Holdem Pirate
This Product now banned by Poker Stars

What was once one of the original empirical poker calculators combining odds and profiling with a unique visual meter built in, Holdem Pirate and its clone Holdem Hawk had a successful run two years back.

Although the software was quirky and caused screen flashing (as does mose screen scraper software) it had potential becuase of a unique VPIP meter which definately advanced the market for online poker calculators.

Then something happened. As Holdem Pirate had some success they teamed up with some not-so-cool marketers and started mining data for black-hat software - namely Poker-Edge. So as soon as Poker Stars got wind of this, players started getting warnings about losing thier accounts (funds) if they kept using it.

In With The Worst of it: A very tiny and inadequate display of your hole cards, and the flop, seems poorly thought out. Now here is the thing with Holdem Pirate and Holdem Hawk. Some skippy programming that monopolizes your computer screen combined with Poker Stars warnings and you got a major headache.

The Best of it: The sad part is the VPIP meter is unique and extremely useful. You can sit at a table, wait for the BB to come around and have a good amount of statistics before you start, even if you were making a cup of coffee. The layout is user friendly, and the calculations are as fast as your table.

Mzone Report: Using VPIP in the Early Stages of a Poker Tournament

The VPIP indicator remains one of the most telling profiles of your opponents. You need an empirical poker calculator like holdem indicator that will keep tabs on this calculation.

If you have been calculating your mzone in online poker tournaments, you may have noticed that the early stages are not exactly a time for closely monitoring your mzone, but rather your opponent's VPIP. The reason for this is simple as everyone at the table is green MZoned.

So due to the limited range of mzones in early play, I find it is more pertinent to follow your opponent's VPIP closer than the other factors. Herein is where you will get a good indication of the kind of player you are up against. Later on in the tournament when the mzone is the most critical indicator, you can weigh in the players profile as well because you have been monitoring the VPIP. Keep in mind that VPIP is one of main factors in determining your opponent's overall profile but actually becomes less and less relevant as the tournament progresses.

If your opponent's VPIP is less than 25%, that should be considered relatively tight, while including some position play with chemistry hands. You can likely put this player down as a Sklansky type drone that waits for quality cards and hopes to double up early, or will wait until middle rounds to try and chip up. This type of player usually understands the game well, but has a low tolerance for risk, and relies on cards.

On the other end of the scale, if your opponent's VPIP is over 40%, you have a loose player on your table. A lot of players go into a holdem tournament with the strategy of building a stack early, or getting out early. These players usually fall into that mindset, while others are simply ring table calling stations and cannot adjust to tournament strategy. In this group as well you will have to account for players who simply don't know what they are doing. You need to have strong hands against players in this group. While you will usually have the right inclination of being ahead of one of these players, if you let your stack ride knowing you are ahead, you will often find yourself the victim of a bad beat, and it's off to the rail.

Now when your opponent is between these two indicators, less than 35% and more than 25% it is a little harder to categorize them because in the early going, a normally tight player could be in this group by virtue of distribution of better hands, and possibly more opportunities in position. You may have to look at other indicators to help you here, like their stack size for instance. I find though, that after a discernable amount of hands, most players are not in this category, so it just may take a little more time before you can pinpoint someone here.