Understanding Poker Tracking Software

[rhombus]

an analogy would be when everyone had wooden tennis rackets and this guy came along with an oversized graphite/titianium racket with catgut and when he hit the ball everyone said WTF, or the golfers with the latest technoogy in their driver.

Its just a tool/ technology thats freely available no cheating and alot of people including myself who actually have it dont get the full benefits because they dont use it properly

Its not going to make you a winner overnight maybe make you a smaller loser

You get out what you put in, its like saying people shouldnt have books about poker because the readers will become better players, just get a book and read it or get a free trial and see if you like it

 

[PokerTracker]

an analogy would be when everyone had wooden tennis rackets and this guy came along with an oversized graphite/titianium racket with catgut and when he hit the ball everyone said WTF, or the golfers with the latest technoogy in their driver.

Its just a tool/ technology thats freely available no cheating and alot of people including myself who actually have it dont get the full benefits because they dont use it properly

Its not going to make you a winner overnight maybe make you a smaller loser

You get out what you put in, its like saying people shouldnt have books about poker because the readers will become better players, just get a book and read it or get a free trial and see if you like it

Good example. We often compare PokerTracker and Holdem Manager to an encyclopedia of your own playing experience. Most people who own encyclopedia's never read the books, owning an encyclopedia doesn't make you smarter - but if you take the time to read and learn then you will become smarter. Tracking software is the same way, if you take the time to review your game after the sessions are done, then you have a greater probability of becoming a great player. The real value from owning PokerTracker and Holdem Manager is after the game is complete, the HUD's job is to improve performance - but only post game review can make you a better player.

 

[YouPay4MyCrack]

an analogy would be when everyone had wooden tennis rackets and this guy came along with an oversized graphite/titianium racket with catgut and when he hit the ball everyone said WTF, or the golfers with the latest technoogy in their driver.

Its just a tool/ technology thats freely available no cheating and alot of people including myself who actually have it dont get the full benefits because they dont use it properly

Its not going to make you a winner overnight maybe make you a smaller loser

You get out what you put in, its like saying people shouldnt have books about poker because the readers will become better players, just get a book and read it or get a free trial and see if you like it

People shouldn't be cheating by reading books from pros offering insight. Lol, jk. I thought the software was doing data mining, that's why I thought it was cheating, but I've looked into it a lot since then. Now I know it's not cheating lol.

We find that many players who were "up in arms" that trackers exist are usually just misinformed, when they speak with us or become better informed the majority of players quickly realize the service our software provides is 100% legitimate, and actually has an important purpose in the online poker ecology. Unfortunately we cannot stop the rumors and misinformation, much of which comes from well meaning players who are just misinformed. This is one of the reasons why we participate on forums, it helps us to get the truth out to the general public.

Thanks for taking the time to learn, we are honored you are now "on our side"!

Not a problem, thanks for taking the time to explain it

 

[Landopope]

A few sites used to allow it. WPN is the last as far as I know to allow it, but a recent update closed the loophole. We do not support datamining, as it is against most site's terms and conditions.

udbrky
Customer Support

I thought WPN was one of the few sites that didn't allow mucked hands to be seen? Is that so they could sell the hand histories?

 

[HoldemManager]

I thought WPN was one of the few sites that didn't allow mucked hands to be seen? Is that so they could sell the hand histories?

WPN does not, and never did, 'sell hands' to my knowledge. They used to write observed hands to disc when not even sitting at a table so that you could use any standard tracker like HM2/PT4 and datamine hands. They stopped doing this earlier this year as part of the preparations for being able to show all mucked cards in the hand history files even if the player chooses not to show at the table like other sites do. That update is supposedly coming sometime early in 2015 last I heard from the WPN Rep on 2+2.

Fozzy71
Customer Support

 

[JoeyStoll]

Actually this is not true. The terms of service for Bovada do allow personal tracking. Bovada chose to provide hand histories 24 hours after the game is completed and include all of the hole cards. Can you imagine if you played a live poker game where at the end of the hand everyone turned over their hole cards - even those who folded preflop? Thats why we choose to not support Bovada.

