New "Intensity Cubes"

[MNDuke]

Then explain why the dice are so streaky?

[Metsfanmax]

Then explain why the dice are so streaky?

There's no reason to believe that the dice are streaky. Streaks obviously can happen in random processes, but to even begin to believe that there's a problem, a sizable number of the player base would also need to be showing signs of having lots of streaks. Anecdotal evidence from two players does not make it there.

[natty dread]

I have found the dice less streaky since the change.

Before, you could use the tactic of "roll and wait", to try to hit the good streaks. If you get +2:s, keep rolling, when you get a -2 stop for a while and resume after a pause.

Now this tactic doesn't work anymore, there doesn't seem to be recognizable streaks to take advantage of. The dice are less predictable.

I for one think this is a good thing. It levels the playing field - everyone gets the same random dice, no one can "boost" their chances at better rolls anymore.

Of course some people might be pissed because they had been relying on the roll & wait strategy and now they perceive to get worse dice because their rolling strategy doesn't work anymore. TOUGH SHIT. Adjust your strategies and quit complaining.

[danfrank]

Of course some people might be pissed because they had been relying on the roll & wait strategy and now they perceive to get worse dice because their rolling strategy doesn't work anymore. TOUGH SHIT. Adjust your strategies and quit complaining.

CHEW HARDER

[AAFitz]

Ive defended the dice as much as anyone...however, since the change, I have found that I lose to 1's far more and with far more armies than I ever remember before. I also see much larger stacks losing to small piles on a regular basis, where I really hardly saw it before.

No doubt this could be perception, but I never minded the dice all that much before, and now I simply cant believe how impossible they feel. Again, its perception and perhaps cant be trusted, but I have some experienced, and am pretty sure Im not imagining it.

[Metsfanmax]

Ive defended the dice as much as anyone...however, since the change, I have found that I lose to 1's far more and with far more armies than I ever remember before. I also see much larger stacks losing to small piles on a regular basis, where I really hardly saw it before.

No doubt this could be perception, but I never minded the dice all that much before, and now I simply cant believe how impossible they feel. Again, its perception and perhaps cant be trusted, but I have some experienced, and am pretty sure Im not imagining it.

Use the Dice Streaks script in the Tools forum and see if you come up with strange results.

[Nola_Lifer]

I guess some people don't want random dice they want fair dice. I feel that is the reason for complaints about losing 10v2 and so on and so forth. Also, I am sure they would be just as pissed in real life if they'd lost it. Computer can't generate randomness even in Vegas they are programed so that machines win at a certain %. So thanks lack and everyone else who is involved regarding the dice. I am sure they get shitty dice too

[natty dread]

Computer can't generate randomness

Random numbers used by CC are not computer-generated.

[wolfpack0530]

I am seeing the same argument over and over now. One side is concerned only with the mathematics and its truthfulness. (his opinion is accurate)

the other side is saying, yes i understand that, but look at these results. When you look at these unbeleivable strings of 'unlikely' events happening over and over and within close proximity of each other, it seems very odd, and strange. it also seems to be counterproductive to the point, or (i cant believe i am using this word) 'spirit' of the decision to make the dice random in the first place. it is all about trying to create a fair and level situation for all players.

Mets, we understand the laws of randomness and random numbers moreso than you think. We just realize that his is not a cryptology club, or advanced math theory chat room. This is a game site, that is striving for fairness.

WHO GIVES A f*ck THAT 1000 CONSECUTIVE 1'S IS RANDOM??? If that ever happened to anyone here, the powers that be would probably at least have the notion that the system might be broken, and that THIS random they chose, was far INFERIOR to the previous random that worked decently for years.

This is my thinking in a nutshell.

Lets say you have a situation where you have a 15 v 3. and you fail. That is a rare occurence!!! you just witnessed something that only happens .22 % of the time. And you would not be considered crazy to expect to win in that situation 99% of the time. Then you lose in that situation, once a day (at least). somedays 3 turns in a row. And you witness something with that low of a probability happens on your turns every day. The odds of that should be pretty low. Why it is the new norm, I dont know, but that is not what it SHOULD be.

