By that reasoning, basketball is a game of chance, depending on the level of the players. They're going to lob it up there and hope it goes in.

But their lob was a skill--one they don't control very well, but a skill nevertheless.

Betting in poker is the same thing, and is the only thing the player controls.

The way the cards come out is always chance, and the level of skill can't influence it.

True, the way cards come out is chance in a single instance of a hand, but in the long run, over thousands, maybe millions of hands, the cards that you expect to come out will do so more often, and the skillful players will win more often (as opposed to the occasional bad beat). If you are talking about professional basketball then of course there is luck.. at such a high level a few points, basically a basket, can make the difference between a championship and a lost series, but again, we see the best teams (for the most part) every year in the playoffs repeatedly. The same can be said for rec basketball - the closer the skill levels are of the players to each other, the more luck may play a factor.

@zep

No, the cards you "expect" will not come out "more often" after millions of hands. They will come out exactly as often as they're supposed to.

Whether or not a card will come out when you place your wager is still a matter of chance. You can't skill it into happening.

Skilled players are undoubtedly taking the likelihood into consideration when they place their bets, of course.

>> By that reasoning, basketball is a game of chance, depending on the level of the players. They're going to lob it up there and hope it goes in.

I think that would be a fair point to make

I don't.

The idea that some players' skill is so low that their ability is indistinguishable from pure luck does not diminish the idea that basketball is very much a skill-based game.

That seems to apply equally to poker...

Isn't that the whole point though? A game is a game of skill iff you can differentiate between beginners and experts.

Sure, but the same is true of every skill game -- even, like, chess, without any explicit luck component. If both players are making essentially random legal moves, the game comes down to luck.