Table Selection
Introduction
In this article
- Profit counts
- Finding profitable tables with or without the help of software
- When you ought to change seats or leave the table
Table selection is strangely ignored or at least undervalued by many people, even by some very strong players. This is very easy to recognise when one looks at the mid-stakes tables on the PartyPoker website. You'll often come across a table occupied solely by TAG players. This is not a profitable situation for anyone of course and, moreover, the participating players should really know better.
Why is table selection so important?
Good table selection is important because it has an immediate effect on the earn rate. All big winners operate according to one basic rule: They only play when they have an edge. Playing poker is not about honour or competing with strong players. On the contrary! One should avoid strong opponents. Profit is the thing that counts, and profit can be made off bad opponents.
The higher the limit is, the more important table selection becomes. At the lowest limits you'll find fish all over the place. The higher you get the less they'll turn up. This means you need to make a careful selection in order to be able to practice your poker skills in an environment that is as profitable as possible.
Good table selection contributes to profitability almost just as much as one's actual poker skills do. Everyone knows the saying: "You could be the tenth best player in the world and still lose if you're sitting at the same table as the top nine".
For those who have ignored this point up till now the know-how presented here will come as a great relief, as long as it's applied consistently. Many players have acquired a solid basis and know what the most important principles of poker strategy are. Their development will now naturally slow down as they will no longer be able to make big progress while fine tuning their skills. Table selection has nothing to do with poker ability, however, and will give anyone who has ignored it up till now an incredible push in the right direction.
What do you need to look out for?
From the view of the person selecting the tables "good value" of course means bad players. The best indication of whether fish are present is the VPIP (voluntarily put money in the pot). Tables with more than 30 VPIP are definitely very profitable. This statistic is the main criterion when selecting tables. There are exceptional cases, however, when you can accept a percentage well below 30. This happens when you can get position on one or two extremely weak players.
Another important statistic is the PFR, i.e the preflop-raise percentage. An average TAG player playing full ring has a PFR of about 8-11. When selecting tables it would be preferable to find a much lower percentage than this, as it is an indication of many passive players. A passive environment is not only a sign of weak opponents, it also has a number of concrete advantages. Firstly you will more often have the opportunity to get a free play in the big blind. You might then even have the chance of flopping something big (two pair or better) with a trash hand. The chances of this happening are 20 to 1 anyhow. Passive preflop play also means you can play more drawing hands in late position, with which you will want to see the flop cheaply when there are good pot odds.
These percentages are applicable to full ring tables. When playing SH tables the percentages are naturally a little less clear. The higher the VPIP and the lower the PFR the better the table is for playing. The same goes for tables with a well over average PFR. Beginners might have trouble with games like these though, as one will have to make harder decisions.
The average VPIP and PFR percentage does not not say anything about the attributes of individual players. The essential question here is: Is it better to play against a more balanced mixure of opponents, to whom one is slightly superior, or is it easier to play tables with two (or more) really bad fish and otherwise strong opponents (who might be slightly superior to you)?
Many prefer the second variety and this is for a number of reasons:
- Players with about 30 VPIP are not necessarily bad postflop. If they are the aggressive type, they can make one's life really hard.
- Real fish on the other hand, with 50 VPIP or a much higher percentage even, are definitely bad players. If you're lucky they'll not only be loose but also passive (calling stations). They would be quite easy to predict in that case, which would in turn mean one could minimise a number of losses against them.
- A fish with 70 VPIP will be in the hand in over two out of three cases. This is exactly what you want.
- If you have position on the megafish then you can often use an isolation play. It is even an advantage here if you have tight-aggressive players playing after you. They usually respect a raise, so that you have a good chance of playing the hand heads-up with the worse player when you have better cards and a better position.
Depending on the played limit/time of day/poker website you might not have the choice of finding the "perfect" table, but will have to be content with what's on offer. You should, however, never join a table that doesn't look like it could be profitable, just because there is no other table available! There's no use playing if you don't at least have a marginal edge. If that's the case you're better off using your time to read some strategy articles or to visit the hand evaluation forum.
This aspect will be discussed under "Seat Selection".