What are you to think? You know that the dice are random, and you know that over 200 million turns, that you are likely to run into almost every 'impossible' scenario at least once just by chance, but you still cant help but think that.....................................
these games are just low probability occurance after low prob occ. It is the 'normal' dice that are becoming rare.

Soon we will be having players going, "holy shit 8 v 10 turned into 2 v 4. I should take a screenshot of this. the fellas wont believe it!!"

That is the issue at hand. Lets drop the semantics about the definition of random, and address the issue of getting a BETTER RANDOM , because the random they chose is a fucking dud!!!!

[wolfpack0530]

Computer can't generate randomness

Random numbers used by CC are not computer-generated.

They are a list right. a list of random numbers, not related to each other, shuffled up in a random way, then listed in sequence, and chosen at a random place on the sequence.

Is that correct?

[natty dread]

Computer can't generate randomness

Random numbers used by CC are not computer-generated.

They are a list right. a list of random numbers, not related to each other, shuffled up in a random way, then listed in sequence, and chosen at a random place on the sequence.

Is that correct?

They are random numbers acquired from random.org which acquires them by receiving and sampling atmospheric noise and converting it to digital form. Atmospheric noise being natural white noise it is a very reliable source of randomness.

These numbers are imported to CC as a list of 50000 numbers from which CC picks from a random place the numbers for each roll.

For all intents and purposes the numbers acquired by this system are completely random and unpredictable.

[AAFitz]

Ive defended the dice as much as anyone...however, since the change, I have found that I lose to 1's far more and with far more armies than I ever remember before. I also see much larger stacks losing to small piles on a regular basis, where I really hardly saw it before.

No doubt this could be perception, but I never minded the dice all that much before, and now I simply cant believe how impossible they feel. Again, its perception and perhaps cant be trusted, but I have some experienced, and am pretty sure Im not imagining it.

Use the Dice Streaks script in the Tools forum and see if you come up with strange results.

You mean like losing 26 to 6 twice in two days. I dont need a script for that thanks. And Im not slowing down my freestyle games to keep track of something I dont need to keep track of.

[Metsfanmax]

I am seeing the same argument over and over now. One side is concerned only with the mathematics and its truthfulness. (his opinion is accurate)

the other side is saying, yes i understand that, but look at these results. When you look at these unbeleivable strings of 'unlikely' events happening over and over and within close proximity of each other, it seems very odd, and strange. it also seems to be counterproductive to the point, or (i cant believe i am using this word) 'spirit' of the decision to make the dice random in the first place. it is all about trying to create a fair and level situation for all players.

Mets, we understand the laws of randomness and random numbers moreso than you think. We just realize that his is not a cryptology club, or advanced math theory chat room. This is a game site, that is striving for fairness.

WHO GIVES A f*ck THAT 1000 CONSECUTIVE 1'S IS RANDOM??? If that ever happened to anyone here, the powers that be would probably at least have the notion that the system might be broken, and that THIS random they chose, was far INFERIOR to the previous random that worked decently for years.

This is my thinking in a nutshell.

Lets say you have a situation where you have a 15 v 3. and you fail. That is a rare occurence!!! you just witnessed something that only happens .22 % of the time. And you would not be considered crazy to expect to win in that situation 99% of the time. Then you lose in that situation, once a day (at least). somedays 3 turns in a row. And you witness something with that low of a probability happens on your turns every day. The odds of that should be pretty low. Why it is the new norm, I dont know, but that is not what it SHOULD be.

What are you to think? You know that the dice are random, and you know that over 200 million turns, that you are likely to run into almost every 'impossible' scenario at least once just by chance, but you still cant help but think that.....................................
these games are just low probability occurance after low prob occ. It is the 'normal' dice that are becoming rare.

Soon we will be having players going, "holy shit 8 v 10 turned into 2 v 4. I should take a screenshot of this. the fellas wont believe it!!"

That is the issue at hand. Lets drop the semantics about the definition of random, and address the issue of getting a BETTER RANDOM , because the random they chose is a fucking dud!!!!

