A short while back Pennsylvania Judge Thomas A. James Jr. ruled that poker is a "skill game" and now that ruling is being followed up by Virginia based consulting firm Cigital. The firm analyzed over 103 million raked hands at Poker Stars between December 1st 2008 and January 2nd 2008 and recorded only the outcomes of hands in which the stakes were at least $.10.

They found that the players with the best cards folded before 75 percent of the hands went into showdowns. One of the study's authors, Paco Hope, explained then that because most of the hands did not end up in showdowns, it meant that a player's skill determined the outcome and not the quality of his hands (luck).

"If the hand didn't have a showdown, the cards didn't pick the winner in that game," said Hope. "There's the public perception that poker is essentially a game of random cards. The study really goes to the heart of that by looking at real numbers, at what do we actually see on online poker - which is pretty representative of poker generally because there's the same rules."

But like with every argument, there is a counter point to be made and in this case it was brought by Peter Winkler, a Dartmouth College mathematician who has studied poker and who believes that the firm should have looked at other facets of the game as well.

"Who folds is determined to a huge degree by the value of the cards!" Winkler said. "The player who picks up A, A and stays in while the rest fold is the lucky one; the player who picks up 3, 2 and folds before the 3, 3, 2 flop comes down is the unlucky one. That the A, A player wins with an ultimately inferior hand does not prove poker is a game of skill. If anything, it shows the opposite: An unskillful player holding the 3, 2 hole cards might have stayed in."

"I don't care who won or why they won," Hope answered. "What I care about is the decisions they made. The fact they decided to fold indicates it was decisions that determined the hand."

We agree that luck plays a role in poker, especially when you are given a great hand to start with but a newbie that hopes on "luck" will have no chance on the long run against a player like Tom "Durrr" Dwan who can make amazing bluffs due to his incredible skill level. Instead of waiting for a lucky hand or for some lucky cards to come down with the flop, players should game plan around factual things like odds, hand strength and betting patterns.

Poker players know that the game is ultimately about skill and they will definitely use this as an advantage against an opponent who is willing to try his luck.