Methods of table selection
Table Scanner is a very simple and efficient method. Good on them who use it! You open several tables at the same time, have them scanned and then you can see which tables are profitable and where the soft spots are straight away. As you can imagine, there are certain prerequisites for performing these wonders:
- PokerStrategy Elephant or similar software
- A very large database
Elephant can be downloaded. But how do you get the large database?
Method 1: You collect data by playing. This is not a very efficient method, as it is very slow.
Method 2: You perform active data mining. You could leave the computer on overnight and then collect data from 12 tables that are open simultaneously.
Method 3: You share the collected data with other miners. There are some subforums for this in the PokerStrategy forum.
Analysis programs like Elephant carry out excellent table selection (providing you have a good database). You open several tables at the desired limit and then wait until the player values are shown. Once you've found a good table, you join it or enter your name on the waiting list. This doesn't work on all of the sites supported by PokerStrategy. But with most of the providers (PartyPoker, PokerStars, etc.) this should be the easiest way to select tables.
There are also special table selection programs that are even easier to use, as one does not have to open tables manually but simply has all the available tables scanned and then gets a list that shows where the biggest fish are sitting. These are programs like SpadeEye (available in the Shop).
But here again it comes down to having a big enough and, if possible, up-to-date database. Some of these programs already have data mining tools integrated. You need to find out beforehand, however, whether your poker provider allows the mining of hand histories and which tools would come into consideration for this. You can find this out by posting a question in the forum or using the search engine.
Programs like Fishfinder make it very easy to find good tables/positions. But what do you do if you don't have this kind of software or a big enough database on the opponents, because you're still new to the limit or because there is no software available that is compatible with the poker website you're using?
In these cases it is also possible to carry out a good selection of tables. If you pay attention you can spot good tables and bad players very quickly. We will now examine how to do this below.
Even before you've opened a table it is possible to make a rough pre-selection. Most poker rooms list the average statistics of every table in the lobby, which can help you to get oriented. The most important of these statistics are the pot size (average size of the pot) and the average VPIP/PFR of the table.
Big pots are an implication of too many players seeing the flop and/or going too far into the hand. As looseness is an indication of a bad player, tables like this potentially have the most fish. So the higher both these values are, the more profitable a table is. This approach does have some disadvantages too, however.
- Big pots will not always be built because of the presence of a number of loose-passive players in the hand. Sometimes they are built by just a few very aggressive players who love raising. This will definitely not be to everyone's liking.
- In some cases big pots are just a product of coincidence. The last hands may have produced action flops (many high cards), which a number of players' holecards were able to manage well.
- Another disadvantage is that large average pots tend to attract sharks, who can find plenty of bait here.
- Big pots are popular. This means there are long waiting lists. When one then finally gets to play for one, the character of the game and therefore the size of the average pot may have changed for the worse.
- A higher table VPIP may be caused by a temporary ultra-shorthanded game (2-4 players), as these games are looser and it is common to find a higher VPIP, even though only TAG players may be sitting at the table.
- The statistics might be out of date and by the time one has managed to get a seat the dynamics of the game may have changed for the worse.
The conclusion we can draw from this is that poker sites merely provide rough findings and that these do not make for an essential criterion when selecting tables.
Another way of selecting tables is by simply observing the game at a table for a short time. It should usually become evident after a few hands whether or not the table would be profitable to play at or not.
The first and clearest indication of a good table is the amount of players who get to see the flop. You should pay attention to how many players are limping preflop or how often players cold call raises and 3-bets.
At shorthanded tables especially a preflop limp is a meaningful sign of a fish. You should therefore try to get a seat after this player. If there are few raises and many limps preflop then the table is definitely profitable to play.
Other signs of a good table:
- Players post their blinds in the middle of the game and don't wait until the blinds have come to them.
On of the clearest indications of a bad player. At full ring tables it might be common to post the blind from the cutoff, but at shorthanded tables this is a definite no-go. Players who post their blind from MP2 are always welcome guests.
- There is dead money on the table before the flop (because of sitting out).
If one clicks "Sit out" and then misses the blinds, one has the opportunity after rejoining the table to post an additional so-called dead blind to get back into the game, without having to wait for one's usual blind bet. A good player will always wait until he has to post his regular blinds.
- Players open limp/many limpers.
