Note-Taking

Hello, fellow card-chatters.

I'm curious as to how many of you take notes on players? I use FTP and have recently started marking players I view as "solid" in green, where the ones that really stand out I mark in blue, such as "loose, agressive, tight," etc.

Do any of you find this feature helpful, or more of a bother?

Thanks, and see you all at the tables!

I generally don't use the color coding, but I do take notes. It is often helpful in identifying certain tendencies in players.

Yes and yes. I also use notes to vent. Luckily there is no censorship on the notes you take or parts of some of mine would be unreadable.

Its also cool that at FTP and PS that you can take notes on the replay screen. That's helpful in rush.

The thing that I have noticed at FTP is that as soon as they install a new software, all the notes are erased.

?????????????????? That never happened to me. The notes are on your computer under C:\Program Files (x86)\Poker\Sites\FullTilt\YOUR NICK.xml. If you are using different computers, that might be why you are losing your notes.

Yeah..I have a desk -top and a lap-top at 2 separate addresses.

for me its blue-green-yelllow-orange-red from worst to best. almost everyone is green-orange unless they are outstanding or the worst ever.

Personally, I don't take notes. What happens when you read your own note like:

"played mid or bttm pr hard, bluffed w/ AK high and so on"

and this hand they're playing top pair or an over pair hard? Did that really help you that hand?

I like to get a read on how a person is playing in the last 20 or 30 hands, I think thats all that really matters. Who cares what they did in that SNG 4 months ago.

That's just my personal preference. I also play poker in real life, mostly a brick and mortar player. I don't like to use things I can't use in real life.

i put tags on certain players i feel i have an advantage against. this way i can pick and choose which tables i want to sit at

Do you use this sowtfware which is being advised by cardschat .. can't remember the name - it just allows to record the hands and the play i think .. is it useful at all ?

Definitely a good way to remember some donkey players and sharks, holdem manager it's a another good choice for something more like statics... definitely useful software for get more info about other players.

I have just recently started taking good notes. Mostly I play SNGs but dabble in 6max and FR. Way back when my notes were mainly : donk, fish, ass, douche, ect.. Now I have a little shorthand system for taking notes as I'm sure most good regs do.

When I first load up my tables I get to work. I take the player to the left of me and click on their notes. Then I type the following:
G:
PF:
F:
T:
R:

These stand for in order: General, pre-flop, flop, turn, river. I then type kind of game under general. For example: G: 6-M 10nl. Then I right click, highlight and copy.

After this it all depend how froggy I feel as to how much notes I take. Sometimes I look up every player while I'm on waiting list and see how many tables they are at. If it is more than four I make a note under my "general" section. For example if he is playing 16 tables the my notes read: G: 6-M 10nl, 16T. The reason I do this is because usually micro stakes multi tablers are super tight and I like to steal their blinds and fold to resistance.

I'm not going into my whole shorthand or anything but I will give an example of what some of my notes look like:

G: 6M,
PF:3B QTs BB, PAI A9s UTG
F:CAI TPNK 90BBd
T:
R:


OK at first glance you are like WTF? But it's ez for me to decode and you should make it easy for yourself to also. When I move my cursor over this player I will know that preflop he 3bet queen ten suited from the big blind and he pushed all in with ace nine suited under the gun. On the flop he has called an all in 90 big blinds deep(effective stack) with top pair no kicker.

3bet is one of my favorite notes. Whenever someone 3bets whether or not you are in the hand you should pay close attention. If it gets to showdown make a note of the cards and position. A few showdowns can help you pin point 3betting range with or without thousands of PT hands.

This is just the basics. Usually I will only make a note if the play is out of the ordinary or something I can exploit. Sometimes I get carried away. You want good notes but also in a quick ez to read from. Plus you don't want to take all day making one note. So I guess the jist of this is if you are going to be serious about note taking you should use some form of shorthand and don't take meaningless notes like "donk" ect.....

I MAKE a TON of notes which I find are VERY useful (for a few reasons). I find when I'm taking alot of notes it really keeps my head into it 100% which in turn helps out my hand-reading skills immensely. (even in the CC donkroll today... guy leads out POT on flop when checked to... I've seen him do this a bunch of times in the past.... bingo.. check-raise allin.. tyvm.. & take it down, lol). < really basic example obv.
I also make full use of the colour codes on Fulltilt. I actually have each colour they have assigned to particular playing styles &/or tendancies. They actually don't even have enough diff. colours to match all the separate groups I have, lol.. so I share some colours (ie. 'red' is for a few diff. types). All the other sites don't have nearly enough colours for me, hee hee.. I'm actually bein' serious... but I make do.

