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Does Duplication Make Poker A Game of Skill?

An ingenious argument to get around legal obstacles

This week saw the championship advent of an ingenious new interpretation of the game of poker - it's called Duplicate Poker and its goal is to get around the luck vs skill debate surrounding the legality of the game.

In the new wrinkle, the cards are set-up so that each table and each seat at each table gets exactly the same cards. Duplicate hole cards, duplicate flop, turn and river.

The idea is to take the 'chance' element out of this poker variation and turn it into a true game of skill by comparing results between players in the same seat on different tables who started with identical cards and chips.

This week the concept was demonstrated at the Oklahoma State Championships at the Cherokee Casino in Tulsa. Scotty Nguyen was there, as well as Linda Johnson, Chip Reese and several other pros. The field was limited to 100 players at ten tables, so each player was actually only competing against the 9 other players in the same at at the different tables.

There are a number of other conventions and rules that are applied, but the basic concept appears to be a sound argument that could introduce an exciting new angle both online and offline to the legal wrangles over poker playing in countries and states that legislate against this form of entertainment.

Poker fans who want to try out the new idea can play for free and learn the details of this style of play at e-PokerUSA.