There's nothing "wrong" with the random we have now. If you want the dice to be rigged so that you win with both armies in a 3v2 exactly 37.17% of the time, then just go ahead and actually say it, but you're not going to find many supporters for that argument. The results from random.org have been shown to be quite fair to a high degree of accuracy. As a result, there's nothing wrong with the dice they've given us. The only thing wrong here, is the unreasonable expectation from people that if an event has a probability of 99% of occurring, that it should basically never happen.

[Kabanellas]

where is the randomness of losing in 2 consecutive rounds 14 troops while killing 0, in 7 3v2 dice rolls. It's getting ridiculous and it keeps happening all the time.

[TheSaxlad]

Are People STILL Complaining?


...

[carlpgoodrich]

Ive defended the dice as much as anyone...however, since the change, I have found that I lose to 1's far more and with far more armies than I ever remember before. I also see much larger stacks losing to small piles on a regular basis, where I really hardly saw it before.

No doubt this could be perception, but I never minded the dice all that much before, and now I simply cant believe how impossible they feel. Again, its perception and perhaps cant be trusted, but I have some experienced, and am pretty sure Im not imagining it.

Use the Dice Streaks script in the Tools forum and see if you come up with strange results.

You mean like losing 26 to 6 twice in two days. I dont need a script for that thanks. And Im not slowing down my freestyle games to keep track of something I dont need to keep track of.

You might be able to believe what you're saying without the script, but if you want anyone else to believe you then you do need the script. Its really amusing that for all the complaining, not one person has downloaded these scripts and still complained. Seems like its all in your head.

Also, there is a very easy way to settle this, though I'm not sure if Lack would be willing to do it. Since we get a new list of 50,000 numbers from random.org every hour, it would be nice if Lack would post some of the "old" lists so we can analyze them.

[Metsfanmax]

Also, there is a very easy way to settle this, though I'm not sure if Lack would be willing to do it. Since we get a new list of 50,000 numbers from random.org every hour, it would be nice if Lack would post some of the "old" lists so we can analyze them.

This is true. All we would have to do is write a simple script to analyze all possible consecutive sets of five numbers, and see if that would result in abnormal 3v2 results (i.e., 3v2 wouldn't win 37% of the time).

I'm going to submit an eTicket with this request.

[carlpgoodrich]

Also, there is a very easy way to settle this, though I'm not sure if Lack would be willing to do it. Since we get a new list of 50,000 numbers from random.org every hour, it would be nice if Lack would post some of the "old" lists so we can analyze them.

This is true. All we would have to do is write a simple script to analyze all possible consecutive sets of five numbers, and see if that would result in abnormal 3v2 results (i.e., 3v2 wouldn't win 37% of the time).

I'm going to submit an eTicket with this request.

Cool. If he agrees, I would be more than willing to write some analysis scripts.

[AAFitz]

Ive defended the dice as much as anyone...however, since the change, I have found that I lose to 1's far more and with far more armies than I ever remember before. I also see much larger stacks losing to small piles on a regular basis, where I really hardly saw it before.

No doubt this could be perception, but I never minded the dice all that much before, and now I simply cant believe how impossible they feel. Again, its perception and perhaps cant be trusted, but I have some experienced, and am pretty sure Im not imagining it.

Use the Dice Streaks script in the Tools forum and see if you come up with strange results.

You mean like losing 26 to 6 twice in two days. I dont need a script for that thanks. And Im not slowing down my freestyle games to keep track of something I dont need to keep track of.

You might be able to believe what you're saying without the script, but if you want anyone else to believe you then you do need the script. Its really amusing that for all the complaining, not one person has downloaded these scripts and still complained. Seems like its all in your head.

Also, there is a very easy way to settle this, though I'm not sure if Lack would be willing to do it. Since we get a new list of 50,000 numbers from random.org every hour, it would be nice if Lack would post some of the "old" lists so we can analyze them.