I use the Stars/FTP/etc color-coded notes for game selection. I only have two categories:

Yellow/Green - possibly bad
Pink - definitely bad

I'll stick at a table with a yellow or green player until I find a better seat. If I can find a seat to the left of a pink player, I'll sit there until my girlfriend pries me out of my chair. I use pink for these players just because it's the most visually assaulting color - hard to miss.

I use HEM (or PT3) notes to record specific information about a player so I can use it not just at the table, but also afterward during my session review.

The most useful thing you can not of is when a player does something you would not expect based on their overall stats. For instance, if a passive player does something strangely aggressive like check/raise bluffing the turn or river. Or a tight player opens some hands that you wouldn't expect to be in their range. These notes tell you something that your HUD can't, and constitute an actionable read.

I probably don't take enough notes, but will make a note of players that make aggressive bluffs or only bet big when they have a sure hand. I find the notes are only beneficial if I'm playing a lot, which I haven't the time to do currently.

To the OP
Taking notes is very helpful BUT it is important you take the right kinds of notes.
HEM and PT3 (extra software) are the best ways to maintain a DB of players notes.
They are both very customizable to show various stats you feel are important.
I use PT3 and stick to some of the basics, hands player, VPIP, Preflop Raise, Aggression etc.
These notes don't go away and are always available for any player I have sat down with.

(Detroit Jimmy, what you are doing is SOOOOOO much easier with PT3, you should check it out)

The other advantage to these programs is the ability to go back and see what you did wrong and what you did right in a session.

As for the notes on the sites, I color code some people
All my CC friends are a certain color, other friends a different color, those cash players playing lots of table are coded,
and of course the FISHIES are in their own category.

Hope this helps

I take notes, but never thought of color coding them. Thanks for the great tip.

I use HEM too. Like GiantBudda says I take notes when actions don't match stats or any 3bet that goes to showdown. It's hard to trust HUD 3bet without huge volume yet you can use your showdown notes to know specific hands and help pinpoint a range.

A HUD is good, but HUD + good notes= < $.

Just to add my .02...

Being new here, I really like how everyone keeps it civil when posting opnions (for the most part ). Even with differing opnions, people act with respect. It's good to see.




Any advantange should be used. One member had posted the note applied to someone maybe 4 months ago. That is a good point, but it still can give a direction with their play.

Even in live play, you're taking mental notes. Why eat up all that mental hard drive space, when you can put it on the computer.

I too color code my notes, and try to code everyone I can first. So if they leave, I'll have tagged them that at least I've seen them once. Then watch for any sort of noteable activity. Color codes just like others have stated. Green means a weak player to me. Red means they have some good stats, blue is for the multitablers who play 12 or more at once. Etc Etc

One exercise I learned out of a Poker book was to identify notes on the player to your left first,as far as style (tight, loose, bet sizes). Then move it out from there.

I liked the idea of swearing at them in the notes, that will keep CHATABUSE from emailing me

On one screen I have all the notes boxes open, and on my bigger screen I have all the tables I'm playing. I order the note boxes in a circle same as the players order. I keep a last hand history box open by the note boxes too.

Good Luck on the tables

DPD

When color coding started on some of these sites, there were few colors to choose from. So, I used them to rate the player. I treated them as a traffic light.

Red------Stop and Think----Solid Player
Yellow---Caution-----------May be trouble not sure yet
Green----Go Baby----------Weak Player

i haven't tried the color coding yet, but i do make notes when information about a player shows itself. a few times i have gone back and read notes while trying to decide how to play a hand, and they have come in handy! sometimes saving me from a big trap, other times to face the bluff and rake in the pot

Here's a few more of my 'colour-coding' of player style/type (keep in mind, I'm playing low buyins, SNG & MTT, where you're regularly running into more than one or two 'fairly bad'..'real bad' types. (there's more in-depth descriptions of each type... but tryin' to keep it simple here).

Blue - CallingStation
Light Blue - MANIAC
Green - Pass/Pass, prone to trapping
Orange - Pass/Agg... weak player, tendancy to play pass. pre.. ie. limps w AK/AQ hands, but really a fit/fold type.. mindonks are pretty much always weak.. postflop> they bet BIG = they got big
Pink - Lag... but a spewy,losing type of rag (ie. cbets POT w air, generally plays bad, overvalues hands in early levels, way too many hands played, etc.)
Purple - TAG, typical player.... generally break-even or marginal winner/loser, doesn't get out of line, but also not capable of much as far as moves go
DarkPurple - TAG but a bit tighter & more winning player
Darkest Purple - shark, reg., very capable player
Red - mouse

there's more but that's it for now, lol. (guess I won't be posting any more screenshots from CC games now, hee hee hee)