Excession:

Thanks for all of your work on the new NL autorate rules. I used them since May 1st and have had by best month ever!! I played on 5 different sites and was plus on all of them.

cat923

When I first switched the auto rating rules, I wasnt sure I was going to like them, but as I've gotten used to them I really love them, the addition of weak tight is a really nice. The only thing I changed was, I changed mine so that there is one xtra loose passive, and onwextra loose agressive.

That sounds like a good idea. Which icons did you change and what rules did you use?

cat923

I would like to add that I have also been playing around with Excession's new autorate and have found a few problems. First off, I separated UA into 3 categories and moved the Extra loose category down in priority a bit. The reason for this is that I would like to know if someone falls into an aggressive category before I go after them for being a cash bag. Instead I put the XL category after all the aggressive categories right above the passives. This way it's easier to know who's likely to play back at you due to their aggressive nature. I would prefer to attack an extra loose passive than an extra loose aggressive. Then if they play back at you, you know they got you beat. Not as much guess work to do. Second, I think I found a problem with the WT category. In the new autorate that Excession put out it seems that players who would otherwise be categorized as TA's or UA's were falling into the weak tight group. I have found myself trying to attack these WT players because of their icons only to have them frequently coming over the top of me due to their aggressive nature. I moved WT down to be rated after the aggressive players. I autorated my database again and found that a lot of WT players were being changed to eagles and time bombs which had I known this when I played a few of them I wouldn't have tried to take the pot from them without a strong hand. I'm sure that it still needs some work, but I think I'm on the right track. I also moved a few icons around in a way that makes more sense to me, but thats just my preference. I'll post my autorate file up here so you can see and give any feedback if anyone has any. You may have to put the spacing back in to make it work for your pokertracker. Again, this is based off of Excession's new rules and I haven't altered the criteria for each group with the exception of seperating the UA's by VP$IP.

Autorate Rules Begin
Aggression:N
ARI_12 1 CS (-6.6BB)
15 5 0.01 1.00 Aggression Factor - Total is between 0.01 and 1.00
3 5 30.00 99.00 Went To Showdown % is between 30.00 and 99.00
1 1 22.00 Vol. Put Money In Pot % is greater than 22.00
ARI_4 2 SM (-18BB)
4 5 1.00 29.00 Won $ At Showdown % is between 1.00 and 29.00
3 1 15.00 Went To Showdown % is greater than 15.00
ARI_7 3 LUA (+6.3BB)
1 5 35.00 99.00 Vol. Put Money In Pot % is between 35.00 and 99.00
16 2 2.75 Aggression Factor - Flop is greater than or equal to 2.75
17 2 1.70 Aggression Factor - Turn is greater than or equal to 1.70
18 2 1.70 Aggression Factor - River is greater than or equal to 1.70
ARI_6 4 sLUA (+6.3BB)
1 5 22.00 35.00 Vol. Put Money In Pot % is between 22.00 and 35.00
16 2 2.75 Aggression Factor - Flop is greater than or equal to 2.75
17 2 1.70 Aggression Factor - Turn is greater than or equal to 1.70
18 2 1.70 Aggression Factor - River is greater than or equal to 1.70
ARI_10 5 TUA (+6.3BB)
1 3 22.00 Vol. Put Money In Pot % is less than 22.00
16 2 2.75 Aggression Factor - Flop is greater than or equal to 2.75
17 2 1.70 Aggression Factor - Turn is greater than or equal to 1.70
18 2 1.70 Aggression Factor - River is greater than or equal to 1.70
ARI_8 6 LA (+2.9BB)
1 5 35.00 99.00 Vol. Put Money In Pot % is between 35.00 and 99.00
16 2 1.80 Aggression Factor - Flop is greater than or equal to 1.80
18 1 0.10 Aggression Factor - River is greater than 0.10
17 1 0.10 Aggression Factor - Turn is greater than 0.10
ARI_14 7 sLA (+5.1BB)
1 5 22.00 35.00 Vol. Put Money In Pot % is between 22.00 and 35.00
16 2 1.80 Aggression Factor - Flop is greater than or equal to 1.80
18 1 0.10 Aggression Factor - River is greater than 0.10
17 1 0.10 Aggression Factor - Turn is greater than 0.10
ARI_15 8 TA (+3.6BB)
1 3 22.00 Vol. Put Money In Pot % is less than 22.00
16 2 1.80 Aggression Factor - Flop is greater than or equal to 1.80
18 1 0.10 Aggression Factor - River is greater than 0.10
17 1 0.10 Aggression Factor - Turn is greater than 0.10
ARI_3 9 XL (-15BB)
1 5 55.00 99.00 Vol. Put Money In Pot % is between 55.00 and 99.00
ARI_5 10 WT (+2.9BB)
3 5 1.00 13.00 Went To Showdown % is between 1.00 and 13.00
ARI_2 11 LP (-9.1BB)
1 5 35.00 55.00 Vol. Put Money In Pot % is between 35.00 and 55.00
15 5 0.01 1.30 Aggression Factor - Total is between 0.01 and 1.30
ARI_13 12 sLP (-3BB)
15 5 0.01 1.30 Aggression Factor - Total is between 0.01 and 1.30
1 5 22.00 35.00 Vol. Put Money In Pot % is between 22.00 and 35.00
ARI_9 13 TP (+0.2BB)
1 3 22.00 Vol. Put Money In Pot % is less than 22.00
15 5 0.01 1.30 Aggression Factor - Total is between 0.01 and 1.30
ARI_11 0 Neutral
1 5 1.00 99.00 Vol. Put Money In Pot % is between 1.00 and 99.00
Autorate Rules End

