PokerTracker Software, LLC is the name of a poker tool software company that produces the PokerTracker line of poker tracking and analysis software. PokerTracker's software imports and parses the hand histories that poker sites create during online play and stores the resulting statistics/information about historical play into a local database library for self-analysis, and for in-game.
The following article was found on the 2+2 forums. The original post by mason55 is titled 10k posts: Aggression Factor, VPIP and You! How to Relate the 3 and can be found here. It explains how to use the PokerTracker statistic called aggression factor. PokerTracker is a piece of software that imports your hand histories and shows you statistics about yourself and your opponents. You can use this to improve your own leaks, as well as finding leaks in your opponents' play. Using the aggression factor statistic can be a bit misleading at times, so this article was written to help users evaluate the stat appropriately.
Create a PokerTracker.com Account. Participate in forum discussions; Comment on blog posts and videos; Receive personalized support; And many other great benefits. If one has the patience to overcome the lengthy installation and debugging process, the reward is a functional program that can save users a nice chunk of change over rival programs like Holdem Manager and PokerTracker. PokerTracker is a piece of software that imports your hand histories and shows you statistics about yourself and your opponents. You can use this to improve.
It seems like people are constantly misunderstanding aggression factor around here. Hopefully this can clear some stuff up.
What is Aggression Factor (AF)
If you look at what aggression factor is in PokerTracker you'll see that it's:
(Raise % + Bet %)
——————
(Call %)
It's the ratio of the amount of time that a player is aggressive vs. the amount of time that he's passive. It's a pretty simple concept but it's easy to misunderstand and misapply.
Screenshot of PokerTracker 3 Stats. Aggression Factor is the 8th tab labeled AF on the bottom.
How to Use Aggression Factor
Aggression factor is a unit-less ratio. It's not that useful without some other information. Just like most other things in poker, it's almost always situation and player dependent, the only exception being a player with an AF of zero.
For example, if someone's aggression factor is 0 over 100 hands we can assume he's pretty passive. He's never bet or raised, only called and folded. If he WERE to suddenly raise us we'd be scared.
Now let's see how AF affects our everyday decisions.
Take 2 players. A 50VPIP and an 18VPIP. Think about the approximate hand ranges that they're seeing a flop with.
50VPIP (Fish):
{22+,A2s+,K2s+,Q2s+,J4s+,T6s+,96s+,86s+,76s,65s,A2o+,K5o+,Q7o+,J7o+,T8o+,98o}
18VPIP (TAG):
{22+,A5s+,K9s+,Q9s+,J9s+,ATo+,KJo+,QJo}
Now think for a second about how each of those hand ranges hits the flop. The TAG is going to be making a lot of top pair, good kicker hands, as well as sets and combo draws. The fish is going to be making a lot of top pair bad kicker and midpair type hands.
Say these players have a flop distribution (just guessing here)
TAG
20% top pair
8% mid pair
2% bottom pair
8% flush draw
1% set
1% combo draw
60% air
Fish
10% top pair
10% middle pair
10% bottom pair
8% flush draw
1% set
1% combo draw
60% air
Let's look at what happens when you bet into them Dmg canvas serial.
TAG
Raise: Combo draw (1%), set(1%), flush draw (8%), top pair (20%) = 30%
Call: Bottom pair (2%), mid pair (8%) = 10%
Fold: Air
Fish
Raise: Combo draw (1%), set(1%), flush draw (8%), top pair (10%), mid pair (10%) = 30%
Call: Bottom pair (10%) = 10%
Fold: Air
These 2 players have the exact same AF (3) but you can see that the fish is way more 'aggressive.' His range when he raises you on the flop is weaker than the TAGs because his starting hand range is weaker.
Limitations of Aggression Factor
If you look at the AF formula, you'll realize that it doesn't include fold %. This is a pretty big limitation of AF and one that people seem to forget about. Let's change the above example a little.
