I can't believe this needs to be said, but it does (and no offense to DS kids, btw)(yes I know, tl;dr):
A Down Syndrome kid can beat Kobe Byant in one game of HORSE if Kobe is sick with the flu and having the worst day of his basketball life while having blurry vision and delusions due to high fever, and the DS kid is having the game of his life.
This does NOT show how basketball is a game of "luck" (statistical variance).
One short term result does not change that 999,999,999 times out of 1,000,000,000 Kobe beats the poor DS kid. It does not take away the skill Kobe has to be able to do this.
The level of variance in poker is higher than the silly example, but is nonetheless levied against skill. The worst player can win X times in a row versus the best player ever, but given longer term results, the best player will SMASH the worst player predictably.
Losing X times in a row to a bad player is like Kobe shooting 15% for a game. It may happen, but rarely. The more likely and consistent result is Kobe shooting upwards of 50% and dropping 25 points on dat ass. This is like a skilled poker player beating the bad player.
"Luck" is a superstitious perception of variance and standard deviation. "Luck" doesn't exist. The DS kid or the bad poker player didn't get "lucky", they happened to get the favor of being there for random variance at the right time. It's statistical anomaly. To personalize it as "luck" is just oversimplification because of a lack of understanding of mathematics and science. It's illogical. It could of been anyone, but it had to be someone...that isn't "luck", it's anomaly or random variance. They key word is RANDOM. Being "lucky" has nothing to do with it...that is an after-the-fact description of a result, not a before-hand prediction. And Kobe and the good poker player are not "lucky" when they "run well", they are experiencing the normal variance due from the edge they hold in skill over the field.
And as I pointed out earlier, no one needs to play each other for skill to be judged. Kobe doesn't need to ever play the DS kid for everyone to know he's more skilled and not just "luckier". The same is true for two different level poker players. Ranking systems work on this very principle. You don't need to play all 1,000,000 players in a ranking system to prove your edge...your results versus their results in the same game (the control) is proof enough of skill differences. This is why anyone who knows anything about math or poker require a HUGE sample size to judge rankings and results in general.
Poker is predominately "luck"? If by that you mean predominately random variance, then sure...only if you suck at the game (which is most people BTW). The same would be true of any sucky basketball player. The worse you are, the more random variance is involved.
Poker is predominately a game of skill? If by that you mean the individual players skill determines how much of a factor variance is, how the variance effects profit/loss, then sure...only if you are good at the game. The same would be true of any good basketball, baseball, or football player. The better you are, the less random variance is involved in results.
Anyone who thinks poker is a game of "luck", please play me HU 1,000 times at stakes I can afford as soon as online poker is legal in the U.S. again. You'll decry "bad luck", and I'll have your money through skill. You can only argue your "luck" factor through 10 or 100 results, not a thousand. I'll even make it easier...pick any NLHE tournament setting, SNGs, MTTSNGs, MTTs, and after a set number of games we'll prop bet on who comes out ahead (for SNGs I'll stick with 1,000...for MTTSNGs I'll go with 2,000...for MTTs I'll go with 4,000...these numbers should SURELY be enough to weather variance.)
(disclaimer: this offer is not open to pros who are just being dicks and want to take my money because they think they have an edge and feel like posing as a "luck"-believing player. It is precisely because my understanding of skill versus variance I won't waste my time playing you...I'll lose or break damn-near even...F that.
)
PS. Those saying whether it's game of skill or not is irrelevant to getting it legalized are correct. That would assume government looks out for our best interests which as bad as believing in "luck"...illogical to the max. They care about re-election and interests who pay that re-election expense; power. This self serving motivation is all that matters. If the special interests want legalized poker now, we'll get it after they stall it as long as possible to extort as much lobbying money as possible from those interests...and not a moment sooner. This is about which lobbying group wants it versus which lobbying group doesn't. The highest bidder will prevail. The only other consideration is how this effects re-election chances. For the Kentucky Senator, for example, his horse racing constituency that doesn't lobby (although some do) may vote him out even he votes for the Bill, even if he is paid more by pro-legalization lobbies to do so, thereby making the total cash involved less valuable (look up marginal utility). It's 1) about keeping power, and 2) about paying for the re-election, and possibly 3) what kind of sweetheart gimme (like a job after office, or for family member) can they get that outweighs both 1 and 2. It all comes down to marginal utility for the politician scumbags, not whether this is a skill game or not. You're dreaming if you think government works logically or for your best interests as a citizen (afterall, we vote them in which is just a manifestation of an informal logical fallacy; argumentum ad populum: appeal to polls, popularity, or votes).
Last edited by Gankstar; 11-17-2011 at 07:46 PM.