well of course if it works for you then that's your choice and good luck to you..but the main 'problem' it seems that you have to me is that you're not checking the aggression numbers in front of you before you make your play...

you can see who are the passive WT and who are the aggressive ones at a glance surely - don't you have Vp$ip,PFR,PFA,WtSD , W$SD and hands played up for all players? same for Xtra-Loose

another problem with on-the-fly fixes to perceived problems is that the player categories you end up with will not be balanced...

the reason that the 9 standard categories come after the 5 priority ones is so that the unusual players are highlighted first

it also means that you can tweak/change/delete the five without messing with the balanced player base underneath..

sure UA and CS will always be aggressive and passive respectively - you could split XL, WT and SM into passive/aggressive/neutral if you had 6 more category slots but you can also get the same information by just looking at their PFA ratings..

and if you split these categories up to end up with too few in each so you would have to loosen their criteria to make them worthwhile again - throwing off all the other nos.

UA consists of less than 4% of the playerbase after 20 hands rated, yet you have dropped other categories to split them into 3? how is that a worthwhile 'fix'? and it looks from your figures as if all three types have the same win rates too..

you also seem to be under the misapprehension that WT players should be passives who never raise back- in fact WT players are players that don't see many showdowns- they will either fold or raise rather than call - passives tend to call more - so more often WT will be aggressives - but as they only go to showdown one in 7 times or less they are still worth bluffing at - if they re-raise you may have to let go especially if they have a high W$SD - but they aren't extreme aggressives like UA's so overall it's still worth doing - and those few that are very aggressive and somehow escape being rated UA you can just avoid bluffing if you like as you will see their big PFA's on screen ..

you are wrong that any WT players will be re-rated UA btw as UA's are rated first (no 4) and WT (no. 5)

if you want to run your amended rules on a decent sized DB and post the same table that I have on the new autorates page we might see how balanced they amended rules are , but I can't say I'm very hopeful..

I see your point about the categories you set up and now that you explained the WT category a little more I think I'll change it back. I think I will also put the Extra-Loose category back at the top, but as for splitting up the Ultra Aggressive category, here is my reasoning. I felt that the UA's had to be split up because there is a fine line between a winning UA and a losing one. UA's VP$IP less than 22% and between 22 and 35% seem somewhat related to TA's and sLA's with the exception of their PFA numbers. Since TA's and sLA's are both winning players, I would assume that the Ultra aggressive version of these players would consist of the bulk of the winning players in your Ultra Aggressor category in your larger database, especially since aggression pays off dividends in No Limit holdem. The Ultra Aggressors that I wanted to single out most were the True Maniacs(correct me if I'm wrong), UA's with over 35% VP$IP. Against a maniac I wouldn’t need the nuts to feel confident in taking his stack whereas against any of the 4 winning aggressive categories I feel I would need pretty close to it to warrant risking my whole stack. I'm sure that according to your numbers UA's as a whole are profitable players, but have you separately analyzed the UA's with over 35% VP$IP and compared them to the remaining UA’s?
Another concern I have is that when I’m up against a WT player, who may have otherwise fallen into the TA category had he not been screened for WT first, and when seconds could be misconstrued as weakness thus provoking more aggression, I would prefer to not have to take the extra few seconds to analyze the details of their stats when it comes time to make a tough decision. In my opinion, having three categories of Neutral players is a waste of icons and I am less concerned about them when I'm in a hand so I am not under any pressure to glance at their VP$IP numbers to see how loose, tight or neutral they are. Re-using 2 of these neutral icons for the more well defined threats seems a bit more useful since the only defining criteria for these players are their VP$IP numbers, which are very easy to view when needed since they don't often pose much of a threat. In order to recognize the TA-like-weak tight players I'd have to examine their VP$IP as well as all three of their post flop aggression numbers which is a bit more complicated.