Whats amusing is your inability to read and comprehend. IM not trying to make anyone believe. Im also not complaining, or suggesting any action based on what I said. I am only, and obviously just pointing out my perception of the new dice, and my experience with them since installation. As far as it being in my head, its possible, but after 10000 games, I do have some experience with them, and am perfectly able to remember to 26 vs 6 losses, inside of 24 hours. I also have probably attacked 6 vs 1, 10000 times. I know the odds, and when I lose 6v1, every day with the few games I play, I know as much as one can know that the odds have changed.

Now, if you dont believe me, I dont care. I dont even care if anyone does. Its simply my perception of what Ive seen with the new dice, and after defending the dice for three years, and not seeing anything to make me think they were not random...I now do, and to an alarming degree. As I said, it may just be my perception, but I saw it before I even knew the dice were changed.

[wolfpack0530]

quote="Metsfanmax"

There's nothing "wrong" with the random we have now. If you want the dice to be rigged so that you win with both armies in a 3v2 exactly 37.17% of the time, then just go ahead and actually say it, but you're not going to find many supporters for that argument

.


You assume waaay too much sir. First you assume that i care alot about winning and losing, and you keep using the word rigged , which implies certain connotations of cheating and deception. Both are quite inaccurate, and unwarranted.
I dont need any dice to be rigged so that 3v2 wins 37.17% of the time. I KNOW that they WILL win 37.17% of the time with a very large sample size approaching infinity. Quit talking semantics and wasting our time citing things we both already know

The results from random.org have been shown to be quite fair to a high degree of accuracy. As a result, there's nothing wrong with the dice they've given us.

I dont doubt that the numbers themselves are perfectly random, or that random.org is unfair. I started this by just posting my personal observations. Perhaps random.org's numbers, and tests were performed on large sample sizes. I am assuming that the more rolls one takes, the more "even" the dice become. After 20,000,000 rolls you see pretty clearly that you have pretty much rolled each number 16.67% of the time, and so has the defender.

But what about the short term? a sample size of 30 rolls, or 15, or even 100. perhaps, random.org's or whatever manipulation CC uses, doesnt stack up so "fairly" over such small sample sizes as the previous manipulation did.

Perhaps, changing the dice was a huge mistake?

The only thing wrong here, is the unreasonable expectation from people that if an event has a probability of 99% of occurring, that it should basically never happen.

How could you be so obtuse as to assume that?? I cant speak for others, but i expect an event with a 1% chance of occurring, to occur 1% (plus or minus the standard deviation) of the time. Of course this would be over a larger sample size. Over the course of 10,000 rolls, I expect to see between 80-120 "unlikely events" defined by me as events likely to occur less than 1% of the time. Now if I see 50 "unlikely events" in 700 rolls, then i start to think that is very odd. then i see another 50 unlikely events in the next 1300 rolls, my doubts start to become confirmed in my mind. I have just seen 100 rare occurrances in 2000 rolls, this is far exceeding the 1% of the time probablility i was expecting. I doubt that true randomness is occuring, and i highly doubt that i will see only 0-20 rare occurances in the next 8000 rolls.

Of course i just made these numbers up to prove a point. The point being that we all expect crappy strings of dice, and to lose 15-1 from time to time, but it should not be happening daily, UNLESS THE DICE ARE MESSED UP OR[size=150] RIGGED[/size] as you so eloquantly put it.

[bedub1]

quote="Metsfanmax"

There's nothing "wrong" with the random we have now. If you want the dice to be rigged so that you win with both armies in a 3v2 exactly 37.17% of the time, then just go ahead and actually say it, but you're not going to find many supporters for that argument

.


You assume waaay too much sir. First you assume that i care alot about winning and losing, and you keep using the word rigged , which implies certain connotations of cheating and deception. Both are quite inaccurate, and unwarranted.
I dont need any dice to be rigged so that 3v2 wins 37.17% of the time. I KNOW that they WILL win 37.17% of the time with a very large sample size approaching infinity. Quit talking semantics and wasting our time citing things we both already know

The results from random.org have been shown to be quite fair to a high degree of accuracy. As a result, there's nothing wrong with the dice they've given us.

