What's in Your HUD with Jamie Wilby (buffyslayer1)

Jamie “buffyslayer1” Wilby took time out of his busy day to share his thoughts on poker software. He is a British poker professional and coach ranked as high as 607th worldwide earlier this year on PocketFives. Wilby primarily focuses on medium- and high-stakes multi-table tournaments.

PokerSoftware: What poker software are you currently using?

Jamie Wilby: I use Holdem Manager 1, PokerStove, Flopzilla, and Table Ninja on a regular basis and sometimes also use Universal Replayer for post-session review.

PokerSoftware: What functions do you like about each program you are using and for what purposes do you use them?

Jamie Wilby: For Table Ninja, I mainly use the pre-flop raise sizing. The software allows me to multi-table more effectively by making my default raise sizes at certain blind levels.

For Holdem Manager, the HUD is very useful during the game, but it is also a great tool to review your own play. I specifically review lines I took against certain villains. Utilizing Holdem Manager’s replayer is my preferred way to review since I have access to HUD stats I would also have in-game.

I feel PokerStove is probably the best free tool out there and pretty essential when reviewing any hand and looking at your equity versus a villain's range.

I have only started using Flopzilla recently, but it is a fantastic tool that allows you to gauge how often board textures hit certain ranges and which turn and river cards are good and bad for both your range (perceived or actual) and the villain's range. By giving you a percentage of the time a villain hits a hand, it makes it easier to analyze whether a standard continuation bet is profitable. Or if it isn’t, are there enough cards on turn and river that you could effectively double-barrel profitably?

Universal Replayer is a quick way to review a hand history. I use it mainly as a backup when Holdem Manager is not functioning properly.

PokerSoftware: What stats do you have in your HUD?

Jamie Wilby: This is how my HUD is formatted:

Line 1 - # of Hands/Poker Site Screen Name
Line 2 – Voluntarily Put $ in Pot % (VPIP) / Pre-Flop Raise % (PFR) / 3 Bet %
Line 3 - Fold to 3 Bet % / Steal %/BB Fold vs. Steal %
Line 4 - Flop Continuation Bet % / Fold Flop to a Continuation Bet % / # of Big Blinds
I also use the pop-ups a lot as well.

PokerSoftware: When do you consult your HUD’s pop-ups?

Jamie Wilby: I consult my HUD’s pop-ups probably every time I face a raise from a player. I will look at his Raise First In % stat for that position. This stat gives me a great idea of how active a player is. For example, a player may only have a 13% Pre-Flop Raise, but when he gets a chance to open the pot first, his raise is more like 25%.

When play is deeper stacked, I will check to see how often an opponent continuation bets and then fires again on the turn, as this will have an impact on the line I decide to take.

I also use pop-ups for the 3bet stat a lot, where I have a customized 3bet pop-up that gives me how often the villain will 3bet an open from, say, late position or if being 3bet, how often he calls, folds, or shoves.

Lastly, I often use my pop-ups in a more general way to get an idea of how aggressive a villain is post-flop, looking at Aggression Factor and other stats as a whole to give an overall picture of how a villain plays.

PokerSoftware: Are there any HUD stats you feel the poker community overrates or underrates?

Jamie Wilby: I think that Pre-Flop Raise % by itself is overrated, as you can have a player who appears extremely tight over a fairly significant sample size; however, looking at his Raise First In % stat, we see he is actually pretty aggressive and just happened to be at a table with lots of active players in front of him.

I think people underrate or don’t look closely enough at the Fold to Continuation Bet % stat. It’s amazing how many times I see people make a continuation bet versus an opponent who only folds 20% to 30% of the time over a large sample. By continuation betting, I feel they are burning equity.

PokerSoftware: Is there any poker software you plan to try in the near future? Also, is there any poker software not currently available you would like to see?

Jamie Wilby: I am thinking of perhaps giving Holdem Manager 2 or PokerTracker 4 a try. I currently use Version 1 of HEM, which suits my needs, but I am always looking at ways to get an edge on my opponents. The one piece of poker software I think there is a huge market for is a upgraded version of Universal Replayer, which works across all sites and allows multiple hands to be loaded from different sites and replayed in one go. That with the ability to customize and order hands would be great. This software needs to be able to classify hands from all sites into categories and order them for review later.

Wilby is available for Poker Coaching and you can find out more information by contacting him at buffyslayer1@live.co.uk or through his blog at http://buffyslayer1.blogspot.co.uk/.