First off. Only people who have taken up both chess and poker seriously should even be taking part in this poll. Anybody else is just being a retard. Why would they think their opinion could be meaningful otherwise?

Secondly, I'm not sure everyone taking part in this poll is interpreting the question being asked in the same way. Is poker more complicated? Probably. But that is not the poll question. Does poker require more analytical skill at the table? Certainly not! It is not even close.

I'm a chess master. I've played 2 chess games blindfolded—without sight of board and pieces. I did not find this too difficult and felt I could handle playing 3 blindfold games.

Now you think about that for a minute. Consider that most people have trouble recalling a new telephone number. That's just 7 digits. And yet I'm able to play 2 chess games blindfolded keeping track of the locations of 32 pieces on 64 squares in each of those 2 games. How am I able to do this? I have no idea. I have about as much trouble as the next guy in remembering a new telephone number.

My working memory, when it comes to chess is ginormous. In other things, it is fairly normal. And that disparity is pretty incredible even to me.

Actually. The size of my working memory when it comes to chess is far greater than I've let on. Because if you had asked me right after I played those 2 blindfold games, to reproduce both games from start to finish, I would have been able to do so. Now the average length of a game is 50 moves from each of the 2 players. That's 100 ply or equivalently 100 positions total. When you factor in the number of pieces and number of squares involved,... I'll let you do the math. How does that compare to recalling a new telephone number? Obviously, there is a huge difference.

Does poker have anything closely resembling this? No way!

In poker, good players do make extensive use of their memory. They recall a lot of information, but this is mostly long term memory stuff they use for pattern recognition. Chess players do plenty of this too. But what I'm talking about is working memory. You need a lot of working memory to do a lot of analytical thinking.

When I think about chess, I need to move the pieces around on the board in my minds eye to explore a tree of variations in order to decide on what move to play. In a particularly difficult position I might explore a tree of variations 20 moves (40 ply) deep with a dozen branches. That isn't extraordinary for a chess master. There simply isn't anything remotely like this in poker.

So how can poker be perhaps a more complicated game and yet require less analytical skill? The element of chance in poker blows up the number of possibilities to consider too much for the type of thinking used in chess to be useful. Unlike chess, this complexity can be tamed to a certain degree with mathematics, but few players including many top players do all that much of this while actually playing a hand. They rely heavily on their experience instead, which they mostly tap through their intuition. This is not analytical thinking. It's the opposite.

So to sum it up, anybody voting for poker: clueless. Most people here voting for chess: lucky guess.

The answer to the actual poll question is clearly chess, and the fact that computers are so good at it is evidence supporting this point.

The question posed by the thread's title is perhaps more interesting, and depends on what you mean by "complex." I suppose you could make a case for poker due to the inherent complexity of human psychology.

There is one aspect of the two games where I think there is a big difference that’s not often mentioned. Both games involve thinking ahead and thinking back. But chess is much more thinking ahead IMO.

‘If I move my queen to xy then he will probably move his rook to yz; then I can move my etc. etc.’

In poker, more thinking is about what happened IMO.

‘He limped in pre-flop, called my raise then went all-in when an Ace hit the flop. Why would he do that if he did not have an ace? Etc. etc.’

Which implies a more "complex" game is still up for grabs

After some thought chess. Chess is very self contained, needed deep analysis of a single situation. Poker needs a much broader ranger of skills, but none in anywhere near the level of detail or accurateness needed in chess.

In poker your calculations can be a little off without too much damage. Odds and pot calculations do not need to be exact approximate is fine. If you forgot a hand your opponent showed down yesterday it likely does not matter much. Your range estimates do not have to be exact as long as they are roughly in the right ball park. You do not need to memorise various push and call tables for close to all in situations, just have a rough feel. There is so much to think about, but none in endless detail.

Chess you just need to analyse a single position to death. As deeply as accurately as possible. Basically as long as you have not finished you can not analyse a chess potion too deeply. While with poker diminishing returns quickly sets in.

You summed it up very well.

Tbh, I think chess is a more complex game.

