Poker, Skill or Luck? what %

as hands played approaches infinity, luck factor approaches 0.

As post count approaches infinity in this thread, people continue to make unfounded claims using terms they refuse to even explain.

Luck refers to that which happens beyond a person's control.

In poker luck would be the cards you are dealt, skill is how you play the cards you are dealt.

For me the ratio would properbly 30% skill, i think i have a good pre-flop play (like the vast majority of players) 70% luck, my post-flop play stinks to high heaven

At least i have identified something to improve

Here's an example of how poker is not all luck. The quiz part is where people will show if they understand poker or think it's luck.

Background...
The guy on the button raises big or goes all-in about 60% of the time (when he's on the button).

Blinds 1000/2000 with 300 ante (9 players)

Button (holding 6K in chips) - raises to 6K all-in
SB - (holding 25K in chips) FOLDS
BB(you) - (holding 20K in chips) you have 45suited

What do you do and why?

BuffaloDolly said:

I agree Mizun, reading the opposition is the main factor and I didnt even mention that. Makes me wonder how some good players would do online, without ever seeing their cards. If you put something on the screen covering you cards but just took notes on other players, you could probally prove that there is less luck involved than some think.

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Sorry for grave robbing, but...

Annette_15 whose real name I can't spell, well she did something like that and won a tournament. She covered the spot where her cards would appear and played solely on position and size of stacks. On the one hand, that's a lot of skill, on the other, that's a whole lot of luck too...

This really depends
Online the skill factor is much lower, considering the amount of donkeys and computer generated factors,,,, but there is always a huge amount of luck, seat positions and game play and also the program its self, it knows whos gonna get what and whats gonna fall.
BUT
live games and tourneys the skill level is a little higher, with the human element with tells, game play, you need to know a bit more than sitting behind a computer screen.
Sitting across from your opponent can give you a much better read on what they have in a live than over the internet,, personally i can bluff alot more online than i can live!!
BUT no matter live or online, the luck factor always outlays the skill

Don't know!
Watching some of the Gus Hansen games I think that man must have 101% of luck and In same time 101% of skills,balls like a bull,or you got to be totally crazy....For online game it's 90-10 luck,skills are for live tables,that's my opinion or should I say my (in)experience

by definition luck is chance that is blown out of proportion in our head.
Good luck is fueled by ego and bad luck is fueled by the lack there of.
So the opinion that luck is replaced by skill in the long run makes sense.
When you slowly stop playing the cards and start playing position, the player and the situation, you need less "luck" because you are making better decisions. Like the Full Tilt commercial says " Knowing when to throw away pocket kings..." Chance is always there, you just learn to know it for what it is.
Poker is not a card game ..... it is a mind game that happens to be played with cards.

I've heard lots of people saying the difference between "short-term" and "long-term"

I've seen some online pros say it's all about the long-term, and if you play your cards right, your skill will be way more important than luck.

I'll say 85% skill 15% luck

Luck/patience

My normal line is 98% patience, 1% luck , 1% skill, thats for online poker only.

Ok, I think we can solve this with a mathematical equation.
Excluding luck, Phil Hellmuth is supposed to win them all. Now, all you gotta do is check what percent Hellmuth has won, and that is the percent skill.

LOL

But seriously, I would agree with previous responses that luck is for the short run, and skill is for the long run. So for the short run, you could check what percent of wsop events are won by amateurs, but then there would need to be some correction for the fact that there are many more amateurs in any given field than pros.... I'm convinced though that there is a way to come out with a reasonable mathematical answer to this question!

dj11 said:

When you can define luck, you will likely get good replies to questions like this.

Yesterday I played a big MTT where the cards were bad, but when they did come I got big gains. I latched on the my phrase of yesterday, which was "I'm not even getting cards good enough to lose money with". I ended up several steps into the money. With really poor cards. This would fit into a skill column. The bad cards into a 'bad luck' column.

I contend I skillfully manipulated bad luck! OR, was I lucky that the cards were generally so bad I couldn't be swayed into playing sub premium hands?

Define luck, and the answer will be self contained.

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I basically consider the only real 'luck' in poker to be when I go all in with streets still to come and the luck is in what cards fall after that.

Although (especially in ring games) I now tend to think of EV instead and pay little attention to this kind of luck, which basically reduces the luck factor to 0. I know I'll have basically no variance from the expected value over my lifetime.

I didn't really explain myself well on that post did I?

What I really wanted to explain was that when there are 5 people in every pot, when every hand has a show down the skill factor is minimized greatly. How often have you had AA or KK in a online SNG and pushed and got 2 callers 1 with Q7o and another with AJo and Q7 gets there.

This is why game selection is important. There is no reason to play in a STT or cash game with 6 crazy players. If they are raising and reraising every hand with ATC it makes the game extremely difficult to put people on a range of hands. The first thing I do if I see someone raise or limp up front I decide the range of hands they might have, I then assign a range of hands in which I can call with, a range I can raise with, and and the rest I fold. Of course I mix it up from time to time as well, but most online players have NO range they can play ATC's, they'll call a reraise almost all the time with ATC's ect. Playing lower limit SNG's, MTT's, or cash games is really a game of Dodge the Donk. The problem is the Dodge the Donk is not a game of skill. You can make the correct dicision like just pushing when there is plenty in the pot and you have AA - the problem is you then have to dodge the donk calls which anywhere from 1 - 5 are calling. It makes it difficult to play that style.

i think it more skill then luck cause you can make player fold the best hand if you know how why play if you think the game is about luck you cant be lucky everyday lol o why would you play ? and what happen s if yoru not lucky for week lol stop till you luck comes back lol

I disagree quite necessary.
I think the technique is well more than luck, if we try to put
I suggest that in percentage 85% skill and 15% luck.
Poker is a brilliant game, we use a lot mathematics, tactics, I can not
say that it is game of luck.

