I try to use the same in forums as my notes system says:
- (standard) reg, like 22/18 w normal postflop stats
- aggro reg, 28+ vpip and high pfr combined w high 3b/postflop freq
- nit reg, 18 vpip and under, high fold to steals, fit/fold postflop and so on
- recreational, which usually is gonna be passive fish w 30+ vpip and low pfr/3b/postflop stats, or if I know he plays like max 2 tables but has reggish stats but will do weird stuff from time to time
- whale / aggro / spewy fish, like the 60/30 guys or the 85/5 callingstation type

So yeah to answer your question, if someone says recreational I think about fishy players who don't take the game too seriously.

I'm interested in hearing about this as well. I was actually going to do a post asking what names and labels people use. I want to get into taking more notes and tagging people but unsure of the best way of going about it. I thought I would start with just tagging/labeling people then move to taking notes.

What labels do people use? I saw a vid on here and saw the groups of players labeled as Nit, TAG, LAG, A-Fish and P-Fish. Obviously TAG and LAG would be more of your regulars, but can they be broken down into bad and good or does that start to get too complicated and what kind of 6 Max stats would they have. I guess a Nit could be either a reg or recreational but not sure it would make a difference on how you would play them. The aggro fish and passive fish would be more of your recreational and fishy players. Also what kinds of stats would they have? I see Panda has laid out some stats I could use and I also know I would need to be paying attention at the tables on how they play, stack sizes, limping etc, not just stats.

I thought of re-doing my tagging system but I have been using this list for quite a while

1) Regular (which is why I wanted to redo it because it isn't specific enough)

2) Nit (fairly obvious)

3) Loose passive (Also, this is not really specific and sometimes overlaps with recreational)

4) Recreational (Every player with a

- computer messed up, double post

In this day and age I'm surprised that people still try and classify players using over simplistic language. With most people using HUDs I've become more used to people listing relevent stats or describing a full hand previously played which gave a solid read.

One of the problems which hasn't gone away over the years is the disconnect between how many players will play pre and post flop. A 34/5 can be classed as loose passive preflop, but often you will see these guys turn into aggro monkeys post flop as if they've changed personalities.

As a full ring player I've come across more than my fair share of nits. But there's a huge difference in how they play. These 9/6 types can range from guys who will stack off only AA pre , or guys who get in JJ+ AK. The label nit doesn't really cover this useful information.

I understand that we're now playing in a time where HUDs are not available on quite a few sites, but I think rather than examining our colour coding system, in this case we should seek to improve our note taking ability. These notes are pure gold when discussing hands here compared to a spurious loose passive label.

During my latest coaching videos i play HUDless and most sites i am playing on does not support them. I discuss finding the player types and how we should mark them.

What mine comes down to at the end of the day is more the notes i have on them. I think playing in small pools like i do i recognise names anyways and can think "easy money", "sick reg" etc but my notes will be way more specific and colour coded.

I think it all should develop through reads basically as stats can be somewhat dodgy due to sample size. So i start everything off as an educated games "i think this guy is a fish as he has played a lot of pots, his sizing is weird, he always calls pre flop and post flop he is super passive", this then will start to lead into facts and those notes will then become more structured.

I second this. Seeing hands showdown are by far the most valuable piece of information. You can take this a step further and think about the hands that your opponent likely folded and note it something like: probably is capable of folding a good top pair to turn c/r on a dry board. Then if you can add to this potential read as you gather more information.