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Practical Work with PT

Now that I have presented the functions and options for PT in detail, I will turn to practical aspects of everyday work with PT, most of all the analysis of your own game.

Filtering in general

I will continually refer to the use of filters in PT so I will present the most important filter functions here.

The first rough filter for finding the data you want can eb found in the preferences tab of the "Ring Game Player Statistics" window. There you can filter out particular limits and pick out specific time frames. A more exact description can be found in section 3.8.

The "Filters" dialog in the "General Info" tab of "Ring Game Player Statistics" is substantially more important:

This dialog lets you filter the hands shown in the "General Info" tab according to different conditions. Most of the options are self-explanatory. Regardless, I will point out a few of them.

Position: PT numbers the relative positions at a full ring table as follows:

0: Button
1: Cut Off
2: MP3
3: MP2
4: MP1
5: UTG+2
6: UTG+1
7: UTG
8: Big Blind
9: Small Blind

Saving filters: PT saves the current configuration as soon as you enter a name for the filter. You can call on this filter later with the "Select An Existing Filter" drop down menu.

Warning: If you want to make a new filter and not use an existing one, always use the "Create New Filter" option, since otherwise you will overwrite the current filter.

Analyzing your own game

Remember that you need a lot of hands for analysis with PT. Extensive work with the stats isn't really worth it until around 20000 hands. The variance is just too great to trust values stemming from smaller samples. You can identify tendencies with a smaller number of hands, but the values are just not strong enough to change your own game on this reason alone.

Please also consider that the measures I present here are just some examples drawn from many possibilities for working with the stats. Any PT stats wiz's out there can let me know about particular analyses and I will include them here.

Lastly, let me say again that statistics can help you to find the right trail when looking for leaks, but seldom give you an exact conclusion about your game. The "vague" statistical information is no substitute for concrete analysis of individual hands. In particular, I would like to recommend to everybody that they make excessive use of the example hand forums.

A rough overview

A well formulated question is necessary for the analysis of your game with PT. The stats presented by PT cannot be meaningfully interpreted without a concrete question. Beginners will have it especially hard looking for weaknesses. It's good to get a foothold, however, by looking through your own stats. To do this, open "Ring Game Player Statistics -> General Info -> More Detail …", which will summarize your stats. You'll see values concerning your game here in black and white.

Fixed limit full ring players can then compare their values with those of "winning players" on $3/$6 here: PokerTracker Stats von winning players auf 3/6 Dollar

Fixed limit shorthanded players can compare here: http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/showfl...rt=1&PHPSESSID=

There are no useable values for comparison available for no limit players since no limit is very stylized from player to player. Still, it's worth taking a look at this: http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/showfl...?Number=4669192

If one or more of your values falls outside the reference range, don't just start changing your game at random. You know that it is unusual but not that you are playing wrong or what you might be doing wrong. You should carefully look into any value outside the reference range.

VP$IP and PFR%: It's relatively easy to control deviations here. It's mostly a matter of building your pre-flop game according to resources available here (starting hand chart, etc.). The tilt control filter is another possibility (see below).

Blind Stealing and Blind Defense: Here it is also recommended that you work through the article on this topic again.

All other values, like Won $ When Saw Flop, Went to Showdown, Won $ at Showdown, Aggression Factors, Folded To River Bet, require careful and regular investigation of individual hands. Mighty as it is, PT cannot replace a good analysis in the example hand forums.

After this rough overview, I will now present some measures for the analysis of your own game in detail.

b. The tilt control filter

The tilt control filter is a simple tool to detect losses due to loose preflop tilts. Too many tilts go unnoticed and are all to easily "forgotten." It is very useful to regularly check your game in the fashion described here to eliminate costly tilts. This method is good for users of the SHC, that is, full ring fixed limit players. However, you can make the analogy for other pre-flop strategies.

• In PT, open "Ring Game Player Statistics" and click on the tab "General Info" then on "Filters".
• Click on "Create New Filter"
• Type something like "Tilt Control Early Position" for the filter description.
• Choose "Hands With Between 10 and 10 Players At The Table".
• Then: "Positions Off The Button Between 5 And 7" to look at only hands from early position.
• Under "Vol. Put $ In Pot" choose the option "Put Money In"
• Then click on "Select Specific Hands …" and choose all hands that you should not play from early position according to the starting hand chart.
• Click "OK" to save the filter.

In the same manner, create filters for middle and late position. You must choose "Positions Off The Button Between …" according to the position; between 4 and 2 for middle position and between 0 and 1 for late. Once again, include the hands that you ought not play in those positions according to the SHC.

You have now created filters for all 3 positions that you can select from the dropdown menu after a click on "Filters" in the "General Info" tab. You will then see whether you have played hands you shouldn't have from the position filter you have chosen, according to the SHC. Every hand that appears here should be inspected carefully. Why did I play that hand? What was the result? Did I make mistakes in the hand that indicate a tilt?