TAG
Raise: Combo draw (1%), set(1%), flush draw (8%), top pair (14%) = 24%
Call: Some mid pair (2%), some top pair (6%) = 8%
Fold: Bottom pair (2%), some mid pair (6%), Air (60%)
Fish
Raise: Combo draw (1%), set(1%), flush draw (8%), top pair (10%), mid pair (10%) = 30%
Call: Bottom pair (10%) = 10%
Fold: Air
The fish's actions haven't changed, but we've had the TAG fold some of his weaker made hands and slow down a little with his top pair hands. This is probably closer to a real distribution. Notice that AF is STILL 3! Even though we've strengthened his distribution for raising he still has the same aggression factor. This is where other stats on your HUD are going to be useful. Things like 'Call continuation bet %' and 'Fold to continuation bet %' will tell you whether a player with a high AF is playing raise/fold with his good hands or he's a player who bluffs with air a lot.
Summary – Don't look at a player with an AF of 0.8 and a VPIP of 80 and say 'durrr better fold to his flop raise, this guy is passive!'
It's the ratio of the amount of time that a player is aggressive vs. the amount of time that he's passive. It's a pretty simple concept but it's easy to misunderstand and misapply.
Screenshot of PokerTracker 3 Stats. Aggression Factor is the 8th tab labeled AF on the bottom.
How to Use Aggression Factor
Aggression factor is a unit-less ratio. It's not that useful without some other information. Just like most other things in poker, it's almost always situation and player dependent, the only exception being a player with an AF of zero.
For example, if someone's aggression factor is 0 over 100 hands we can assume he's pretty passive. He's never bet or raised, only called and folded. If he WERE to suddenly raise us we'd be scared.
Now let's see how AF affects our everyday decisions.
Take 2 players. A 50VPIP and an 18VPIP. Think about the approximate hand ranges that they're seeing a flop with.
50VPIP (Fish):
{22+,A2s+,K2s+,Q2s+,J4s+,T6s+,96s+,86s+,76s,65s,A2o+,K5o+,Q7o+,J7o+,T8o+,98o}
18VPIP (TAG):
{22+,A5s+,K9s+,Q9s+,J9s+,ATo+,KJo+,QJo}
Now think for a second about how each of those hand ranges hits the flop. The TAG is going to be making a lot of top pair, good kicker hands, as well as sets and combo draws. The fish is going to be making a lot of top pair bad kicker and midpair type hands.
Say these players have a flop distribution (just guessing here)
TAG
20% top pair
8% mid pair
2% bottom pair
8% flush draw
1% set
1% combo draw
60% air
Fish
10% top pair
10% middle pair
10% bottom pair
8% flush draw
1% set
1% combo draw
60% air
Let's look at what happens when you bet into them Dmg canvas serial.
TAG
Raise: Combo draw (1%), set(1%), flush draw (8%), top pair (20%) = 30%
Call: Bottom pair (2%), mid pair (8%) = 10%
Fold: Air
Fish
Raise: Combo draw (1%), set(1%), flush draw (8%), top pair (10%), mid pair (10%) = 30%
Call: Bottom pair (10%) = 10%
Fold: Air
These 2 players have the exact same AF (3) but you can see that the fish is way more 'aggressive.' His range when he raises you on the flop is weaker than the TAGs because his starting hand range is weaker.
Limitations of Aggression Factor
If you look at the AF formula, you'll realize that it doesn't include fold %. This is a pretty big limitation of AF and one that people seem to forget about. Let's change the above example a little.
TAG
Raise: Combo draw (1%), set(1%), flush draw (8%), top pair (14%) = 24%
Call: Some mid pair (2%), some top pair (6%) = 8%
Fold: Bottom pair (2%), some mid pair (6%), Air (60%)
Fish
Raise: Combo draw (1%), set(1%), flush draw (8%), top pair (10%), mid pair (10%) = 30%
Call: Bottom pair (10%) = 10%
Fold: Air
The fish's actions haven't changed, but we've had the TAG fold some of his weaker made hands and slow down a little with his top pair hands. This is probably closer to a real distribution. Notice that AF is STILL 3! Even though we've strengthened his distribution for raising he still has the same aggression factor. This is where other stats on your HUD are going to be useful. Things like 'Call continuation bet %' and 'Fold to continuation bet %' will tell you whether a player with a high AF is playing raise/fold with his good hands or he's a player who bluffs with air a lot.
Summary – Don't look at a player with an AF of 0.8 and a VPIP of 80 and say 'durrr better fold to his flop raise, this guy is passive!'
