How useful are most stats in micro stakes?

I was reading an artical about convergence of data yesterday and started to wonder if most stats were actually of any real value in microstakes.

The reason being that I seldom have more than a couple of hundred hands on an opponent.. and usually I have none.

Things like V$IP and PFR have a very low convergence son within a hundred hands the results are fairly accurate, but most other stats have such a high convergence point that they are meaningless without 1-2K hands (which I won't have)

The easiest one here to talk about is PF 3-bet. The games I play have little PF 3-betting, so when it happens its difficult to float it because I simply dont have the stats to put someone on a 3-bet range.

Anyone think the same.. or think different.. if so how and why.

Personally I think they're more valuable. Most people aren't mixing things up that much and you can get a lot about their play just from vpip/pfr. Honestly most stats aren't all that useful with good solid regs anyway, they're usually the most useful in identifying fish. Is the fish a total station? A spewtard? It helps to be able to know how to play against them without having to actually notice and note something they do that's fishy. When you see a 77/65/9 you know that you can call them down pretty light and when you see the 90/5/0.5 you know that you can vbet them super-thin and probably get out of their way if they raise.

One thing the artical pointed out was that AF was a stat which took a lot of hands before it became meaningful.

The example given was an opponent who hit trips on the flop and value bet every street. His AF would be extremely high and would take a fair few hands to settle down again. It could be very misleading to assume the AF tendances of an opponent based on AF with a low sample of hands.

I think that the stats become meaningful if you are multitabling or just want to know the V$IP. But the micro's are not even really about skill, just about who is not a total donk and knows somewhat how to play.i play the micros and i would certainly not buy PT or any HUD for the micro stakes or anything under 25nl.

Stu_Ungar said:

One thing the artical pointed out was that AF was a stat which took a lot of hands before it became meaningful.

The example given was an opponent who hit trips on the flop and value bet every street. His AF would be extremely high and would take a fair few hands to settle down again. It could be very misleading to assume the AF tendances of an opponent based on AF with a low sample of hands.

Click to expand...

This is true but doesn't triple value betting tell us something? Many people in this spot would slowplay and c/c a lot.

But you're right, it takes a little longer to converge but it's the information we have. If we see 9 in reality that usually means it's most likely between 6 and 12 (actually no because AF is a ratio, not linear, but basically the point is there's a range). So if we see a high AF, it means it's likely he's aggressive. If we see a low AF, it's likely he's passive. Sure we'll be wrong sometimes but it's just like any other spot in poker. When we don't have odds we fold even if it's possible we would hit. The more hands we have, the more accurate the stat is and the more weight we can give it, and basically what you said is right, the vpip/pfr is going to converge the fastest and are thus the most useful stats to use on unknowns.

States are states, i mean they are taken from live games and test and
trials, now the only reason why i could think that micro stakes would
possibly change that, even if it were a little bit, would be that the
people there are just a lot looser than in the higher stakes, but i would
guess that most people play the relative same with according to what
hand they get, just with small diferences, which are the ones that most
matter. I would stick with the states since they are usually very reliable
on most tables, small or big stakes.

i think stats are more useful at the lower stakes than the higher ones.
There are much more poeple playing lower stakes and its a harder to recognize people. and another thing is that people playing the lower stakes generally are not very creative and have the same patterns tendencies most of the time. If you are worried about the number of hands, i think data mining is a must for lower stakes.