Hello; I literally had to sign up on this site, after I read this quote above, to respond to this. I've never posted in a poker forum in my life, but this one really got me going.

I've got to call BS on this statement. You chose NOT to support Bovada because they....24 hour AFTER release hand histories of what EVERYONE'S hole cards are. So WHAT?!?!

Everyone is anonymous on Bovada. There is ZERO advantage to knowing what (let use an example) say "player 6" had even if he folded preflop. OMG "player 6" fold XYZ hand I'll remember that for next time.....UMMMM no you won't, because you have zero clue who player 6 is going to be next time.....

Your analogy of the live poker game is just not even in the same realm, if it was live and you saw everyone cards yes that makes no sense, but anonymous online gives you zero edge knowing what everyone had 24 hours later, because you'll never know if your playing that same person again.

Maybe I'm not understanding something here, and I'd love for you to enlighten me. But how the heck does this make any logical sense what you are saying here.

PS -- I only bring this up because I 100% wish you would make your program compatible with Bovada. I really miss the tracking features and being able to replay big hands that I won and lost on. Checking all my stats/percentages and comparing them to others. Also that graph charting your wins and losses is a thing of pure gold. I really miss watching that chart going up over time...so cool....

PLEASE RESPOND I'M CURIOUS....

Thanks
Joey Stoll

 

[WVHillbilly]

Yeah I agree that PT and HEM choosing not to support importing day-old, anonymous hands is silly, especially for the reason they posted above.

There is a 3rd party util that I use that allows you to import Bovada hhs. http://acepokersolutions.com/bovadahandconverter.html

 

[PokerTracker]

Hello; I literally had to sign up on this site, after I read this quote above, to respond to this. I've never posted in a poker forum in my life, but this one really got me going.

I've got to call BS on this statement. You chose NOT to support Bovada because they....24 hour AFTER release hand histories of what EVERYONE'S hole cards are. So WHAT?!?!

Your confusing two different components of our software. The tracker is the main application, the HUD is just a display of the information in the tracker; but the HUD is not as important as the information contained within the tracker. We could certainly support Bovada if we wished to within the tracker, which is what we explained the post you incorrectly claimed is BS. Also, in case you were not aware, the technology actually does exist to create a HUD at Bovada, the Bovada poker client is not that secure - it would not be that hard to tap into the memory to mimic a hand history from memory. With that said, this is something we will not do; it is against our moral code.

Our original quote is below to verify that our statement was 100% accurate and true.

Originally Posted by Randall McMurphy
Bovada/Bodog does not allow those trackers, as far as I know.
Actually this is not true. The terms of service for Bovada do allow personal tracking. Bovada chose to provide hand histories 24 hours after the game is completed and include all of the hole cards. Can you imagine if you played a live poker game where at the end of the hand everyone turned over their hole cards - even those who folded preflop? Thats why we choose to not support Bovada. It might also surprise you to know that Bovada actually asked us to support their 4.0 software, we declined their request. We supported Bodog 3.0 software with the company's full permission, in fact we were close with the CEO at the time.

Everyone is anonymous on Bovada. There is ZERO advantage to knowing what (let use an example) say "player 6" had even if he folded preflop. OMG "player 6" fold XYZ hand I'll remember that for next time.....UMMMM no you won't, because you have zero clue who player 6 is going to be next time.....

Partially incorrect. We agree there is no advantage, but we also never claimed that you have an advantage using a HUD at a normal table... a losing player with a HUD will still be a losing player, there is no advantage to be gained. What the HUD provides is productivity... you could slow down the game and take meticulous notes on each anonymous opponent, or you can use the HUD's ability to track each hand do this for you. PokerTracker supports anonymous tables at partypoker, iPoker, and Microgaming MPN for example - and in each situation the use of a HUD helps the player by allowing him or her to be more productive, and possibly play at more tables at the same time without having to over-rely on taking meticulous notes.

Your analogy of the live poker game is just not even in the same realm, if it was live and you saw everyone cards yes that makes no sense, but anonymous online gives you zero edge knowing what everyone had 24 hours later, because you'll never know if your playing that same person again.

