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    Your Elvenar Team

Getting tired of having Instants shoved down my throat

  • Thread starter DeletedUser10990
  • Start date

SunsetDanar

Well-Known Member
that's a gambler's fallacy. The odds do not change. You have exactly the same chance after 100 failures as you did after 1 success. with a 25% chance, the odds are still 4:1 against you getting the daily building, no matter how many times you've already failed. Odds do not change based on statistics.

Referencing the table once again, we have no definitive information about it's type, how it was constructed or even how it's accessed. Random access at multiple table access points, for example, would certainly change the odds of obtaining one prize over another even with the percentages remaining the same. We have information enough to simply make assumptions rather than draw conclusions so I'll assume you may be in error.
 

DeletedUser1390

Guest
You list 6 outcomes. If we separate your 1. into "monty shows you a goat in #2" and "monty shows you a goat in #3", then we would have 8 outcomes, 4 winners and 4 losers evenly split on stay and switch. You can't account for all possible outcomes by ignoring some.

Here is another representation you gave which again falsely combines the 2 possibilities and that is why it does not come away with the right result.
Assuming pick of door 1. Line 1 in that image: car, goat, goat. Monty eliminates door 2:goat, stay wins, change loses. Monty eliminates door 3:goat, stay wins, change loses. Line 2, Monty can only eliminate door 3, no changes to this line, stay loses and change wins. Line 3, Monty can only eliminate door 2 no changes to this line, stay loses and change wins. Now count: winners on stay 2, losers on stay 2, winners on change 2, losers on change 2.

Interesting conversation, folks. You seem to have settled the matter (I think), but it occurs to me another way to describe the flaw in this argument. If you want to calculate probability by enumerating all possible outcomes, that only works assuming that those outcomes are equally likely. In this case, sure you can split case 1 (you picked the car) into two outcomes, 'monty shows you a goat in #2' and 'monty shows you a goat in #3'; but those outcomes viewed separately are only half as likely as the other two outcomes (where you pick a goat and Monty shows you the other one), because that entire case still only occurs 1/3 of the time.

So if you break it down this way, you may indeed have 8 total outcomes, 4 winners and 4 losers - but they are not equally likely. The 4 winners each occur 1/6 of the time, the 4 losers 1/12 of time. That math will get you the correct result.
 

Ashrem

Oh Wise One
Referencing the table once again, we have no definitive information about it's type, how it was constructed or even how it's accessed. Random access at multiple table access points, for example, would certainly change the odds of obtaining one prize over another even with the percentages remaining the same. We have information enough to simply make assumptions rather than draw conclusions so I'll assume you may be in error.
Sure, but assuming they've designed a non-standard way to distribute the percentage chances has nothing to recommend it as an advantageous idea over assuming they are lying and just programmed them differently than they say.

And, once again, the majority of people who have kept detailed records of their picks across a large number of selections have all come within a standard deviation of as expected from the listed numbers.

Using a small number of people to presume some sort of weird data base design does not satisfy the rule of "simplest explanation is usually the correct one". Which is that anything random includes a chance of being unlucky. Take that with the combination of known factors: 1) Unlucky people are generally disproportionately represented on the forums because the set of unhappy players self-select a heavier weighting for speaking up and 2) unhappy people are more-than-average likely to exaggerate the degree of their "unluckiness" in order to justify their complaint, and you have a very simple and mathematically likely answer.
 

SunsetDanar

Well-Known Member
Sure, but assuming they've designed a non-standard way to distribute the percentage chances has nothing to recommend it as an advantageous idea over assuming they are lying and just programmed them differently than they say.

And, once again, the majority of people who have kept detailed records of their picks across a large number of selections have all come within a standard deviation of as expected from the listed numbers.

Using a small number of people to presume some sort of weird data base design does not satisfy the rule of "simplest explanation is usually the correct one". Which is that anything random includes a chance of being unlucky. Take that with the combination of known factors: 1) Unlucky people are generally disproportionately represented on the forums because the set of unhappy players self-select a heavier weighting for speaking up and 2) unhappy people are more-than-average likely to exaggerate the degree of their "unluckiness" in order to justify their complaint, and you have a very simple and mathematically likely answer.

Let me ask you this, first. What is the 'standard' way to distribute percentage chances? Second, where has it been said how the table was programmed or even what it is? That's a fact that I've referenced repeatedly. Finally, neither of us have implied that the devs have lied about anything related to this widely perceived anomaly although I have seen implications by others in this thread so I'll disregard that statement.

What is the 'standard deviation' would be my next question. Who established it and when was it announced? I guess I missed it.

You're pretty much spot on here and I agree. Unlucky people seem to continue to be unlucky and are the loudest voice. Your analogy here carries some weight with me as well and I like it. I even allowed that there should be a limerick to represent your thoughts. Perhaps you could compose one. I gave it a try but I'm sorely lacking in rhyming skills. Only one point of contention. Algorithmic tables are widely applied in the gaming world for a reason...They are easy to construct, they are friendly to a wide variety of applications and they work, and they work quite well. So 'weird' is probably not the adjective that I'd apply to it. I also liked your reference to the fact that the simplest answer may be the correct one. So...How about this. You get more instants simply because there are more to be had...
 

Ashrem

Oh Wise One
Let me ask you this, first. What is the 'standard' way to distribute percentage chances?
Generate a pseudo random and compare it to the list.
Second, where has it been said how the table was programmed or even what it is? That's a fact that I've referenced repeatedly.
It hasn't. There's no reason to "program" a table for a random prize. You create a fixed table, you request a random number and you compare the random number to the table.
What is the 'standard deviation' would be my next question. Who established it and when was it announced? I guess I missed it.
Standard deviation is not a thing, it's a mathematical concept that indicates that anything (especially anything random) will not always be a perfect match for the expected result. The larger your sample, the smaller your standard deviation is expected to be. If you are flipping a coin twice to select heads or tails, the standard deviation would be 100%, because there's nothing at all unusual about getting the same result twice in two tries. If you do 5 million flips, your standard deviation should be substantially below 1% or there is something wrong with your method. One person going for a 25% chance 10 times and missing every time is unusual, and annoying, but it's not outside the standard deviation for a test that is being conducted by thousands of players. In such a test, we expect there will be a few with extraordinarily good or bad results.
So...How about this. You get more instants simply because there are more to be had...
Agreed. As indicated elsewhere, people tend to focus on their 25% chance of getting a building, instead of their 75% chance of not getting a building.
 

DeletedUser7370

Guest
What is the 'standard' way to distribute percentage chances?
There is no specific standard, but there are common programming practices that have been used for decades and new programmers soak them up as they read their text books and then put them out without even thinking about it. For something like the rolling on opening the boxes a common method would look like:
Code:
r=random*100
if r>75 then building
else if r>68 then +200 nuts
else if r>60 then +5 runes
else if r>50 then +25 KP
...
else if r>13 then +140 nuts
else +2 booster
 

SoggyShorts

Mathematician par Excellence
What is the 'standard deviation' would be my next question. Who established it and when was it announced? I guess I missed it.

What is the 'standard' way to distribute percentage chances?
There are two main approaches to generating random numbers using a computer: Pseudo-Random Number Generators (PRNGs) and True Random Number Generators (TRNGs).
Using either one of those you then compare the result to your table.
1-25 = building
26-33= 200 nuts
34-41 = 5 runes
etc
 
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