misses turn he is Passive and when he misses on river he doesn't take advantage of the scare card and/or try for a bluff since that is the ONLY way he can win the hand so he is Fish/Passive on river

Add all this up, and I see him as TAG preflop and flop and a Passive Fish turn and river if he whiffs

So, whenever i'm playing against him in future hands, I don't need to remember the exact hands persay, but just the fact that he is TAG pre and on the flop but turns into a passive fish come turn and river if he whiffs.

So, if i'm in a hand with him and the river is a busted flush draw and he bets, I can then assume he's not bluffing because passive fish don't bluff rivers when they miss and I can adjust accordingly.

As I get more info I add more info to his profile.

I do this for everyone and find that the generalized labels gets me 85% of the information I need. Takes me about an hour to get enough info on the table to start actively exploiting what I see.

I almost don't want to say this, because I feel like it should be so obvious and no one has mentioned it, but listen to people talk about hands to get a feel for how they think about the game.

Also, remember that it is a game. Every poker table has a certain dynamic. Two guys are brawling, or one guy's tilty and other players are going after him or whatever. Treat it as a game. Keep up with the dynamic, adjust accordingly and look for opportunities. Talk to the other players and try to get a bead on them/throw a few curveballs their way.

If I was going to sum up my attitude toward live poker it would be this: don't be the guy with an iPod.

+1 million to the bolded.

I forgot to mention that in my post as well.

You can take it a step further and start asking people to show and what they had. I'm a pretty good at judging who is telling the truth.

I've seen the iPod cost people so much money because they miss out on the free information that V's often give. The biggest one is when self appointed table captains and wannabe pros argue poker theory at the table and tell everyone exactly how they play via correcting everyone else's mistakes

buyin stack size + reload stack size is crucial too, says a lot about the player

I bring a pen and tablet to record player tendencies, an abacus to keep track of pot size.

Between these and my starting hands chart, I crush the game.

You should go with a plan and expand it as you play more.

Watching every pot and 9 other players to gather random imformation is almost impossible.

For me, the range of hands I play from the LJ HJ and CO changes dermatically depending on who is to the left of me... So I watch the two or three players to the left of me to begin with. I they often fold to raises I can buy the buttan and I can increase my ranges.

For bluffing purpose I want to know who is capable of folding on a flop raise, in a limped pot. Some one bets out and get raises, they then fold they are capable I can bluff them. I make plas in limped pots often so this is infromation I need.

I also have developed player tendency assumptions....I assume players do these, if the do somthing diffrent I note it.

Bet sizing tells I find very useful, so I watch for players who raise pre flop with odd ammounts (very large very small) and wake up to watch that hand. Simillarly most players Cbet the same amount as there pre flop raise...if its much bigger I take note, wake up and observe.

Any aggression is going to be hard for me to deal with, so I make note whenever a plaeyrs does something aggressive.

The idea is to pick a couple of things you can use most often, and look for them.

I like the idea of an abacus, I gotten pretty good at counting pots in my head, but the abacus looks like fun, I may see if I can find one.

I tend to just watch football between hands and then rely on race age and gender steriotypes whenever I am in a hand. Also if you look deep into their eyes, you can see their VPIP right in their eyes. *note, does not work for asian players*

i will at first glance use age, gender, race, as stereo types until proven otherwise. buy-in amount, things they say, way they act, etc. How much they over-bet, under-bet, no bet. I label people as fit/fold, loose-passive, tight-weak, maniac, wanna-be, macho-pissing contest player, tag, lag. i try to find their motivation for playing, overall experience, they're view of me etc. label them as level 1, 2, 3, or higher thinking. I use the position in which they enter the pot, the frequency of limping, amount of raising and a whole bunch of other things. I tend to stay out of the pots until 2 orbits or so then apply the appropriate style to exploit the players tendencies. at most low stakes games the players are loose-passive, or tight-weak and against these players i lag it up.

The first rule of using an iPod at the table is to make sure you can still hear everyone.

Despite dgiharris's [serious] invocation of anything Phil Hellmuth said or wrote (might be the first time I've seen that around here, at first I thought: level?), he's got this down. That's the way to do it. Lot's of other good advice ITT too.

I'll just add that while it takes time to build up a profile on everyone at the table, you can and should start right away. Focus is huge. So many people come and go in my games that if I don't at least start building my reads as soon as a fish sits down, he might be bust before I get a shot at playing a hand with him.

How do players handle/stack their chips? Are they wearing sunglasses? How do they dress? Are they quiet, or talkative? Tentative, or aggressive?

Stereotyping based on age/race/sex is popular, but you need to make sure you don't turn off your observation skills and just decide old=tight, for example. If you continue to pay attention, there will generally be at least one person at the table who is the exception to the rule, so to speak. So don't let new information pass you by simply because you've always already decided what kind of player a person is. Also, as mentioned above, lots of people switch gears throughout a session because of winning and becoming overconfident, losing and tilting, simply changing strategies, trying to get an extra hand in before dinner, etc.

It's good to come up with some kind of routine that works for you. I think focusing on players to your left first makes a ton of sense. This will allow you to play more profitably from late position which is huge. If you know the maniac on the button to your immediate left is playing every hand, that obviously changes how you play your HJ and CO hands.

Ask lots of questions and be social and fun. People LOVE to talk about themselves, so get someone, anyone, at the table talking. They'll tell you where they're from, what they do for a living, how long they've been playing poker, whether they're up or down for the day, if they just busted out of the tournament, what hand they had in that last pot, and on and on and on. In order to be friendly, you can give a little bit of information away too, which is fine, because you'll be gaining way way more than everyone else because most of the time you'll be listening, not talking.

Kind of a ramble, but I hope that helps. Good luck!

Literally the worst feeling when I have been playing with a guy for 3 hours, we play a hand together and as I'm recording the hand in my phone I have no idea how he plays.

Pay attention and keep mental notes. Just need a good memory, we all doze off though.