Bovada decided to re-write the rules of the game to help them combat fears of cheating through collusion by showing all of the hole cards. It does not matter if the game is anonymous or not, showing all the cards at the table does not conform with the rules of poker in any format; and therefore something we will not support for personal tracking. Our decision has nothing to do with edges gained, its a rules issue in our eyes, and we are confidant that we made the right choice morally. Additionally there is the issue of post-Black Friday legality, which we discuss below. As you can see, this is a rather complex topic!

PS: There is a third party Bovada converter for PokerTracker, this converter changes hands to pokerstars format. PokerTracker will import these improperly formatted hands because our importer cannot tell the difference between an authorised PokerStars hand and an unauthorised third party conversion, however these hands are not officially supported. They have been known to break many of our filters because they were not designed to address hands where hole cards for all players are known.

PS -- I only bring this up because I 100% wish you would make your program compatible with Bovada. I really miss the tracking features and being able to replay big hands that I won and lost on. Checking all my stats/percentages and comparing them to others. Also that graph charting your wins and losses is a thing of pure gold. I really miss watching that chart going up over time...so cool....

See our answers above, but if you have a specific question we will be happy to answer if this post does not clear things up for you. Its unlikely that our policies on this matter will change because the management of Bovada has been indicted, we do not wish to add support for any companies that have been indicted by the DOJ, its not good business to do so. Instead our focus is on the regulated markets, for example we are proud to support the state of New Jersey in the USA. We still support some legacy networks such as WPN, Merge, and Cake but that is primarily because we supported them prior to black friday - we do not support any new US facing networks post black friday unless they are licensed, regulated, and legally allowed to perform within the market. PokerTracker's parent company prides itself on being an accountable company within the industry, we work closely with sites and regulators whenever possible to assure compliance.

 

[PokerTracker]

Yeah I agree that PT and HEM choosing not to support importing day-old, anonymous hands is silly, especially for the reason they posted above.

There is a 3rd party util that I use that allows you to import Bovada hhs. http://acepokersolutions.com/bovadahandconverter.html

This converter works by changing Bovada hands to PokerStars format. PokerTracker will import these improperly formatted hands because our importer cannot tell the difference between an authorised PokerStars hand and an unauthorised third party conversion, however these hands are not officially supported. They have been known to break many of our filters because they were not designed to address hands where hole cards for all players are known (if only the hands at showdown are recorded in the hand history these problems will not occur). If we wanted to support Bovada hands we could create an importer in less than a week, we already have the technology to do this - but there are many other factors involved such as the filters, legality, morality, and other topics such as indictments from the DOJ that keeps us from supporting Bovada. It is highly unlikely that our policy on this matter will change anytime soon, until then you are free to use the third party converter if you wish - but you should be aware that we will not support any problems caused by the converter - eventually these problems appear if you use certain reports or filters.

 

[WVHillbilly]

You supported Stars while they were under indictment by the DoJ. So that excuse is pure BS.

 

[WVHillbilly]

I don't care if you support the Poker Ace converter. I wouldn't expect you to. Just think it's ridiculous that I have to resort to using a 3rd party App when as you say you could support reading Bovada's native hhs in less than a week.

 

[JoeyStoll]

Have you guys ever heard of the quote "The amount of energy necessary to refute BS is an order of magnitude bigger than to produce it." ??

Your confusing two different components of our software. The tracker is the main application, the HUD is just a display of the information in the tracker; but the HUD is not as important as the information contained within the tracker. We could certainly support Bovada if we wished to within the tracker, which is what we explained the post you incorrectly claimed is BS.

How am I confusing anything? HUD or Tracker I don't care which one you pick, I certainly didn't specifically pick one or the other out when calling your BS out. I simply called you out for your claim that you didn't support Bovada, because they release FULL hand histories 24 hours later which somehow would be akin to having everyone at a live game turn their cards face up after a hand. I'll say it again, that logic makes ZERO sense. That was your answer to why you didn't support them. I'm just calling a spade a spade here.

Also, in case you were not aware, the technology actually does exist to create a HUD at Bovada, the Bovada poker client is not that secure - it would not be that hard to tap into the memory to mimic a hand history from memory. With that said, this is something we will not do; it is against our moral code.