Another very good sign of a fishy table. Open limps, especially in later positions, are almost always a sign of weaker players. Many limpers at a table are an indication for a more loose-passive style of play with many calling stations, your favourite opponents. Overlimping after a number of players, however, is no longer automatically a sign of a bad player. At tables like this good players can also limp.
- There are often cold callers after someone has raised.
As is taught in the Shorthanded Strategy section for beginners, one should always raise or fold after a raiser. There are also situations when a cold call makes sense here, for example when the blinds/players after you are very loose and bad and you have a good multiway hand. But in the majority of cases a cold caller after a raiser tends to be a bad player.
- SB often calls after a steal-raise from the cutoff or button.
The same logic applies here again. It is almost always wrong for the SB to cold call after a (steal) raiser and is more than likely a sign of a weak player.
- Abusive chat/heated discussions: one or more players might be on tilt.
You'll often see players use abusive language against their opponents after a few bad beats or excitedly explain to their opponents what they did wrong. This might be an indication of one or more players not being able to control their emotions and thus making themselves easy prey. Beginners should be careful, however. The atmosphere at these kinds of tables can get very heated and aggressive, a situation which can be utilised profitably by a more experienced player, but can turn out badly for beginners. If you have trouble dealing with aggressive opponents and are not used to the shorthanded style of play then you ought to proceed with caution and perhaps find a new table.
- Players with too small a stack at the table
Players who join a table with a stack that isn't full (and are not short stack strategy players) or do not buy more chips once they've lost quite a few are usually weak players. Of course good players might also find themselves in a situation when, in the heat of the game, they forget to reload. The probability that such players would sit at a table with a short stack for a longer period of time, however, is relatively low.
You should add really bad players to your buddy list, so that you can easily find them again later. On PartyPoker this works in the following way: go to My account > Buddy List > Add. If a player is on the buddy list, you proceed as follows: Search Tables (list below) > Player Search > Buddys > Tick > Search.
At the low limits it is not necessary to create a buddy list, as there are usually plenty of tables with very bad players. It's not worth the effort until the mid-stakes, when one has found a real fish and wants to play against him as often as possible and might want to keep track of him at the higher limits too.You should not exaggerate, however, and only include the real fish in your list, as there are also enough bad players at the higher limits and because the list would otherwise become too confusing. As a rough guideline you could just include players with a VPIP of over 50% and see where fish like these are sitting before the beginning of each session.
The buddy list has some problematic aspects too, however. One might never meet some players again as they stop playing because of their big losses. They might reappear, but only from time to time. Others change their limit or perhaps one changes the limit oneself and leaves the fish behind. But even when the players in question are online and are playing at the right limit there is a potential problem. Many of them will not allow themselves to be found (guess why?) and activate "Hide me from search" in the Options menu. You will only see a 0 after their name in that case. The bottom line is that one needs quite a large pool of "buddies" to be able to use this tool successfully.
Be flexible!
Those who are willing to compromise will be more successful at selecting tables. Many players, especially beginners and slightly advanced players, feel most comfortable playing full ring games. There is time to wait for good hands in these games. But to get to the coveted table with 10 players one needs a table with exactly nine players and one free seat.
Of course it is rare to find this line-up. Alternatively one could always enter one's name on the waiting list of a fully occupied table, but this is only for those with patience. The biggest problem that arises from this rigid approach is that one does not have the freedom to select the seat. One has to take the seat that just happens to become available.
Good luck to anyone who is willing to take a seat at a table that has two, three, four or even five seats available! Someone like that will find a table straight away and can also select the best position on the fish. Tables with seven or eight players (including oneself) are very similar to the full ring game. They also tend to fill up quickly again. Tables with six players are borderline cases and tables with five or less players are definitely shorthanded.
So anyone who can play both variations, i.e. full ring and shorthanded, definitely has an advantage when it comes to table selection. Unlike the tables with six players the half empty 10-max tables are desirable to the experienced player in a number of ways. The opponents are usually not out-and-out shorthanded specialists, as they were originally sitting at a full 10-max table (except those who joined the table when it was already half empty). Many of the remaining players have ended up sticking with the table, because they are behind and don't like to leave the table a loser. These 'break even hunters' are often on tilt and are therefore potential prey.