The weakness of the tilt control filter is it can only inspect full tables easily, due to the way PT works.

c. Finding problem hands

Before looking for problem hands, it's best to assemble the SHC or Open Raise Chart and something to write with. You'll need it.

Everybody has hands they like to play, and can play them to the end, post-flop. But everybody also has hands that give them problems post-flop. The following laborious procedure can lead you to such personal problem hands.

Open "Ring Game Player Statistics" in PT. Go to the preferences tab and check that only the limits and dates are chosen that you want to analyze. Now go to the general info tab, click on filters and activate "not a blind" for "blind status" and choose the number of players at the table; "Hands With Between 8 And 10 Players At Table" for full ring.

In the list of starting hands you will now see all hands that you played on full tables when not in the blinds. Now look through this table using the SHC. In theory, you should have made gains with all hands in the SHC. Note starting hands where this is not the case.

When doing so remember: it could take (very) many hands before you make a profit with marginal starting hands, such as small suited connectors. Since the average win per hand is very small, a single bad beat can be enough to keep this hand in the minus for a long time. This doesn't mean the hand is a problem hand.

If you are unsure whether a hand is a problem hand, it's helpful to look at whole hand groups. If you take losses on 76s, but win with other suited connectors, it's probably that you are looking at a statistical phenomenon and not a great weakpoint. When in doubt, look over the hand histories for that hand.

When you have a list of problem hand candidates, use it to create a filter in PT as in the following. In this way, you'll always have fast access to the list and can look at it as it progresses.

• Click "filters" in "general info"
• Click "Create New Filter"
• Use something like "problem hands" for "Filter Description".
• Choose"Not A Blind" for "Blind Status".
• Then: "Hands With Between 8 And 10 Players At The Table".
• Now click "Select Specific Hands…" and check the possible problem hands.
• Clicking OK saves the filter. You can no select it using "Select An Existing Filter" in the drop down menu of "filters" under "general info".

These problem hands now require the utmost inspection. I reccommend looking at the winrate for these hands at the end of a poker day. This works well if you choose the filter you just made and then look through different time windows using the preferences tab. Furthermore, it is advisable to look through individual hand histories for particularly troublesome problem hands, even if it takes a lot of time or you have to post some of them in the example hand forums for advice.

I personally hold this kind of work with such a list of problem hands to be the best way to work with PT. Man will repeat his mistakes, so this is the best way to make you aware of the problem. It is easier anyway, than looking at all the stats and taxing yourself trying to find the cause for a too-high "Went to Showdown" value. It's easiest to spot mistakes if you work with filters like "problem hands" or "tilt control" briefly at the end of a poker day.

Tip: It might be helpful to compare winrates for your hands on this page: http://www.pokerroom.com/main/page/games/evstats/expValue

Here you can find stats, including average win/loss per hand for all the starting hands by limit and count of players at the table. The stats come from a very large database maintained by the site "PokerRoom" of hands played on their site. Remember that these are average, not optimal values. A good player will surely be above these values.

d. Analyzing problem hands in the context of position

You should always remember, that gains and losses not only depend on the relative strength of your own hand but also on the relative position. It is especially important for no limit Hold'em. I recommend that all problem hands be inspected in detail with regard to relative position at the table.

To do this, open "Ring Game Player Statistics" and choose the preferences tab and the appropriate limit. Open the tab "position stats". Choose a position from the list above. You can choose more than one at once using the "ctrl" key.

For full ring games they are:

Early Position: Positions 5-7
Middle Position: Positions 2-4
Late Position: Button and Pos. 1

In the list below you will see the starting hands played from this position. Using the list of your possible problem hands, you can now check whether they are a problem when played from a particular position.

In general, it is not a bad idea to look over this list in the context of position (early, middle, late) to see whether some hands that you have not already identified as problem hands are causing problems from particular positions.

Note when doing so, that when you filter by position, the count of hands is reduced considerably. Therefore, the variance is more influential and the figures are less reliable. Before marking starting hands as problem hands, carefully look through the hand histories to make sure no bad beats are skewing your stats.

e. Top 10 of the day

Here is another exercise for the end of a session or a day of poker playing to get a rough overview of the quality of your game. It only takes 20 or 30 minutes in all. Just look at your 10 winningest and 10 most losing hands. The winning hands are often more interesting than the losing. You are more likely to "overlook" mistakes in winning hands, since you've already thought about the losing hands enough.

• To do this, pick the current date from the preferences tab.
• Under the game notes tab, choose your nickname for "show only hands played by:"
• Click "Get All".
• Now sort the table by net gains by clicking on "Net".
• Clicking on the blue hand number will bring you to that hand's history and lets you play it back.

f. Playing in the blinds/blind steals

It is difficult to analyze your game from the blinds because of the difficulty of posing concrete questions. This can be done with the help of the proper filters. Here I will present the most important questions.

Please note that PT cannot differentiate between a steal raise and a first-in value raise from late position. PT will identify even a first-in raise with AA from the cut off as a steal raise. When analyzing your blind game and steals, it is often good to look at individual hand histories. This is quite time consuming.

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