Free 60 Day Trial to PokerTracker
If you are a statistics nut like myself and enjoy having all of this information on your opponents; I would highly recommend the PokerTracker software. It takes all of the hand histories that you have played and imports them into one large database. You can then browse a vast collection of stats about yourself and the opponents you have played against. This is where the Aggression Factor statistic in this article comes from. Evaluating your opponent's stats to find weaknesses in their game is an obvious benefit, but you can also find your own leaks and quickly improve your game by analyzing your PokerTracker stats.
Unfortunately this software costs money to purchase because of the constant updating the developers must do. The full version costs $90, but there is a discounted rate for micro stakes players to pay $45 up front and $45 at the higher limits. I purchased the full version of PokerTracker because I was already playing 50NL and it was well worth it. I was quickly able to win back the two buy ins I spent and quickened my ability to move up in limits. You can support PokerTrikz and receive a free 60-day trial to PokerTracker by using our links when you visit their website.
Edits for clarity or readability have been made.
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Let us start with a simple explanation about what PokerTracker is.
PokerTracker was launched in the year 2007 by PokerTracker software LLC as an aide to help analyze poker games which were played online.
The software was created to not only analyze games but also to provide hand history, win/loss, and value calculations while playing an online game of poker.
A feature of this software is that it provides users with a live display on the table that they are playing, which means data is shown on the fly.
Thanks to so many statistics and tools PokerTracker quickly has become one of the most used and best tools to help play online poker.
It has a customizable heads-up display which is a boon for most players. This was a critical factor in helping players make better decisions and refine their game, this helped players using PokerTracker get a significant edge over the players not using the software.
Also read: How I (Ab)used Poker Calculators To Dominate The Tables
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How does PokerTracker work?
A clever program, but how does it work?
It needs to be installed like any other software that you do on your laptop or computer, you would need a license to make the best use of all its features.
You can upgrade to a better version or license if you need to, so do not worry if you want to try out the lesser features first before deciding to buy the full version with all the features.
After installing the software you would need to create a database.
The database contains all your hands, results; cards etc. will be stored so that you can have all the information available to you at any time.
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The final step would be to decide which currency you would be using and the software would be using when you are playing your poker games. You would also need to choose the sites and networks where you play your games.
PokerTracker will then create a database of hand and histories which are part of the original database if the software cannot do something like this for a website, and then you can manually create hands and save them.
The next step is to provide names for all the websites and networks where you play the game; this is done so that you get information about hand histories and games being played.
Cisco webex meeting (ios). PokerTracker provides a lot of other information which is related to your playing style as well.
Setting up the HUD to show only information that you want is the final step before you can enjoy playing your game with this magnificent software. PokerTracker does provide a basic setting, which in itself is quite amazing but with the ability to tinker the HUD, you may be able to get a better experience than the default HUD display.
Pokertracker Hud
Files shredder. Once all this is done, you just need to start playing poker on any site or network and presto! The software runs and the HUD will start displaying all hands and stats from your current game.
PokerTracker for your help
With almost everyone using some sort of online help while playing the game, PokerTracker is one such tool which should not be missed. Apart from making life easier when playing poker, it augments your skill and can make your poker earnings and life much better.
The software can help you conceal some of your shortcomings and make you a better player all around, some of the features in PokerTracker which can help you out include:
- Graphs: The software comes with a set of graphs which can provide you information about how much your winnings have been, expected value, your rake backs and of course your win rate.
- Reports: One major aspect of PokerTracker is it shows tournament statistics, depending on how long the tournament goes.
- The HUD: This HUD is customizable, which is something you do not get in most software. It provides a lot of stats on the fly and keeps you updated throughout the game.
- Session reports: Another great feature of PokerTracker is the ability to go deeper into your games with a slew of interactive reports on your poker playing sessions which can help you find out various things about how you have done over the games.
Playing a few games with this software can help you learn a lot about your game and how good the other players are. The software also has a nice note feature which keeps a tab on the opponent players and writes down valuable information about their playing style which you can check up later.
You can also buy another add-on to your software which is called TableTracker. This helps you find the best tables on various poker sites; the tables are filtered out to match what you like based on your playing style. In short, the software finds the best tables which can help you win more.
Try before you buy
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PokerTracker does have a 30 day trial period where you can see how well the software works for you.
Of course, once the 30 days are up you would have to either stop using the software or purchase the complete software to continue your poker games.
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PokerTracker should not be considered as something which only the professionals use, this is something which should be taken up by poker players who want to learn a lot more about not only their playing style but also are looking to win more games.
