Prove to whom? Nobody is disputing the skill edge experts have in poker in the long run, the legal problem is that the purse is awarded at the end of each hand making every individual hand subject to the skill test, including coolers.

The courts distinguish poker as being different from games like golf or bowling because poker players are not presented with an equal challenge, with each determining his own fortune by his own skill because poker presents players with different hands, making the players unequal.

The best example I can think of to counter this argument is billiards being a game of skill with an unequal challenge, but billiard tournaments require a number of opportunities for the element of chance to even out before any prizes are awarded.

There are obviously all sorts of approaches that may be used to answer this question but one which often seems to get short shrift is the experimental approach. Establish a player population made up of people of all skill levels (including novices) and allow them to play a series of predetermined setups and compare the results. This would work with players going against a computer heads up, but would be even more telling in player-v-player action.

I'm pretty confident that even over a limited number of hands the results would be quite clear and easily explained to a lay audience.

No. I agree with you a poker tournament with a fixed fee to enter and rest goes to a prize pool with clearly defined payout structure is virtually identical to a golf,chess or checkers or any sporting tournament setup in this structure where one is a participant.

Over time one must consider i.e. probability to be dealt amount of aces and kings equally. If we play chess and flip a coin to decide who gets white first and confers one an unequal advantage - it only makes the players unequal form that point on -both had an equal opportunity at the start of the game to win the toss. Pool games often start with a toss of a coin to decide who breaks too.

Over time everyone gets the same opportunity to break or play white first.

I agree with the article by Sklansky however.

I'm surprised that a business man like him who's been dealing with politician thinks that this is a key issue to the legalisation debate. The "skill" point was already taking care of by a nice private presentation in a casino followed by a fat brown bag for those fellow politicians who love poker soooooo muuuuucchhhh

I hope this discussion convinces D. Sklansky that there is a need for more critical thinking and requires a DUC2 book imo

I think we are over thinking this a little. Over time some graphs go consistently up, some go consistently down. That's enough evidence for me.

The only argument that works is one based on statistical analysis of data, measuring win rates and standard deviations over millions of hands. The databases from online poker sites give lawyers the ammunition they need to clearly define the relationship between skill and variance in determining potential outcomes. The fact that there are strong elements of adaptive strategy, logic, and calculation involved in being successful does not negate the strong role that variance plays over small sample sizes; nor does it negate the fact that poker is a form of gambling and can be used as a drug for degenerates (10k coinflips anyone?).

Most people do not study statistics and have a cognitive bias towards overestimating the reliability/meaning of small sample sizes. The role of chance does not meaningfully 'even out' for many people, even over the course of a lifetime. The sample size is too small. It only 'evens out' in the aggregate. But people experience life as individuals and their cognitive biases are to interpret their lives through the distorted lenses of small sample sizes. I think it is salient to bring these points to the forefront in any legal or social presentation if one is interested in persuading the non-gambler to appreciate the subtleties of the relationship between the various forms of mental skills required to negotiate a game which involves statistical variance. Risk management (aka 'trading' or 'socially acceptable gambling') is a good analogue to employ in this vein.

Seldom do the lambs slaughter the butcher.

I don't think it is any longer a key issue. I just happened to have thought up the "75%" and the "compared to the average player" points during a conversation I had with Mason yesterday. So I posted it. Actually I agree with others that the fact that poker is predominately skill could just as easily be used as an argument against its legalization.

Skill is relative at every stake. Who's to say if it is predominately skill or luck?

The outcome in any one hand in poker is almost entirely down to luck - it depends largely on the what cards come out and in what order.

The way to measure the effect of a skill difference between two players, such as between the expert and average player mentioned by David Sklansky, would be to compare the outcome of a hand played by the average player against the expert to the outcome of exactly the same hand with the cards reversed. We all know that the expert player is more likely to win more when dealt the winning side of the hand, and lose less when dealt the losing hand. The procedure would not need to be repeated over too many situations before it becomes clear that skill is making a difference. This way of thinking gets around the problem of one player being dealt better cards.

If one actually wanted to perform this experiment, there would obviously be the problem that the players would have already seen the hand play out and therefore already know what the other player is holding the second time. There would be various ways of getting around this (for example using two experts vs two amateurs) but I don't think this is a problem if all we are looking for is a definition - base it on the difference in profit between two players if they have to take both sides of a hand, averaged over a wide range of situations.

[This post is based on the idea of "reciprocality", as discussed by Tommy Angelo in various places]

[/QUOTE]Poker is a game of skill in which luck plays a role. The same is true of many other games of skill. The only worthwhile question is how skill and luck are balanced in determining outcomes.[/QUOTE]

Two problems I have with the debate is skill's effect on the outcome and quantifying a players EV.

