[trhway]

>Poker is a combination of luck and skill

Luck follows (or at least positively correlates) with skill :) 30+ years ago in our company of friends in the university dormitories we had a guy who had the card deck handling skills of a major illusionist (and those skills were naturally a source of significant income for him). The guy was also tremendously lucky - well beside mere being alive and without broken bones while applying his skills for income :) - in particular once he won an amount enough to buy 1-bdrm apt in St.Petersburg back then on a scratch lottery ticket that he bought at a random place on our way while we were walking to some business meeting in a city that we just arrived that morning. If it were a skillful illusion, then it was way beyond anything i've heard or seen before :)

[interroboink]

I'm not sure I follow... You feel that his skills as an illusionist somehow helped him win on that scratch lottery ticket?

[eschneider]

I used to be the absolute BEST at scratch lottery tickets. OTOH, "every ticket a winner" used to be a thing, and I had free access to an MRI machine at the time.

Sometimes, you make your own luck...

[WalterBright]

I thought the people that administer the lottery keep track of the winners, and investigate any statistically anomalous winners.

[eschneider]

You may have noticed that "every ticket a winner" scratch cards are no longer a thing.