luck vs skill

[critterdude]

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I personally think its 90% skill and 10% luck

No way there's that little luck in poker. The best estimate I can remember is 65% skill, 35% luck. If poker were 90% skill, there'd be very little action. Another good measure is the oft-stated maxim that an expert player wins about 2/3 of his sessions.

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Are we discussing a hand, a session, or a winning player in the long run? If we are dicussing winning or being a profitable player annually it is 100% skill and 0% luck.

If we are discussing individual hands or even sessions each player could calculate their particular luck or variance.

I believe the distinction here is important because human nature is to blame losses on luck and wins on skill. This obviously doesn't improve one's game.

[Paluka]

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My poker career is going into year #2, as I have become more serious about my play, friends and family have been critical, becase they feel its all about luck. I personally think its 90% skill and 10% luck, but I would like the opinion of some seasoned veterans

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Most non-gamblers don't even understand what "luck" means. They have not thought about issues like shortrun vs longrun, standard deviation, expectancy, etc... Ask them to define what they mean by luck and they won't be able to quantify it or explain it in any sort of reasonable way.
Trying to have discussions like this with people who lack a gambling background is pointless.

[Kurn, son of Mogh]

I believe the distinction here is important because human nature is to blame losses on luck and wins on skill. This obviously doesn't improve one's game.

I agree that definition is important. Chess is 100% skill, and there are far fewer professional chess players in the world than there are professional poker players.

Sklansky & Malmuth have written about how a moderate short-term luck factor is crucial to making poker a profitable long-term profession.

The key is that luck plays a big factor in the play of each hand, but long-term, poker is a game of skill. It's the balance of skill vs. luck that makes the game beatable.

[astroglide]

do you consider it lucky to be dealt aces or kings? making a draw without odds? it all catches up.

[LetsRock]

I agree with you to the point that I failed to specify long term vs. short term perameters.

My points were written under the framework of a short term thought - luck vs. skill in say, one session. I assumed that when someone is talking about luck vs. skill, they're refering to a very short-term frame work.

To me it's obvious that the little edges that skill add to a game pay off very handsomely over the long term.

But to believe that you can accumulate enough edges to beat someone who's running lucky (or to overcome bad luck on your own part) is just not true. A player could play 500 hands perfectly (so perfect that the hands could be face up)and still lose during any given stretch - luck is involved and we (pompously placing myself in the "skilled" category) have to be ready for "those days" when luck beats skill.

[critterdude]

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I believe the distinction here is important because human nature is to blame losses on luck and wins on skill. This obviously doesn't improve one's game.

I agree that definition is important. Chess is 100% skill, and there are far fewer professional chess players in the world than there are professional poker players.

Sklansky & Malmuth have written about how a moderate short-term luck factor is crucial to making poker a profitable long-term profession.

The key is that luck plays a big factor in the play of each hand, but long-term, poker is a game of skill. It's the balance of skill vs. luck that makes the game beatable.



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The fact that weaker players can get lucky in the short run is what keeps them in the game. Better Skill than your opponents guaruntees, as long as your have the bankroll to handle variance, that in the long run you will win/profit.

If you are saying as long as you can handle short run "luck" streaks that in the long run 100% of the time the more skilled player wins we agree.

Employing strategies or adjustments at a table based on these lucky steaks is also another subject and skill.

I think we agree just are wording this a little differently.

Bottom line to be a winning player in the LONG RUN is 0% luck and 100% skill. The better player eventually takes the weaker player's money. The luck factor is what effects how long it takes not as to who wins.

[LetsRock]

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Bottom line to be a winning player in the LONG RUN is 0% luck and 100% skill. The better player eventually takes the weaker player's money. The luck factor is what effects how long it takes not as to who wins.

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I couldn't agree more!

[El Barto]

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Bottom line to be a winning player in the LONG RUN is 0% luck and 100% skill. The better player eventually takes the weaker player's money. The luck factor is what effects how long it takes not as to who wins.

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I couldn't agree more!

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Let's not overstate the case. Luck can make the difference between a long term win rate of 1.1 BB/hr vs. 1.3 BB/hr even over a very long term.

Add up the 10 biggest pots you have ever won, and think how your long term win rate would be different if you just lost those extra 10 pots. For a lot of us, this would make a noticable dent in our bankroll.

[critterdude]

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Bottom line to be a winning player in the LONG RUN is 0% luck and 100% skill. The better player eventually takes the weaker player's money. The luck factor is what effects how long it takes not as to who wins.

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I couldn't agree more!

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Let's not overstate the case. Luck can make the difference between a long term win rate of 1.1 BB/hr vs. 1.3 BB/hr even over a very long term.

Add up the 10 biggest pots you have ever won, and think how your long term win rate would be different if you just lost those extra 10 pots. For a lot of us, this would make a noticable dent in our bankroll.

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If luck factor has not evened out then by definition you are still in the short run.

I know this seems like splitting hairs but to new players it is very important to understand.

[Homer]

I personally think its 90% skill and 10% luck, but I would like the opinion of some seasoned veterans

In the short-run, luck is huge. In the long-run, it's minimal.