I dont doubt that the numbers themselves are perfectly random, or that random.org is unfair. I started this by just posting my personal observations. Perhaps random.org's numbers, and tests were performed on large sample sizes. I am assuming that the more rolls one takes, the more "even" the dice become. After 20,000,000 rolls you see pretty clearly that you have pretty much rolled each number 16.67% of the time, and so has the defender.

But what about the short term? a sample size of 30 rolls, or 15, or even 100. perhaps, random.org's or whatever manipulation CC uses, doesnt stack up so "fairly" over such small sample sizes as the previous manipulation did.

Perhaps, changing the dice was a huge mistake?

The only thing wrong here, is the unreasonable expectation from people that if an event has a probability of 99% of occurring, that it should basically never happen.

How could you be so obtuse as to assume that?? I cant speak for others, but i expect an event with a 1% chance of occurring, to occur 1% (plus or minus the standard deviation) of the time. Of course this would be over a larger sample size. Over the course of 10,000 rolls, I expect to see between 80-120 "unlikely events" defined by me as events likely to occur less than 1% of the time. Now if I see 50 "unlikely events" in 700 rolls, then i start to think that is very odd. then i see another 50 unlikely events in the next 1300 rolls, my doubts start to become confirmed in my mind. I have just seen 100 rare occurrances in 2000 rolls, this is far exceeding the 1% of the time probablility i was expecting. I doubt that true randomness is occuring, and i highly doubt that i will see only 0-20 rare occurances in the next 8000 rolls.

Of course i just made these numbers up to prove a point. The point being that we all expect crappy strings of dice, and to lose 15-1 from time to time, but it should not be happening daily, UNLESS THE DICE ARE MESSED UP OR[size=150] RIGGED[/size] as you so eloquantly put it.

Keep in mind the daily sample size is something along the lines of 2 million dice rolls a day....So things that are 1 in a million happen several times a day..

[bedub1]

I agree that using a PRNG pick a number between 1 and 6 gives PRNs, but that is not what we are doing, not at all. If you use a TRNG to generate a list of TRNs, and you want to read from this list, starting at the beginning is just as arbitrary as starting anywhere else. Hence using a PRNG to pick where we start does nothing to remove the "true" randomness of the list of TRNs.

I got it. So if you had a list of peoples names, and you used random.org in this fashion to get a persons name:

Q3.6: How do I pick one or more items from a list at random?

The easiest way to do this is to use the List Randomizer as follows:

1. Enter all your list items on separate lines in the List Randomizer and submit the form. This will produce a randomized list.
2. The item picked will be the first that appears on the randomized list. If you need to pick two items, use the first two from the randomized list, and so forth.
3. Discard the remaining items.

Then you get a truly random persons name.

But if you use a PRNG to pick a persons name, then you get a PR name. But you guys are saying it's still a name. But instead of us picking from a list of names, we pick from a list of TRUE random numbers. So even though we picked it Pseudo Randomly, it's still a persons name, or true random number?

YES! Thats a really good example, I wish I had though of that... But yes, to my understanding that is correct. And since they are true random numbers, it doesn't matter if we read them sequentially or in some arbitrary fashion (like a PRNG).

I would argue that you have a person, and you have a number, or a pseudo random person and a pseudo random number. Just as you have a Pseudoly picked person, you have a Pseudoly picked number. It doesn't matter that it's a "truly random" number or a "truly random" person or a "pseudoly random" person or just 6 numbers on the side of a die. Order of operations is what applies.

Order of operations
Truly Truly random = Truly
Truly Pseudo random = Truly
Pseudo Truly = Pseudo
Pseudo Pseudo = Pseudo

Does this make sense?

[Metsfanmax]

You assume waaay too much sir. First you assume that i care alot about winning and losing, and you keep using the word rigged , which implies certain connotations of cheating and deception. Both are quite inaccurate, and unwarranted.

I said nothing regarding cheating or deception. My point was quite straightforward - if you object to streaks, the only logical alternative is to "fix" the dice so that they don't happen.