I find it unreasonable to say skill is the predominant factor in a game where it can't control the outcome. And I think there's way too many factors, with number of hands played being the main one, to correctly quantify a players EV in poker in general.

Having said that, it's obvious some players are awful and are guaranteed to lose. While some are great and increase their chance to beat the game.

There is zero skill in roulette. The EV is clear and unchanging.

Skill plays a major role in poker. The EV is unclear and ever changing.

Unlike roulette, a skilled poker player can obviously play to a higher level of EV than the guy sitting next to him. But like roulette, the outcome is totally out of your control.

I just don't see how the multitude of unquantifiable variables and inability to effect the outcome constitutes it no longer being a game of chance.

My problem with the debate involving govt control is having them relentlessly promoting the purchase of all forms of lottery tickets you have no chance of winning. But then refusing to let you play poker where you might win.

Yes, and the time element is relevant in a tournament, but if the discussion here is about playing cash poker online under the laws currently on the books, a single hand of poker where a winner is declared at the end could never pass the predominant skill test.

A tournament might even pass the material element of chance test, since the tournament is decided by the chip standing rather than the hand rankings.

How about we just have a group of highly skilled pros challenge everyone who thinks the game is nothing but luck to sit down to an 8 hour session of the game of their choice?

Anyone who has played more than two hands of poker knows that both skill and luck are components, and that over the long term, the more skilled you are, the more you'll win. Skilled players may lose individual hands or sessions (sometimes for protracted periods of time due to variance), but over the long term they will come out ahead.

I'm not sure why it's necessary to put a specific percentage on it other than to give lawmakers something they can use for a sound bite.

To a hammer, everything looks like a nail.

To an actuary, things deserve a specific percentage.

But a proverb might achieve the same objective.

Poker rewards patience, discipline and aggression.

I think the best argument against the position of the court here to convince the legislature to change the law is that poker has the distinction from all other games of allowing the player to fold the playing field he is dealt by chance, or later in the game if the playing field changes.

Looking at it from that stand point, no other game allows a player to control their fortune more than poker, a player can't elect to fold all the par 5's if he can't hit the driver.

The chance in poker is something that we should celebrate, a player is welcome to fold until he thinks the cards he is dealt give him a sufficient edge on his competition, if poker is illegal simply because the starting hands aren't equal, handicapped golf and bowling tournaments should be illegal for the same reason.

The forced bets could still be an issue, but the element of chance is not something for which we should apologize.

The importance of that point is that people arbitrarily want poker declared as a game of skill, but not numerous other gambling games, because lawmakers are obviously not going to green light legal online pai gow. That's why the "skill vs luck" nonsense is best left abandoned- it stems from player bias that they're okay with games when other player mistakes benefit them and not the casino.

ike's post is superb

This reminds me of that old story where a pro sits down to play the ME of the WSOP. He gets AA on his first hand and happily gets it all in pf vs a tourist with AK.

AA gets cracked by flopped trip K's.

On his way out, another pro consoles him with "It's okay. You got it in good. Just think how much you won in the long run."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z3GmjoorPmQ

Maybe this hand of Viffer vs. Negreanu is the best type of way to explain it. The hand that's important here starts at about 4.00 into the video. Negreanu has AQ. Hits the absolute nuts on the turn and his opponent still puts in money. The river is important also.

The opponent of someone who has no chance to lose can decide how much that they will lose.

This. I just hope people really grasp what he is saying. Ive thought about the skill vs luck argument quite a bit, but never in this manner. Get Ike in front of one of those committee hearings. Seriously.

Commonsensically?

I liked the post, but the above excerpt is not true. The win rate is independent of sample size and variance. After 100 hours, the absolute dollar amount might be greater than the standard deviation, but the win rate is a fraction; the total amount won divided by the number of hands or time taken to play them.
Someone who uses skill to achieve a win rate of 5bb/100 cannot possibly achieve a standard deviation of less than 5bb/100, precisely because of fluctuations in luck. (Standard deviation is more likely to be 80bb/100 or something like that). The existence of variance, along with the different units used to measure win rates and SD means statements like "the win rate exceeds the standard deviation" are illogical.

Whether or not it's even worth trying to define what "Predominately skill" is I think that using an "average" player as a reference point is pretty stupid because what an "average player" is is subject to change. Your "average player" in 2001 and 2011 are going to be pretty different. I think a completely random player would be a better reference point. At least then you could probably show that a random actor in a blackjack game is probably less "less bad" compared to a skilled blackjack player than a random actor in a poker game compared to a skilled poker player thus showing a relative measure of how much skill can affect long term results.


I'm reading that statement to mean that BB/100 < SD/100 but probably that that BB/10000 > SD/10000...