TAG stats? (Moved from limit forum)

EditThis thread was posted in the limit forum but I think the conversation should be continued where it can be discussed further. I would like it to continue as a No Limit Discussion but be clear if talking about limit: Jyms


Hi. I multitable (16-24 tables) on pokerstars $0.04/$0.02 and seem to find myself up against the same players quite often. I was wondering what stats would represent a TAG at Limit poker and these stakes (cash games btw). Anyone got any ideas. The reason for the question is that my stats don't come near to what I'd expect of a TAG but I can't find any profitable hands that I'm not playing. I'm not quite sure what my stats are at the moment by the way as I keep varying my game to try and squeeze more out of it. I'm talking VPIP/PFR by the way. Any help would be appreciated. Many thanks in advance

I can tell you that it's not just about playing profitable hands. I don't play limit but if you only play hands that are good enough to make a profit from you will be very easy to play against. Opening up non profitable hands might just help you make a profit with them.

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Originally Posted by jyms

I can tell you that it's not just about playing profitable hands. I don't play limit but if you only play hands that are good enough to make a profit from you will be very easy to play against. Opening up non profitable hands might just help you make a profit with them.

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I don't understand this. You should absolutely only play hands that are profitable. This goes for any form of poker.

There are caveats where profitable means "more than you would lose by folding" e.g. BB play, but fundamentally folding all unprofitable hands and playing all profitable hands will increase your winrate.

Of course, if you are making bad decisions then you could be losing with "theoretically profitable" hands too... My guess is that OPs problem is somewhere around here. You are probably losing too much with your boarderline hands and not winning enough with your good hands.

My suggestion to OP is to post some hands in specific spots where you think you are having trouble and to maybe post some screenshots of your stats so the limit gurus can take a look.

I tend to agree with Pelion. As far as I can tell, playing only the hands that are profitable in any given situation is the definition (or at least the driving principle) of TAG style play. When you include in the 0 (or very nearly 0) EV hands, then you've got a LAG style.

Clearly, you'll be bluffing a fair amount with either style, so there are plenty of situations where you're raising with hands that are -EV in a vacuum (i.e., when not taken into the context of a range). Bluffing hands are generally better chosen when they have a certain amount of equity when called... as such, they would be profitable hands if the action was different, and the inclusion of them in your raising range is in order to maximize profitability of the raising range as a whole.

At any rate, what would be LAG stats at any given table might be TAG or spew at another table, or even the same table a few minutes later. Don't worry too much about your own stats at the micros. If everyone limps and no one folds, a TAG range could be as wide as 40% or more. As your opponents become more aware, you'll be forced to manicure your value ranges and bluffs more and more.

Really, I'm concerned that you'd ask this type of question, while playing 16+ tables. If you're not paying enough attention to the Villains to notice what the stats are of the tight regs vs. the loose regs vs. the fish and whales, then your attention is too divided to be playing that many tables at your best.
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I mean, you may be most profitable at that volume, but you're capping your ability to see deeper into the game than your current level by occupying 100% of your brain power on auto-piloting the tables. In essence, it's like you've found the most profitable short-term solution, but at the expense of the long-term profit of learning and moving up in stakes.
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Which is fine if you've proven to yourself that you can beat those stakes, and you are just grinding up a small initial deposit to the stakes where you know your attention isn't wasted by trying to pay any more attention to lolfish.
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Which is why it's a bother that you're asking about things like VPIP/PFR guidelines that have little bearing on your current stakes.

Thanks for your prompt responses. I am winning at this level multitabling but from most of the reading I've done the descriptions of the TAG LAG styles etc... seem to be aimed at No Limit. I was a winning player when I used to play no limit but the swings in variance were too great for comfort so I read up considerably on Limit and I'm just building up my bankroll. My main concern has been that the people who I'm either breaking even in the HEM 2 vs player reports ... or that are considerably beating me have what I would expect to be TAG stats (23/17 ETC...), but my VPIP and PFR are way too low compared to them (18/8... Or thereabouts). I don't bluff very much at these stakes as it doesn't seem to be profitable. So I'm looking for a way to bring myself in line with what would be considered a TAG style. The multitabling is just about profitablility as it's not worth my while to play at just a couple of tables at a time.

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Originally Posted by Pelion

I don't understand this. You should absolutely only play hands that are profitable. This goes for any form of poker.

There are caveats where profitable means "more than you would lose by folding" e.g. BB play, but fundamentally folding all unprofitable hands and playing all profitable hands will increase your winrate.

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If you add hands that are -EV to your range but they make other hands in your range more +EV then should you not add them to your range?

That was my point. It's not just hands of +EV it's the most EV range you can play.

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Originally Posted by ImSavy

If you add hands that are -EV to your range but they make other hands in your range more +EV then should you not add them to your range?

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Those hands do not exist. This comes from a misunderstanding of the concept of balance.

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Originally Posted by Pelion

Those hands do not exist. This comes from a misunderstanding of the concept of balance.

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I don't really see what it has to do with balance at all tbh with you. It's an exploitative measure.

If you can come up with an example of where you think it applies, I'd be interested to hear it (in another thread - to avoid derailing).

The usual example given is to do with comparing a player who only plays AA (and everyone folds) with a player who starts throwing in some 22/72o/whatever (an "unprofitable hand") as well as AA so that his AA gets more action and his 22 gets more folds thus increasing the EV of his range. The point is that he will only continue to add 22 while he has enough fold equity to make the additional hand +EV. The minute he is adding more combinations of 22 than are profitable in a vacuum, the profitability of his overall range also begins to suffer.

Adding unprofitable hands is unprofitable. Adding weak, but profitable hands is profitable. It's really that simple.

You know, this may be something I have misapplied in the past. I don't claim to be sure. I just always assumed what savy is talking about as gospel. I am pen to the discussion, and I am going to move this thread to the SH forum to continue this discussion. It isn't a derail.

Bump, because I am still curious about this answer

The idea behind it is due to people reacting badly to what you do. Let's say you're just open shoving AA then people are just going to call with AA and fold all the time depending on rake, it's pretty easy. If people know you are shoving AA and 23o then there is still a correct response to this, but it isn't obvious. So it's very likely people adjust badly and as a result we win more/lose less. If they adjust perfectly then it boils down to whether our new plan is more right or wrong than the last one.

If you take the same idea and apply it to more complicated situations it becomes a better idea. A good example is people playing a good LAG style. Although they may have hands in their ranges which are unprofitable people react to it so badly that you win. If people are adjusting perfectly all the time then no it doesn't work you'd both end up playing GTO , but if they aren't (which people do all the time) it can work very well. Hence why I said it's an exploitative measure not really anything to do with balance.

I suppose going back to the original point we only want to play profitable hands, but we may be able to play our ranges in a way where people play so badly it makes more hands +EV. Although it's about trying to find the most +EV way. So if there was a way where we could play 80% of our hand in a profitable way, but playing 20% of our hands was more profitable we'd do that anyway.

Sorry about the delay, dunno why I never got round to it.