I dont need any dice to be rigged so that 3v2 wins 37.17% of the time. I KNOW that they WILL win 37.17% of the time with a very large sample size approaching infinity. Quit talking semantics and wasting our time citing things we both already know
I dont doubt that the numbers themselves are perfectly random, or that random.org is unfair. I started this by just posting my personal observations. Perhaps random.org's numbers, and tests were performed on large sample sizes. I am assuming that the more rolls one takes, the more "even" the dice become. After 20,000,000 rolls you see pretty clearly that you have pretty much rolled each number 16.67% of the time, and so has the defender.

But what about the short term? a sample size of 30 rolls, or 15, or even 100. perhaps, random.org's or whatever manipulation CC uses, doesnt stack up so "fairly" over such small sample sizes as the previous manipulation did.

Perhaps, changing the dice was a huge mistake?

This is an illogical conclusion. We're using the same RNG that we used to (all numbers previously came, and still do come, from random.org). We've only changed the method we use to obtain the numbers from that site. Therefore, unless random.org has changed its algorithm around the same time we changed our method of obtaining the dice from them, then nothing has changed, and you can't say the dice have changed at all.

How could you be so obtuse as to assume that?? I cant speak for others, but i expect an event with a 1% chance of occurring, to occur 1% (plus or minus the standard deviation) of the time.

Well, I don't want to be rude, but I assume things like that because of incorrect statements like this. Probability only meaningfully deals with the proportions of events occurring over a large sample size, as you point out in the next line - it has nothing to do with how often an event occurs in time. If the only test for fairness is that the event occurs about 100 times in 10,000 rolls, then the test is still being upheld if all 100 times happen in the first 200 rolls of that sample. You're being disingenuous below when you say that this proves there's a problem with the dice - either you believe that probability is only meaningful over large sample sizes, or you don't. If you do, you can't point to a small sample (~1000 rolls) and use it to say the dice aren't random.

Of course this would be over a larger sample size. Over the course of 10,000 rolls, I expect to see between 80-120 "unlikely events" defined by me as events likely to occur less than 1% of the time. Now if I see 50 "unlikely events" in 700 rolls, then i start to think that is very odd. then i see another 50 unlikely events in the next 1300 rolls, my doubts start to become confirmed in my mind. I have just seen 100 rare occurrances in 2000 rolls, this is far exceeding the 1% of the time probablility i was expecting. I doubt that true randomness is occuring, and i highly doubt that i will see only 0-20 rare occurances in the next 8000 rolls.

Again, the only way that the dice could be non-random is if random.org has a flawed algorithm (which they don't). That being said, carl and I have also said that one way that streaks could occur is if the sequences of numbers we get are somehow skewed toward changing the probabilities of a given 3v2 roll, for example. If the numbers were purely random, then this would not be an issue, but I suppose it's conceivably within the realm of possibilities in the Universe that there's enough of a bias in the distribution such that these patterns could occur. This is why I've submitted an eTicket for some of the old dice lists to be released, and we'll do some analysis on those lists to see whether they substantially deviate from expected outcomes for large samples. I would hope that if we find that the results are suitably random, that you would admit that there really isn't a problem with the dice.

[Commander9]

Well, I guess I'll be just another one in a long line to say this, but these are sure as hell not random. More so, it's comes in certain dice series and then you usually have periods of "yay" and "F*** this." However, after I bought my premium, it pretty much has been almost always the "F*** this" mode, as I almost never get even "moderate" or "average" dice. It's rather funny how in 4 games of 5 I'll need at least 3 dice to take one, while my opponent will sweep through me without any restraints. Normally, I'm not the one to complain in public, but this is rather ridiculous. Don't get me wrong, I know that having bad dice is a part of games, but not all the time. All I want is that my opponents wouldn't get extreme handicap almost every time they play with me.

I know my opinion doesn't matter, but while these dice are many things, random is definitely not one of them. I really love this game and the essence of this, but this just cost me too many nerves. After my premium expires, I'll probably will go back to being a premium with "happy" dice, as this is just not worth it.

Best regards,
Tom.

[Metsfanmax]

Well, I guess I'll be just another one in a long line to say this, but these are sure as hell not random.

http://www.random.org/statistics/