If we were to compare the 2 games, then it's clearly chess vs HU poker. You can't compare for example 6max or mtts vs chess.

So, HU poker vs chess

- in poker, your opponent has 3 strategies to start: fold, limp, raise(when he's on the BTN); fold, call, 3bet when he's OOP
- in chess you have way more than 3 opening strategies

The flop(poker), after the first moves(chess)
- in poker again, you have 3 strategies: call, fold, raise.
-in chess, let's assume your opponent's opening strategy is N. Depending on the variety of opponent's opening strategies you have at least N defending strategies which you can employ. Also if N is his opening strategy, that leads to n*y battle strategies. By battle strategies I am talking about the lines he takes. This is waaaaaay more combinatorically complex than poker, because in chess you have more pieces of different strengths. In poker you have 2 cards against opponent's range which on average is in 7 states in term of equity(rounded off) : 80/20, 70/30, 60/40, 50/50 and vice-versa. You have more choices in chess to adapt, by applying n+X strategies, in which X is a multitude of strategies+experience gained over z number of games or strategies known. In poker you have a limited number of combinatoric situations( for ex: if you call flop you have 3 other variants for turn: fold, call, raise and so on.. Don't know or want to calculate the numbers now because I am drunk.$
In chess you have way more combinatoric situations that can be applied if we give all pieces and moves a mathematical vlue times(x) strategies.

Sorry to drunk to explain further but I think you get the idea...if not, we can surely deliberate on it further...

Tl;dr: chess is a more complex game than poker, because in chess you can apply more strategies than in poker, taling into consideration a mathematical value for a strategy.

Hope it makes sense. If it does not, english is not my first language, and I am drunk

Peace

I personally vote for poker...

How about this question:
"Which is more complex: chess or understanding facial expressions". On the surface, some of us might consider chess to be more complex because there's so much more analytical depth and thinking required, whereas we process a person's facial expression in an instant... But from a computational perspective, I think everybody who has worked on these types of problems would say that understanding human expression is a much more complex problem.

Similarly, poker is a much much more difficult problem than chess from a computational perspective. It *seems* to have a much smaller "state space" (e.g., the number of different states you need to reason about in order to make any particular decision), but in reality, this just isn't the case. Because of the incomplete information and random aspect of the game, the state space in poker is ginormous. However, humans just happen to be really really good at bundling variables together efficiently in order to work and reason well in games like poker; just as humans are well adapted to understanding other people's expressions.

Poker is more complex. It just doesn't necessarily seem that way...

/thread

Wow, great post. Also shocked to learn that ginormous is a real word. mind blown x2

i go for chess,

cause for every move u have to be thinking like 5 or 10 moves ahead, and have a clear strategy abou it

this is a misconception and is only really true if you are a computer and really depends on the position. there are plenty of times when you will not look forwards much at all just because the move or plan is natural and obviously correct, to a human anyway

also just to contradict what i just said i'm pretty sure if you scanned the brains of successful chess players vs successful poker players the chess players would show more activity in the areas responsible for analysis.

I believe I stated that poker was probably more complicated. As for recognizing facial expressions, that is not an analytical task. We are able to do it instantly precisely, because it is not. We have it "wired" into us the capacity to do this. Even a infant is able to do this. It is not effortful to recognize facial expressions.

Contrast that with computing 79*53. This is not a complex problem, but we cannot do it instantly. It requires more effort. Much more than recognizing faces. 79*53 is an analytical, error prone process. The poll question is about, which requires more analytical skill. Chess is highly analytical in sharp contrast to poker.

ok, maybe i'm exaggerating with every move, cause there are easier moves than others or u are already following the right plan, but i dont think these are the most, cause u always have to be aware and trying to visualize your plan or opponent plan

It amazes me how many poker players just don't get this very important concept.

lol at anyone thinking poker is more complex than chess.

Reaching grandmaster level requires studying 10 hours per day day in day out for years and years.

It wouldn't surprise me if most elite players did spend 10+ hours a day studying/playing poker.