You Are The One

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GaPete_slith
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You Are The One

Post by GaPete_slith »

I have not brought this up because until now, I had wondered if I was really imagining things. I'm also not sure that uploading a zipped game file will show this. I realized today I already have two games zipped and on the board where this has happened so, why not ask? A couple of games ago I started to think that I was encountering an unexplainable number of ones in land combat rolls. I was using the die six charts. In my game before last I attacked Paris 18 times in a game year and rolled a big fat one, every single time. Now I know this is possible, I just find it statistically unlikely and this is not mentioning the fact that the Paris attacks were not the only ones with a high number of one results. The game did not start out doing this but, by the end, I could not seem to get another result. The next game I played, the one zipped and uploaded in the conquest of japan thread, did the same thing. If you look at the game you will notice that Germany did not even conquer Poland in that game. The rolls were so bad, and ones so often, that the entire thing devolved into one big war of attrition that the Germans could not win. The game I started yesterday, I switched charts and I'm getting varied results again. Has anyone else noticed something similar? I'm curious.
If I am to be damned then let it be for who I am and not what I think you want me to be.
4personalbusiness
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RE: You Are The One

Post by 4personalbusiness »

You rolled a one 18 times in a row? I asked this question some time ago and the answer basically was making a randomizer is so easy that we shouldn't even ask about it. You should read those posts...I can't remember where the thread is but you can find it in the list of my posts in my profile area. Now, to be fair, I've played 2d10 exclusively over the past year and never noticed anything weird. Does 2d10 use the same internal die roller? Who knows? But you're not likely to get any hard evidence here that the internal die roller is reliable. You just have to take it on faith. FlaPete

PS, Other die roll services do publish reports/charts on the accuracy of their die rollers. You can always use one of those if you're a skeptical type who actually likes to see evidence before believing something. [:-]
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GaPete_slith
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RE: You Are The One

Post by GaPete_slith »

Well it wasn't 18 times in a row, it was 18 attacks by the allies on Paris, in a game year, and every single attack rolled a one. Of course, it wasn't only those attacks. I started to notice that most of the attacks, anywhere, were never rolling higher than a 3, most of the time 1's. This continued in the next game I played. This was in stark contrast to the games before it where it seemed like the Germans could never do any wrong. The game I am playing now, I switched to d10 and so far, I'm getting far more varied results. I also have to note, this was for land combat only, the air and naval rolls, etc, all seemed perfectly random.
If I am to be damned then let it be for who I am and not what I think you want me to be.
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TeaLeaf
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RE: You Are The One

Post by TeaLeaf »

Just remember (M)WiF is a game where luck has a huge influence.
In a short game luck isn't such a bad thing because it ends soon and then you can play another game. In WiF I find the luck factor a design flaw.
If pure, dumb luck makes it impossible for a player to make any progress and ultimately loose the game, you're looking at 80+ hours of suffering.

I have not seen too many '1's or '2's in my games though...
More of extremely unfair allocation of who gets to roll the ones or the tens when...
Much like: 'always' rolling HIGH during naval search, AVERAGE during air combat and LOW during land combat... Your rolls are statistically averaged out and yet extremely unlucky.
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Courtenay
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RE: You Are The One

Post by Courtenay »

The luck described is so extreme, though, that something seems wrong. A repeated use of the same random number seed? I don't know, but I would check my user settings.
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RE: You Are The One

Post by paulderynck »

Back when I was a manager I noticed that people were taking sick days on Mondays and Fridays - an astonishing 40% of the work week!!
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GaPete_slith
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RE: You Are The One

Post by GaPete_slith »

Tealeaf, I understand statistics and the luck factor and it was one reason why I was so hesitant and waited literally months and months, along with playing two separate solo games, to bring this up. I wanted to see it happen in more than one game. Course the flaw here with the luck factor theory was settled with the last game I played. The Paris example was just an example. The fact was this was going on with all of the rolls, for all sides, using the d6 charts. If you get in a situation where all sides can build a defense that reduces attacks to 3 and 2 to 1 odds, the resulting game is like refighting world war one. If you look at that game I uploaded in the conquest of japan problem thread, you will note that even Poland survived the war. It was after that game I was sure something was not quite right. What I did not know, still don't, is if this is a problem in the game, my computer, or some combination. The only way to find out is ask questions and see what others have experienced. In this case, the work around for this has been successful. I simply stopped using the d6 charts. What I was also unsure of, was there some modifier at work I didn't know about?