I modified this one again. I decided that I'll divide the Xtra loose into passive and aggressive and divide the UA's into Loose and Tight. The original order should be intact. Any thoughts, suggestions, disagreements?

Autorate Rules Begin
Aggression:N
ARI_6 1 XL-A (-15BB)
1 5 55.00 99.00 Vol. Put Money In Pot % is between 55.00 and 99.00
15 1 1.55 Aggression Factor - Total is greater than 1.55
ARI_3 2 XL-P (-15BB)
1 5 55.00 99.00 Vol. Put Money In Pot % is between 55.00 and 99.00
15 4 1.55 Aggression Factor - Total is less than or equal to 1.55
ARI_12 3 CS (-6.6BB)
15 5 0.01 1.00 Aggression Factor - Total is between 0.01 and 1.00
3 5 30.00 99.00 Went To Showdown % is between 30.00 and 99.00
1 1 22.00 Vol. Put Money In Pot % is greater than 22.00
ARI_4 4 SM (-18BB)
4 5 1.00 29.00 Won $ At Showdown % is between 1.00 and 29.00
3 1 15.00 Went To Showdown % is greater than 15.00
ARI_7 5 MANIAC
1 5 35.00 99.00 Vol. Put Money In Pot % is between 35.00 and 99.00
16 2 2.75 Aggression Factor - Flop is greater than or equal to 2.75
17 2 1.70 Aggression Factor - Turn is greater than or equal to 1.70
18 2 1.70 Aggression Factor - River is greater than or equal to 1.70
ARI_10 6 UA (+6.3BB)
1 3 35.00 Vol. Put Money In Pot % is less than 35.00
16 2 2.75 Aggression Factor - Flop is greater than or equal to 2.75
17 2 1.70 Aggression Factor - Turn is greater than or equal to 1.70
18 2 1.70 Aggression Factor - River is greater than or equal to 1.70
ARI_5 7 WT (+2.9BB)
3 5 1.00 13.00 Went To Showdown % is between 1.00 and 13.00
ARI_14 8 sLA (+5.1BB)
1 5 22.00 35.00 Vol. Put Money In Pot % is between 22.00 and 35.00
16 2 1.80 Aggression Factor - Flop is greater than or equal to 1.80
18 1 0.10 Aggression Factor - River is greater than 0.10
17 1 0.10 Aggression Factor - Turn is greater than 0.10
ARI_8 9 LA (+2.9BB)
1 5 35.00 99.00 Vol. Put Money In Pot % is between 35.00 and 99.00
16 2 1.80 Aggression Factor - Flop is greater than or equal to 1.80
18 1 0.10 Aggression Factor - River is greater than 0.10
17 1 0.10 Aggression Factor - Turn is greater than 0.10
ARI_15 10 TA (+3.6BB)
1 3 22.00 Vol. Put Money In Pot % is less than 22.00
16 2 1.80 Aggression Factor - Flop is greater than or equal to 1.80
18 1 0.10 Aggression Factor - River is greater than 0.10
17 1 0.10 Aggression Factor - Turn is greater than 0.10
ARI_2 11 LP (-9.1BB)
1 5 35.00 99.00 Vol. Put Money In Pot % is between 35.00 and 99.00
15 5 0.01 1.30 Aggression Factor - Total is between 0.01 and 1.30
ARI_9 12 TP (+0.2BB)
1 3 22.00 Vol. Put Money In Pot % is less than 22.00
15 5 0.01 1.30 Aggression Factor - Total is between 0.01 and 1.30
ARI_13 13 sLP (-3BB)
15 5 0.01 1.30 Aggression Factor - Total is between 0.01 and 1.30
1 5 22.00 35.00 Vol. Put Money In Pot % is between 22.00 and 35.00
ARI_11 0 Neutral
1 5 1.00 99.00 Vol. Put Money In Pot % is between 1.00 and 99.00
Autorate Rules End