Skill in Poker - Empirical Evidence

[bennymacca]

i stumbled across an article that referenced a report that had a statistical analysis of poker players, with the amount of hands played, and the winrate, as a measure of whether poker is a game or skill or chance.

i thought it was very interesting. i tried to find the original paper, but i couldn't unless i paid for it, but i did find this presentation. for those that dont have a mathematical background it might be a little heavy going, but i thought it was interesting in general at how the confidence interval for the win rate changed with the amount of hands played.

if i am reading the paper right, is says that 99.7% of players lose all of their bankroll before they play 1658 hands.

slide 15 is the most interesting, especially where is says that a CRF of 100k is not unlikely.

this is the grey area in the eyes of many people. not IF poker is a game of skill, but when does it become a game of skill, and whether the average player can be expected to put in that many hands. i.e for the grinders, and a lot of us that play regularly, poker IS a game of skill, but for the person that might only ever put $100 online, put it all on 1 table, and see what happens, it is most definitely a game of chance. and thats where the legal uncertainty comes in.

Skill_in_Games_-_Theory_and_Empirical_Evidence_for_Poker.pdf

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[Origami]

Likes this ---->

Empirical Evidence for Poker: Results

• Median of the absolute winrate decreases rapidly the more
hands a group played
• Skill of top 100 group is highest, but absolute amount of skill is
lower
• Top 100 has a high homogeinity
• High absolute winrates only with negative winrates
• Absence of losing players in top 100

Low skill establishes itself much faster than high skill

benny the cunt does this explain why I like playing in fields of less than 100..??

[bennymacca]

benny the cunt does this explain why I like playing in fields of less than 100..??

lol bruce.

[Adrian]

The empirical evidence that there is no skill is that run OK sometimes and even managed to win a few times this season.

All the rest of the modelling can be ignored.