Courtenay, that's a good idea. I'm going to check all of those.
If I am to be damned then let it be for who I am and not what I think you want me to be.
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Joseignacio
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RE: You Are The One

Post by Joseignacio »

ORIGINAL: 4personalbusiness

You rolled a one 18 times in a row? I asked this question some time ago and the answer basically was making a randomizer is so easy that we shouldn't even ask about it. You should read those posts...I can't remember where the thread is but you can find it in the list of my posts in my profile area. Now, to be fair, I've played 2d10 exclusively over the past year and never noticed anything weird. Does 2d10 use the same internal die roller? Who knows? But you're not likely to get any hard evidence here that the internal die roller is reliable. You just have to take it on faith. FlaPete

PS, Other die roll services do publish reports/charts on the accuracy of their die rollers. You can always use one of those if you're a skeptical type who actually likes to see evidence before believing something. [:-]

I commented that aa well within the last year, after reading Juntoalmar's AAR in his external blog. Of course there could be the bias of remembering (and posting) more often the cases of extreme rolls but, else, the sequence of extreme rolls was serious.

However, I have rolled with physical die for one year in the Med, trying to find the Regia Marina with a CW fleet and from like 20 rolls in one year, finding only once or twice, my results being mostly 8 and upper. While the It player got 1 to 3 results most of the times, allowing him to abort combat or take it with huge advantage at will. the other times we simply didn't find each other.

It's not the only time I hae had such bad luck but was possibly the worst.

So, I can believe in things like that, but 18 "1s" seem "a bit" excessive for me. [:D]
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Dabrion
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RE: You Are The One

Post by Dabrion »

That is how the dice tell you to play a naval strategy ;)
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RE: You Are The One

Post by Shannon V. OKeets »

ORIGINAL: GaPete

I have not brought this up because until now, I had wondered if I was really imagining things. I'm also not sure that uploading a zipped game file will show this. I realized today I already have two games zipped and on the board where this has happened so, why not ask? A couple of games ago I started to think that I was encountering an unexplainable number of ones in land combat rolls. I was using the die six charts. In my game before last I attacked Paris 18 times in a game year and rolled a big fat one, every single time. Now I know this is possible, I just find it statistically unlikely and this is not mentioning the fact that the Paris attacks were not the only ones with a high number of one results. The game did not start out doing this but, by the end, I could not seem to get another result. The next game I played, the one zipped and uploaded in the conquest of japan thread, did the same thing. If you look at the game you will notice that Germany did not even conquer Poland in that game. The rolls were so bad, and ones so often, that the entire thing devolved into one big war of attrition that the Germans could not win. The game I started yesterday, I switched charts and I'm getting varied results again. Has anyone else noticed something similar? I'm curious.
There are no "die 6 charts". Do you mean 1D10? Or are you playing a game other than MWIF?
Steve

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GaPete_slith
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RE: You Are The One

Post by GaPete_slith »

Yeah my bad, the 1 D10.
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RE: You Are The One

Post by Shannon V. OKeets »

The random number generator is random - that should not be confused with it being 'fair'.

In one of my NetPlay games there was an air battle with one fighter escorting 2 bombers for a ground strike. The defender sent an interceptor and both fighters were shot down on the first round of combat (5 and 2 on the 2 die table). Then the bombers missed all 4 ground strikes (4 and 3 tactical air factors on a clear terrain hex in Fine weather). So the air-to-air combat rolls were low and the ground strike rolls were high.

The missed ground strikes slightly irked me, but c'est la vie.

The next impulse I had 9 unopposed ground strikes: 3 with 5 factors, 2 with 3 factors, 3 with 1 factor, and 1 with 2 factors. All on clear terrain in Fine weather. The first 8 missed![X(] Only the last 20% probability ground strike disorganized a land unit. At the point that the last ground strike worked I was very, very grateful. Those 3 factor ground strikes were to disorganized OOS 7 factor units - success would have reduced them to 1 factor and enabled them to be overrun. Sigh.[8|]
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Joseignacio
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RE: You Are The One

Post by Joseignacio »

Steve, everybody knows that rolling a die doesn't mean you get "fair " results.