Seat Selection
Where you are sitting in relation to the individual player types unavoidably makes a difference. Position in Hold'em is simply very significant. It is so important, that it has its own distinctive rule: Money always flows from right to left in Hold'em.
When you are considering who you want to have seated to the right of you, you need to ask yourself who the biggest spenders are. The answer is simple: the really bad players. So you want to have the really bad players on your right. You cannot always recognise bad players straight away, but there is one sign: looseness.
You want:
- Loose passive opponents on your right
- Loose aggressive opponents on your right
- Tight passive opponents on your left
- Tight aggressive opponents on your left (it would be good to have this type of opponent on your right, but someone has to sit on your left, and it's better when this is a TAG rather than a LAG)
So you want all loose players on your right and all the tight ones on your left. It is also good to have position on players who are in the hand more often than others. That way you'll have a position advantage more often.
Most of the money in Hold'em comes from the calling stations, as they're the worst players. A calling station is admittedly also a good companion to have on one's left, as he will cold call raises with bad hands from time to time and will also not put a lot of pressure on you when he has good cards, and so does not use his position advantage much. But still.
If you raise with AK or a higher pocket pair then you want the loose-passive player to already be in the hand with J9o. Even a calling station will not cold call with any old trash. But once he's in the game, he'll usually stay in it till the river, as long as he's managed to catch a little piece of the board (he'll often start off with a baby pair and call down with that).
So your good hands will pay off. The winning chances will increase considerably if you manage to isolate the calling station with a raise.
A loose passive player usually has a low PFR. This means two things:
- Take care when he raises. In cases like this he is usually holding a premium hand.
- As he is usually just limping with hands like AQ-AT, you will have the opportunity to raise AQ aggressive instead of having to fold.
A big advantage of having position on a player like this is that his passive style of play will give you the opportunity to play your hand optimally, i.e. to value bet it on the turn or get a free card or to see the showdown for free when it's unimproved on the river.
The LAG player is aggressive and hard to predict. It is therefore more important to have position on him than on the loose-passive player. If it comes to tough battles then one can get more bets out of one's winning hands and minimise the costs when one has losing hands.
The loose-aggressive player can't bluff as effectively out of position. He has no opportunity to make raises as semi-bluffs. A very loose LAG player with a high PFR (maniac) can already be isolated with decent hands.
The LAG player will often try to steal your blinds. That's why you should try to find out his stealing standards in good time, so that you can shoot back with determination. If you do that early on during the session, he might just gain respect for you and you will keep him from "stealing on light hands".
OK, so you'd love to have all players sit to your right, but that's just not possible. So the rock should sit to your left. You might not really be able to earn anything off him from that position, but then getting money off him isn't easy anyway. At least he won't be able to cause much damage when he's on your left, as he doesn't consistently protect good hands and often just calls. That way he doesn't get enough value out of his winning hands. If he raises, however, then you'll usually have an easy fold, as he will probably be holding more than just a top pair.
If you raise first in with shaky hands (ace-little) in late position he will hardly 3-bet you with AT or AJ. You will often be able to buy the button off him, both preflop and postflop. He will only defend his blinds against your regular attempts to steal (from him) with the strongest hands, so not nearly enough.
When it comes to TAG players many arguments speak in favour of both sides. Because of lack of space, however, they ought to sit to your left (there are not enough rocks!).
Let's discuss the disadvantages should one be sitting to your right: Because of his "raise or fold" policy he will raise in middle position first in with many hands that are not top-notch (KQ, KJs, AT), but against which you will have to fold despite having AJ or even AQ, simply because you can't exclude the possibility of him holding a premium hand. You will rarely get to play therefore, which can be frustrating. The TAG player has it in for the fish, just like you do. If he's sitting to your right he will often get to raise before you and will snatch the fish off you. In multiway pots the TAG player will often prevent from getting a better hand by protecting and raising as a semi-bluff.
So now for our actual topic: the TAG player sits to your left. As he will recognise you as a solid player, he will usually respect your raises and will not get in your way while you battle against the fish. In a heads-up with him you will always have the opportunity to check-raise on the flop with a strong hand. If he's very aggressive and consistently abides by the follow-through principle you can even check-raise him on the turn, depending on the board. You will be able to steal his blinds once or twice.