I dont think luck enters into it at all if you are gaming, not gambling. All you will see is variance if you keep playing an optimal game, and a graph that rises to infinity.

I agree with others we have no real definition of the terms here so we are all speaking from different directions and there can be no consensus as to the orignial question, but 'luck' as it is commonly referred to plays no part in ones long term success as a poker player. Ask Stu Ungar (RIP), Chris Ferguson, or the countless others who make a living by using their skills, not relying on luck.

If I am winning its 90% skill, but if I am losing its all luck. Just kidding. I would like to know what luck is. Whats the definition?

IMHO variance is overrated. Before anyone yells at me, I believe in variance. Believe isn't even the right word since it's been proven to exist. I know it's real, however...

Without a BR that can handle the variance, particular those occasional long stretches where every time you have great odds of winning only boom! suckage, I'm sorry but, at that point variance might as well be luck. Variance isn't predictable. It's not like a major storm where you get warning weeks in advance and provided you can afford to get the hell out, ya hurry up and get the hell out. No it's more like an earthquake you know it's inevitable. You just don't know when it's coming or how.(Okay so every hand has variance, but you know I'm meaning the bad kind, where things work out all wrong). Also like an earthquake, there can be aftershocks. Some earthquakes hit and that's it just the one little tremmor. Others hit and you still feel the ground shaking at intervals for quite awhile afterwards. It was like that with Loma Prieta.

Until I have at least a few hundred bucks to play with, I need good luck. A few hundred bucks is enough to play for the long haul at microstakes, and will cover a losing streak or two. Good luck lets you run $5 up to $500. Skill seems to let you do it faster because you can fully captalize on those winning hands, and get out of the losing ones with a minimum of loss.

I'm just saying, while variance affects everyone, good or bad, it's not something you can really work with until you have enough loot to cover it.

In a recent t.v. commericial for Full Tilt...it shows in the backdrop different pro's at the table,Jesus,Lederer,and a few others that are affiliated with FT...While showing their faces the narrator asks a question.."If poker is all about luck,why do you keep seeing the same faces at the final tables?"...Then the camera pans around the table once again,showing the faces of the pro players.... the question is obviously rhetorical,the answer being,poker is NOT all about luck,poker is about skill.... At the very least at those upper levels,those players,the Negraneaus,the Chans,the Hellmuths,the Iveys,etc etc...did NOT get where they are today because they got lucky...
You can have the worst hand at the table and still take down that pot...that takes skill....Ever watch Gus Hansen?...lol

Mental exercise.

You have to admit that skill has an edge over luck. Even if that advantage is only 1%, so that for any giving session the skill will hold a 50.5/49.5 % edge.

This would suggest that after 200 sessions, skill will hold a 100% advantage over luck. This part is possibly provable, but still luck will hang in there and cause irksome nuisances enough so that poker, like the stock market, can not provide a sure thing.

But poker is more about making the right decisions in a risk environment.

SavagePenguin said:

Short term, 85% luck, 15% skill.
Long term, 1% luck, 99% skill.

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long term skill is maybe overestimated, but the general idea is right

I'm not going to bother putting a % on it, but, I feel that the more skill you have the more luck you can create for yourself and the better off you are when someone gets lucky against you.

luck in the short term skill long term ill take long term over a few big wins anyday

Skill or luck

I've been in turneys where I'd go thirty hands without even getting a face card--- So luck has it if cheat doesn't have it first. If you don't get the cards to play--you can't even play. Luck is the major factor. Any idiot can calculate odds once they have the cards. It's getting the cards- it's getting the flop- it's catching the river. Luck luck luck. When it's all said and done--I think 80%+ to the luck factor about says it all.

100% Skill.
100% Luck.

It really matters what we are measuring here. Otherwise it is a meaningless question!

We are just playing a head game to try to arbitrarily measure our own (lack of) skill. These sorts of head games are good practice for all the other ones that help us justify losses and wins. Those head games are BAAAAAAD for our wallets.

How about these?

What keeps the river card from not pairing the board?
100% Luck.

What makes you capable of deciding if this is the time to bet against that rivercard pairing?
100% Skill.

Or is it this one?

100% Skill -- when I am winning.
100% Luck -- when I am losing.



love,
cAPS

nottocer said:

I've been in turneys where I'd go thirty hands without even getting a face card--- So luck has it if cheat doesn't have it first. If you don't get the cards to play--you can't even play. Luck is the major factor. Any idiot can calculate odds once they have the cards. It's getting the cards- it's getting the flop- it's catching the river. Luck luck luck. When it's all said and done--I think 80%+ to the luck factor about says it all.

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You're supposed to play both of your cards.