But rolling a die 18 times 1 or similar has extraordinary low odds. So it's extremely unprobable in a random numbers generator that works properly (with no unintentional, but existing bias for example?)... Can't calculate the odds because the info of GaPete is not complete but may be we are speaking of 1/1.000.000 or even 1/1.000.000.000 that that could happen, if I am understanding it well.
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paulderynck
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RE: You Are The One

Post by paulderynck »

There was no claim that 18 rolls in a row were '1's. Reading the initial post properly would reveal this.
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Courtenay
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RE: You Are The One

Post by Courtenay »

ORIGINAL: paulderynck

There was no claim that 18 rolls in a row were '1's. Reading the initial post properly would reveal this.
True, he claimed that 18 attacks on Paris produced a 1. The look elsewhere effect does apply, so the odds of this happening were better than 1 in 10^-18. Given the generous assumption that there were 1000 other possible sets of 18 rolls he could pick, the odds were 1 in 10^-15. One in a quadrillion events just don't happen. That is an 8 sigma effect.
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RE: You Are The One

Post by Shannon V. OKeets »

ORIGINAL: GaPete

I have not brought this up because until now, I had wondered if I was really imagining things. I'm also not sure that uploading a zipped game file will show this. I realized today I already have two games zipped and on the board where this has happened so, why not ask? A couple of games ago I started to think that I was encountering an unexplainable number of ones in land combat rolls. I was using the die six charts. In my game before last I attacked Paris 18 times in a game year and rolled a big fat one, every single time. Now I know this is possible, I just find it statistically unlikely and this is not mentioning the fact that the Paris attacks were not the only ones with a high number of one results. The game did not start out doing this but, by the end, I could not seem to get another result. The next game I played, the one zipped and uploaded in the conquest of japan thread, did the same thing. If you look at the game you will notice that Germany did not even conquer Poland in that game. The rolls were so bad, and ones so often, that the entire thing devolved into one big war of attrition that the Germans could not win. The game I started yesterday, I switched charts and I'm getting varied results again. Has anyone else noticed something similar? I'm curious.
How bad were those attacks?

On the 1D10 you subtract 1 from the die roll for each extra major power in the attack (if using the optional rule). You also subtract 1 for each odds level below 1:2. So a 1:5 attack subtracts 3 from the die roll. The program never lets the net die roll go to zero or negative.

Paris has a river on 3 sides, so the attackers might have been halved. Weather can also reduce the odds level, causing reductions in the die roll.

The land combat table resolution form should give summary information about all of those odds modifications.
Steve

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paulderynck
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RE: You Are The One

Post by paulderynck »

ORIGINAL: Courtenay

ORIGINAL: paulderynck

There was no claim that 18 rolls in a row were '1's. Reading the initial post properly would reveal this.
True, he claimed that 18 attacks on Paris produced a 1. The look elsewhere effect does apply, so the odds of this happening were better than 1 in 10^-18. Given the generous assumption that there were 1000 other possible sets of 18 rolls he could pick, the odds were 1 in 10^-15. One in a quadrillion events just don't happen. That is an 8 sigma effect.
Let's make some more generous assumptions. 3-hex assaults by 3 units per hex. If you roll a one they'll all be disorganized. How many HQs are needed to re-org and try again? It is very unlikely that 3 attacks can be done every turn for 6 turns given all the weather combinations. With units attacking from less hexes then the low odds and poor weather combinations will yield the subtractions Steve mentions.

I think the hyperbole here is the number 18.
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Joseignacio
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RE: You Are The One

Post by Joseignacio »

ORIGINAL: paulderynck

There was no claim that 18 rolls in a row were '1's. Reading the initial post properly would reveal this.

I did. If I hadn't I would not have estimated the probabilities in 1/10^6 to 1/10^9 but would have directly and exactly evaluated them in 1/10^18. [:D]
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Joseignacio
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RE: You Are The One

Post by Joseignacio »

ORIGINAL: Courtenay

ORIGINAL: paulderynck

There was no claim that 18 rolls in a row were '1's. Reading the initial post properly would reveal this.
True, he claimed that 18 attacks on Paris produced a 1. The look elsewhere effect does apply, so the odds of this happening were better than 1 in 10^-18. Given the generous assumption that there were 1000 other possible sets of 18 rolls he could pick, the odds were 1 in 10^-15. One in a quadrillion events just don't happen. That is an 8 sigma effect.

Sh*t, I could have spared my previous post. Thanks, Courtenay! [:D]
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paulderynck
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RE: You Are The One

Post by paulderynck »

Maybe the best idea here is to switch to 2D10 and never worry about rolling a 1 for land combat ever again.
Paul
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