Of course it is not always possible to get the best table position. If there are three or four bad players at the table then this need not be a problem, however. In that case you should try to get a seat as close to the bad players as possible, even if means sitting to the right of them. Although you then won't be able to isolate them preflop and will have to play against them out of position postflop, you will be in the hand with them more often in blind steal situations, where they will often make mistakes and increase your profit because of this. At good tables you will have to accept that a TAG player will sit to your right when there are lots of fish in the game. So while you should not underestimate the table position and should try to get the best seat when possible, you can also not be too choosy. During the course of the game you can always change seats if needed.
If you have a good opportunity to change seats, don't miss it. The following conditions apply here:
- A seat becomes available.
- There are no players on the waiting list, who would have priority over the seat.
- The new table position improves the relative position on the weak players somewhat.
And the procedure:
- Remember the table number or select the table on the table list with the cursor.
- Wait until the hand comes to an end. The moment the money is given to the winner you should stand up.
- Wait until the cards have been dealt for the new hand (estimation).
- Double-click on the bar representing the table on the table list.
- You should now hopefully be able to take the available seat.
All this fuss is needed because otherwise you would always end up in the same seat if you were to leave the game in the middle of the hand and were to return immediately. You should wait until the last minute to stand up, so that you keep the seat occupied for as long as possible. This is necessary because of the danger of losing both your old seat and the new one you're aiming for when you return. This only goes for PartyPoker, however. On some sites (such as PokerStars) it is possible to change seats at any time during the hand, as long as one is not involved in that particular hand.
If changing your seat is clearly advantageous to your profit expectation, then you can also change seats in late position and thus sacrifice a number of free plays!
When should you leave a table?
If one of the tables you are playing at is acceptable, but not exactly fantastic, you should keep an eye out for other tables while playing. As one will fold a lot as a tight player, one should use one's spare energy to improve the playing conditions by looking for softer tables. This is especially possible without having to put a lot of effort into it when you can use the scanning method or the buddy list.
What table is most worth leaving? Essentially the one with the strongest opponents. Even if you are ahead at a table like that it doesn't mean you have to stay. A stroke of luck is a passing phenomena. It doesn't say anything about the future of your game! In the same way a table is not necessarily bad just because you lost at it. When there is an abundance of fish at that table it will give you a very positive profit expectation, so you ought to stick with it.
Many players actually think in the opposite way. They remain at a table full of strong players just because they are behind. They simply don't want to leave the table a loser and try to break even. The mistake they make with this approach is that they're taking it all too personally. Being behind is not something to be ashamed of. It can happen to anyone if the cards happen to come that way. One should never consider it as a personal defeat. The table results also don't really count - it is the total account balance in the long term that counts a lot more. So leaving a table a loser doesn't affect the account balance. One should be able to live with this, especially as a winning player.
There are also reasons to leave a table even when there is no other more attractive alternative. Fish, who are the reason for why you're sitting where you're sitting, have a disadvantage. Their presence is very unstable, as they tend to go broke at some point. So if the reason for your own presence is disappearing you should also leave. You can then look for profitable games in your own good time. Most of the old hands have moved to multitabling anyway. Anyone playing four tables at the same time can close two tables that have dried up without any hassle, without being bored to death. He can then use his free time to continue looking.
Of course there are some disadvantages to changing tables frequently. First of all it disturbs your game. Some players feel overwhelmed by having to look for new tables and feel it distracts them too much. In that case it's questionable whether one should give up all the observations and reads one has gathered at a particular table in order to look for a new table that might have a VPIP that is only two or three percent higher. One also has to consider the table image. Once one is regarded as a winning player, because one is clearly ahead, this can be used to play a high pressure game with aggressive preflop raises and semi-bluffs. You cannot take the respect you've gained to the new table unfortunately.
Conclusion
The fact is: many mediocre players make quite a decent profit from playing poker, even though they are not especially talented. They simply know how to select their games. Then there are many talented and creative players who go broke again and again, just because they ignore the basic principles of table selection. They miss the profitable situations, unlike every big winner. A winner is someone for whom the game really is about winning. All his thoughts and actions are focused on this one objective. Winners only play when they recognise an advantage, i.e. recognise when a game will be profitable.
Never play without an edge!
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