How much of chess is luck?

Maybe 50% luck and 50% skills?

You have luck when your opponent plays an inaccurasie, and skills if you can spot it and punish it.

If you play a bad move yourself, and your opponent doesnt punish it, you have luck.

What Richard Hunter says, that when in doubt the move you chose turns more lucky is a bit luck, and also a bit intuition (skills).  Get luck is luck, cash in the luck is skills.

On luck and it's role in games, there was a study done into Monopoly (a game uncontroversially revolving around luck) in which a game was rigged so that one of the players got certain advantages over the others. e.g. more money for passing Go, more dice(!) etc. What they found was that the advantaged players were still likely to attribute their success at winning to their own skills! https://planetsave.com/2013/12/23/a-rigged-game-of-monopoly-reveals-how-feeling-wealthy-changes-our-behavior-ted-video/

So even in a game, (which is largely just a glorified Ludo), where luck predominates, and in the most extreme circumstances, people still want to explain their performance with skill rather than luck.

You can see why then in Chess, which is much more about skill, people are even more loath to admit that luck might play a part.

It seems that's just how (some) human beings are.

Quantifying skills versus luck is a too big statistical an mathemathical task. I do not have the numbers, but I can tell about my lucky win last thursday in Nordstrand, Høstturneringen.  Luck started three weeks ealier when my opponent Tom gave us a Sicilian lecture. Therefore I decided to play French in stead. Luck number one, and it turned out decisive because Tom (whos strenght is ca equal with mine) did not now a simple openingtrap in French, and he lost a centrepawn early (my luck and my skills).  Some moves later Tom got lucky, i didnt see a simple fork coming, he won quality and equalized. Then my skills got working, realizing that knight for rook and a bigger centre is good, and I played hard getting knight high and advancing centrepawn. In the end that pawn won the game for me queening, My luck and skills was so good that I got away with blundering rook for knight.   It is hard to separate luck from skills because they work together.

Magnus Carlsen is maybe the luckiest chessplayer in the world. He is so good and fast at blitz that nobody wants  a blitztiebreak with him. Therefore they will on equal points not play draw against him, and to avoid draw they must play more risky. When they are taking risks Magnus gets opportunities (luck) and takes those opportunities with skill.

No, it is not related to luck in any way. You may interpret certain things as being lucky, but they're not.

As others have said, chess is a game of perfect information -- both players see the complete gamestate. If you end up in a better position, it is because you played better moves than your opponent did. The ability of yours to find better options than your opponent is an indication of skill, not luck.

If you have two moves that look identical, you can pick one at random, but it is best to calculate to the best of your ability and decide on one.

You are making tangible choices that have a direct impact on the game. There is no aspect of chance with regards to your moves against your opponent's moves. If you find better moves than your opponent, it is because you yourself decided on them for one reason or another, and you are winning only because of your past decisions. There is nothing in chess outside of your control -- it's about who makes the best choices, and those choices can be calculated.

I think numbers that is not available must be ignored.  And there are several ways to count.    50/50  maybe is not far off . Take it more as a saying , than a number. Fifty -fifty means it can easily go both ways..   I win ca as many games as I lose, and in all my winning games I had luck (and some skills), in my losing gams my opponent outluckskilled me,  It is absolutely impossible to win a game of chess withiout your opponent doing a bad move (my luck), and on my level (1453fide) it is nessesary with some skills to kapitalize on that luck to finish with victory.

Aboutt bringing something constructive to the table, I think you shold be satisfied with the tale of my game versus Tom, but I can do it better . I can find my notes and post the game with annotations.

 "chess is a game of perfect information -- both players see the complete gamestate"

It is not. They see the game at only the current state. (The past state is irrelevant). They do not see the future state with anything like clarity.

Perfect chess is luckgreed. You dont give away any luck (not a single inaccurasy) , and you take all the luck you get (spot your opponents mistakes and weaknesses and punish them).

First my compliments LadyMisil. I enjoy your good and wise writing.

A reason lowrated players can beat much better players some days is that the lowrated actually is very good except when he /she is out of theory or/and makes mistakes (which is very often). The lowrated makes more mistakes because they are less experienced, but sometimes the game follows a path where their experience is sufficient.  How to cope with the tournamentsituation and stress is also a factor. 

Another thing is excpectations. My biggest upset was when I was ca 850 Nowegian rating and won against a 1600 N (1800 fide).   At that time I had played a lot sicilian dragon, and felt comfortable. My opponent played for victory regardless of the board situation. I made a perfect opening and got a slight advantage. If he had realized that I was just as good as him that day, he would have seen that he was slightly worse and fought for saving the draw. In stead he ment that he as the better player should play for win, so he gave up the bishoppair and doubled a pawn to get an attack. In the end I won because the bishops could move faster than his knights and I got a pawn queening.

I played my best game that year, and he played worse, because he underestimated me and because the idea of fighting for draw had not reached his mind.

@Djonni:  Clearly you should just have your wife, IQ of 185 according to you, play your games for you.  Why settle for upsets?

I was running my marathon at a 2 hour pace and then my stamina just gave out!  What poor luck I have.  Nobody can condition their body for competitions...it's clearly up to the whim of the gods how my health will fare on any given day.  I can have no effect on it whatsoever.  How was I supposed to know I should not eat a full leftover pepperoni and anchovy pizza the morning of the marathon?  My luck always runs bad, no matter what I do...

Upsets are fun  , but I have to follow my nephews advice: He says I play bad when I play passive, and good when I play like Morphy     Here is my best game this summer (no upset, equal strenght): https://www.chess.com/no/blog/DjonniDerevnja/fransk-motsatt-rokert-alekhines-kanon-spidder-tarnoffer

Maybe I was slightly  joking, but with a core of seriousness. Have you read this game? Do you agree that it was of very high quality? Both Eivind Sæteren Berntsen (my nephew), Stockfish, Valdemar Staunsbjerg(chessteacher) and GM Vladimir Georgiev says it was a very good game, and they all are impressed by ..20Kb8 . See how tempostrong I push, this game was flowing, and it was flowing fast. 

This game is also a proof that a 1453 Fide on a very good day can play a very good game.

I dont need to be strong enough to understand Morphys play. Those words came from my nephew Eivind and he is strong enough. In january he crushed a 2100 Fide that also played a good game that day.

Serious answers only, please.

Chess involves plenty of good luck, zero bad luck except for situations where people fall ill mid-game or other peripheral causes.

Chess is 99% luck.

is luck a thing?  duh... always, but chess is a skill based game.  there's no dice, there's no draw, there's no flop, it's not gambling, this is not a hard question.  All the information is there,  the outcome depends on your ability to use it.  if your citing luck in your chess games then its a poor excuse and you will not grow as a player.  if you can't look ahead at least you can play a strong position.  the degree of luck your so interested in is actually quite uninteresting... unless your looking for some excuse for your low level of play... then maybe that would be appealing.  I would guess the one in the most denial here is you richard hunter.

it just seems like luck when you dont fully understand the game, position ect. 

Mr '1851' thinks he's a chess genius. 

'We'? I take it you've haven't asked anyone before speaking on their behalf?

Some good discussions tonight but it seems that the trolls have came out of their cave. Time for me to retire, methinks.