So I'm testing out coaching and have started by taking a uNL student. To get him started I wrote a compilation over what PA hud-stats I find most usefull and how I put them into practice. I figured I might as well post it here because it might help some of you guys out. I consider
vpip,
pfr and
number of hands standard to have in your hud, so I'm going to assume you all know what they are and how to use them.
Disclaimer first: DO NOT TURN INTO A PA HUD-BOT
1. Handreading is always the nuts. PA hud does not take the board or previous betting into consideration, there's no substitution for handreading.
2. Stats should mainly be used in somewhat close situations to tilt the decision in either direction. Ex: You're at the turn facing a situation you consider pretty marginal to 2nd barrel. You look at villain's wtsd (went to showdown) and it's 36%, so you give it up.
3. Stats are just numbers, they do not know why they look the way they do, it's up to you to figure out. Constantly keep taking notes. Ex: You realise villain is a habitual slowplayer, so despite of his river af being high, he's not bluffing much on the river.
4. Consider your image. Ex: If you have a laggy image some opponents will start playing back at you light. It's your job to spot these opponents. Looking blindly at you PA-stats will otherwise fool you.
Aggression Factor (af) – A (bet + raise)/call ratio postflop- I don't use this stat so much actually, I think for most situations there are other postflop aggression stats that will be a better help. It will give a decent overall hint on your opponents postflop aggression though.
- Important to consider, as vpip increases it becomes harder to maintain a high af. A player with a vpip of 60% combined with an af of 2 is probably very aggressive. This is because he plays crappy hands, crappy hands rarely make big hands and yet he manage to play these hands aggressive.
Attempted to steal blind % (atsb) – How often villain raises first in from CO/button- Mainly shows how positional aware the opponent is and helps us figure out how light we should 3-bet him in steal situations.
- If a frequent stealer is also a calling station we still most often need a quality hands to re-raise anyway. As always, the best way to play vs stations is to play good hands and valuetown hard.
- Since atsb is the same as pfr from CO/btn first in, you can get a quite good idea of what hands your opponent steals with. Generally an atsb of 30%+ makes a quite frequent stealer, my atsb is around 36-40%. Put the numbers into Poker Stove to get an idea of what those ranges includes.
C-bet % (cb) - How often villain c-bets
C-bet turn % (cbt) - How often villain 2nd barrels- If your opponents has a high cb but a low cbt it's an opponent we could float and plan to take the pot away on the turn, unless he also has a high wtsd (went to showdown) since it'sa sign he's a station.
- If both the cb and cbt is high we're often better off raising the flop if we want to bluff him (still, don't try to bluff a station obv). At the same time we should be more prone to call rather than raise the flop with our strong hands, to collect an extra bet on the turn.
- If the cb stat is low we should realise he most often has a strong hand when he c-bets and thus we should not call as many c-bets. This is also an opponent we should be more inclined to float preflop ip, because he's more likely to play predictable postflop.
- So what's a high c-bet turn frequency? It highly depends on how often villain bets the flop. Ex: If someone has a cb of 90%, then a cbt of 50% is high. If someone has a cb 50%, then a cbt of 50% is pretty low. You need to use your own judgement to draw conclusions.
Fold to c-bet % (ftcb) - How often villain folds to a c-bet
Raise c-bet % (rcb) – How often villain raises a c-bet- Ftcb is probably the postflop stat I use the most. I just love to be isolate limpers that has a high ftcb. It doesn't matter if the he's playing 70/10 or 12/5, all are players that are playing incorrect from a game theory perspective, meaning we'll make an immediate profit from raising any two cards vs them and c-bet the flop. Anyone having a fold to c-bet of 65%+ is probably a good target.
Of course we need to realise there's more players at the table so if the rest of the table is loose we can't isolate much anyway.
- A high ftcb also means we should be less inclined to 2nd barrel (and vice versa), as his range after calling a c-bet is rather strong.
- Rcb is the very most underestimated stat imo. Some players have a rcb of 4%, but players having 20%+ is pretty common. Needless to say, there's a huuuge difference in the range you should felt vs those type of players. A 4%er usually only raises really strong hands or very, VERY strong draws. A 20%+er is very likely to be capable of raising air, fd/oesd and maybe even marginal tp or gs. This stat is a great help.
- Rcb is one of few postflop stats I have color coded. 0-15% = white. 15%+ = red. A player raising 15% of the c-bets are likely to do so with some draws/air. Against a 20%+ I'm usually willing felt any top pair for 100bb, but do NOT use this as a rule-of-thumb, as it's obviously depending on the board and the strength of my tp.
Went to showdown % (wtsd) – How often villain goes to sd when seeing a flop
Won at showdown % (w@sd) – How often villain wins at sd- If a player has a high wtsd you should valuebet a wider range and vice versa. It's quite straight forward, if he often goes to sd, he's likely to call you down light. On the flip side, if villain has a low wtsd, he's unlikely to call you down, thus a good target for a bluff. Wtsd is a great stat.
- If a player has a high wtsd you should usually just c-bet and give up, maybe not even c-bet. Vs a player with a high wtsd and a low ftcb you should mainly play strong hands and wait until you hit a hand and and take him to valuetown.
- A high w@sd means is an indicator that villain only takes relatively strong hands to sd, thus we should v-bet him with a tighter range.
- I also use w@sd to determine the accuracy of the wtsd-number. If someone has a high wtsd (~32%+) and a high w@sd (~55%+) it's a sign of him running hot and he's not necessairily a callingstation.
Bet river % (br) – How often villain bets the river- Br is the best stat for knowing when to call with a bluffcatcher and when to check the river to induce a bluff imo.
- It's also the stat I use when deciding whether or not to check the turn through to induce a river bluff.
- Some of you might use river af instead of br, personally I don't think that's a good idea, at least not when used to determine whether or not to induce a bluff. That's because a player can easily get a high af despite checking behind alot, as checking isn't a part of the af ratio. Also, raises effects the river af and raises aren't really relevant when it comes to bluffinducing.
- Note that br has nothing to do with how often villain raises the river, I prefer going by feel when raised on the river. A high river af could be the result of villain being a habitual slowplayer, while br won't be affected as much (as a habitual slowplayer is more likely to put in a raise, not a bet, on the river).
Combining stats:
There are tons of information to be achieved by combining different stats. I'm just going to give a couple of examples. But beware, it's easy to mis-interpret the stats and why they look the way they do and end up spewing.
- A player with a low ftcb, a high turn af and a low wtsd is likely to be a habitual floater. A floater generally calls alot of flops (low ftcb), he tries to take the pot down on the turn with his weak hand (high turn af). A floater either gives up or bet/raise, he rarely calls, the definition of a high af. And he rarely goes to sd because he either takes it down on the turn, or he gives up with his weak hand (low wtsd).
- A player with a fold blind to steal (fbts) of 75% or less and a call pfr of 5% or less is likely to be 3-betting light from the blinds. He's folding too rarely against blind steals in comparison how often he calls to not be 3-betting light vs blind steals.
The sample size issue:
You need to consider that most of these stats need a decent sample size to be accurate. However there's no fixed amount of hands where you can start to trust your stats. After 100 hands most of these stats just gives you a vague hint on how your opponent is playing.This doesn't mean the stats are completely useless, but you need to know they might very well be way off. As the sample size increases to 200, 300 etc, you can start to trust the stats more. Passing 1000 hands you're starting to get a good idea of how your opponents play, but still there can easily be flaws in the stats.