I'm not sure why you are even bringing this statement up?? I don't think anyone doubted for second you guys could make a HUD for Bovada (considering you've created HUD's for 1000 other poker sites) but nice job calling out Bovada to the carpet for their unsecured client, to prove what point exactly and to whom? I only see this entire statement as a way for you to boast about how you could "tap into the memory" at Bovada....cool nice job...great....who cares?? It certainly doesn't change the fact that you had BS reasons stated above for NOT supporting the site.

Partially incorrect. We agree there is no advantage, but we also never claimed that you have an advantage using a HUD at a normal table... a losing player with a HUD will still be a losing player, there is no advantage to be gained. What the HUD provides is productivity... you could slow down the game and take meticulous notes on each anonymous opponent, or you can use the HUD's ability to track each hand do this for you. PokerTracker supports anonymous tables at PartyPoker, iPoker, and Microgaming MPN for example - and in each situation the use of a HUD helps the player by allowing him or her to be more productive, and possibly play at more tables at the same time without having to over-rely on taking meticulous notes.

So you say I'm partially incorrect, but then go on to immediately say that "we agree there is no advantage". And then begin talking about HUD's again...
What's up with you and HUDS? Nothing in my statement had anything to do with HUDs. My whole point/statement was that their is NO advantage with having hand histories posted 24 hours later with anonymous players, to with which you've now agreed. Thanks for agreeing! You just proved me correct!!

Bovada decided to re-write the rules of the game to help them combat fears of cheating through collusion by showing all of the hole cards. It does not matter if the game is anonymous or not, showing all the cards at the table does not conform with the rules of poker in any format; and therefore something we will not support for personal tracking. Our decision has nothing to do with edges gained, its a rules issue in our eyes, and we are confidant that we made the right choice morally. Additionally there is the issue of post-Black Friday legality, which we discuss below. As you can see, this is a rather complex topic!

You guys take large leaps of logic. So you morally support creating and selling software to people who I would describe as "in the know" to help them play better/smarter/more efficient whatever you name it against other people who have ZERO clue it's being used against them. But your a "moral" company, lol. I know 100+ people who've played online poker and every time when I tell each one of them about HUD's and tracking and all this jazz they are STUNNED. They feel cheated. I'm telling you it looks TERRIBLE because they were/are blindsided by it. It's not openly advertised or shared and they don't KNOW that it's being done, that's the kicker. I played for YEARS and had no idea people were saving massive hand histories and using HUD's -- it's not exactly advertised on the poker client when you open it up! It certainly wasn't advertised on the FullTilt commercials!

When someone at a poker table whips out a note book and starts taking notes about other players, well first off they would get laughed out of the room at my home game, but second if they do this everyone see's it. Everyone knows about it. It's on the level. It's fair. What people don't like is getting blindsided by a fancy program that VERY much appears to be giving someone else an edge. Your not going to convince the average Joe that it's NOT cheating when someone has every single hand you've ever played against them stored in a HUD right above their head and that same average Joe HAS NO CLUE THIS IS GOING ON. Again, common sense here people....it's not that hard to see...It's not rocket science...THAT is the major issue...

PS: There is a third party Bovada converter for PokerTracker, this converter changes hands to PokerStars format. PokerTracker will import these improperly formatted hands because our importer cannot tell the difference between an authorised PokerStars hand and an unauthorised third party conversion, however these hands are not officially supported. They have been known to break many of our filters because they were not designed to address hands where hole cards for all players are known.

Agreed.

Its unlikely that our policies on this matter will change because the management of Bovada has been indicted, we do not wish to add support for any companies that have been indicted by the DOJ, its not good business to do so. Instead our focus is on the regulated markets, for example we are proud to support the state of New Jersey in the USA. We still support some legacy networks such as WPN, Merge, and Cake but that is primarily because we supported them prior to black friday - we do not support any new US facing networks post black friday unless they are licensed, regulated, and legally allowed to perform within the market. PokerTracker's parent company prides itself on being an accountable company within the industry, we work closely with sites and regulators whenever possible to assure compliance.

This makes sense.