An exploration of randomness.
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dough_boy wrote:
I have had numerous reports of server errors and "mass" losses like this. Devs would have to weigh in on whether they are related or not.

But honestly, it is just normal for me to have that happen. Ironically my dice have been much better the last few days.
Cireon wrote:
No, they will be completed unrelated.
“This is how humans are: We question all our beliefs, except for the ones that we really believe in, and those we never think to question.”
- Speaker for the Dead, O.S. Card
Cireon wrote:
Oh sorry, after thinking about it a bit more, I know what's going on.

The bug we had earlier happened only when you would conquer a territory. This means that any time you attacked, and you killed enough troops to take the territory, the server would error. However, if you then retried and rolled badly, you wouldn't conquer the territory, and the server would accept the result. This would cause only the results where you lose to be recorded. So yeah, the troop losses were due to a bug.

Sorry for that. Mistakes happen. Sadly there isn't an easy way to revert things, so your best bet is to have a staff member return points.
“This is how humans are: We question all our beliefs, except for the ones that we really believe in, and those we never think to question.”
- Speaker for the Dead, O.S. Card
kwikool wrote:
and yet again
N. Central Brazil (kwikool) attacked Amazonia (johnboi81) killing 1, losing 7.
Virtuosity98 wrote:
kwikool
and yet again
N. Central Brazil (kwikool) attacked Amazonia (johnboi81) killing 1, losing 7.

These dice are not extreme. They are unlucky, but you would expect an 8vs3 to lose 9% of the time.
Anyway, citing isolated examples does nothing to prove alleged systemic flaws, as has been discussed at length in this very thread.
It is now Day 8. Please submit your Lynch vote, as well as any Role-specific Day actions you wish to perform (countdown).
Day Actions:
• #LYNCH [player], #NO LYNCH, #ABSTAIN in forum thread.
• Role-specific actions (via PM with V98).





B4rny wrote:
I do know, dice are dice. But I'm at a point, where I am losing game after game, because of dice failing me.
U would think, attacker has the advantage, but I'm thinking that's not the case.
My way of counting, and putting my troops is: number of troops to kill + number of territories to take = minimum needed. Most of the time I add 5,6,7 troops, depending on how many I have left. But time after time, the dice are failing me. It can't be, you lose games, over and over, because you make an attack, to start, or in the middle of a winning streak, and you lose the whole game because for example 20 can't kill 10? That doesn't make any sense.

Maybe in a couple of days I will delete this answer, but right now, I'm just frustrated. For those who can, take a look at my lost games, you'll find a lot of lost attacks while going for the win.
Virtuosity98 wrote:
If it keeps happening, chances are it's because it's the most likely outcome.
Your formula:
number of troops to kill + number of territories to take = minimum needed
For me is about a 70% chance of success. Maybe a bit more, but not much more. So if your kill depends on two separate attack runs (which is usually the case) then your overall chance of success is now 0.7*0.7 = 0.49. Much lower. With more splits, the chance falls further. I think this factor is very easy to underestimate.

Again, if something keeps happening time and time again, I look at my strategy rather than the dice. Btw I'm also fully (and painfully) aware that your rank is way higher than mine lol ^^

On the other hand, it is plausible that your losing streak is due to bad dice. I made it to about 4000 rating, then had a horrific streak where everything seemed to go wrong (people attacking me for "no reason", dice refusing to cooperate, 4 cards no set, etc). And since then I haven't been able to recover the 1000 points I lost in a pretty short period of time. So either it's possible to get these awful luck streaks, or my strategic ability has completely abandoned me haha :D

Just my two cents :)
It is now Day 8. Please submit your Lynch vote, as well as any Role-specific Day actions you wish to perform (countdown).
Day Actions:
• #LYNCH [player], #NO LYNCH, #ABSTAIN in forum thread.
• Role-specific actions (via PM with V98).





The_Bishop wrote:
That formula is wrong. Usually you need more troops than that to stay safe, unless there are many 1's in that case it might be okay. And "adding 5, 6, 7 troops" is not a metric, you should express it as a percentage like "adding 10-15% troops more".

Here is a good calculator everybody should use: http://gamesbyemail.com/Games/Gambit/BattleOdds

In any case the outcome of dice is never garanted, you should decide for yourself what is the best safety range. And -- I am happy Virtuosity has already mentioned it -- multiple attacks require odd multiplications, so for example 5 times 90% equals to 60%. I see many which fail to understand that, so they think to be unlucky when in fact they just don't realize they are gambling much.
«God doesn't play dice with the World» ~ Albert Einstein
elysium5 wrote:
It is a strategy game but I sometimes think people forget that it is also a risky strategy game. The dice are random so there is always risk. It is trying to account for both and make your moves accordingly that makes someone a good strategy/risk player but that is the point of this type of game. You can have a pretty good strategy but with a risk factor that could swing a game is very possible, for good and for bad.

You could be the world's best strategist and have more skill than anyone but throw the randomness of dice in there and the outcome is going to vary.

I always think of comparing it to Chess with dice. Could you imagine playing Chess with all the rules the same except that when you try to take a piece instead of it being an automatic takedown you had to roll dice to determine the outcome of the move? You could be the greatest Chess player in the world but all of a sudden the game you are playing now has the added element of risk and randomness. No matter how good you are, you no longer have the ultimate advantage of being the greatest player ever over less skilled players. There is now the element of risk and randomness involved.

That is why I love this game.
"I can picture in my mind a world without war, a world without hate. And I can picture us attacking that world, because they'd never expect it."
Matty wrote:
Yeah, the thing about battles with dice (and real battles btw) is that they can fail. And you need to have a backup plan for when it does (or overwelming numbers so that the chance of failing is less).

Please don't delete the answer - it has a very good point. Dice are dice, and dice being dice, they can (and eventually will) betray you. So plan accordingly.
"Strength doesn't lie in numbers, strength doesn't lie in wealth. Strength lies in nights of peaceful slumbers." ~Maria
B4rny wrote:
https://dominating12.com/game/1084872
https://dominating12.com/game/1077486
https://dominating12.com/game/1080693
https://dominating12.com/game/1083793
https://dominating12.com/game/1075664
https://dominating12.com/game/1079390
https://dominating12.com/game/1081273

In the ongoing D12 game I also failed my attack, but there I had to split more tighter than I wanted to, so there Bishop's theory is valuable: the more times you have 80% luck, the bigger your chances to fail. https://dominating12.com/game/1078039

These are just a few, where I lost the game, because I failed my attack. Sometimes it was close, sometimes it was close to ridiculous. But I never start an attack thinking: Oops, I will need luck here.

If someone is interested, or if you just have too much time, feel free to give some feedback.. :)
kwikool wrote:
i play 3-4 games a week. with regular dice and i can tell you that these dice do not emulate real life. normally the attacker has a slight advantage. i have never seen that over the long haul that that is what happens.. im not a programmer but as i said i play with real dice every week...and these do NOT act like real dice.
The_Bishop wrote:
To every dice complainer.

I personally ran (time consuming) tests on D-twelve virtual dice with thousands of rolls in sets of ten and the average outcome of ten rolls (3v2 dice) was kills 11, loses 9. Just as expected. Extreme cases also happened like kills 19, loses 1 or kills 3, loses 17 but they were rare. Actually the more are extreme the more are rare. This is what I have been experimenting here at DominatingTwelve. So how are dice in real life? I'm curious to know!

I also play in real life and it's totally different, not the dice but the environment, we talk, eat, drink, we have pleasure staying with friends, it's easier to forget bad dice, and also it's easier to stop an attack when things are going wrong, while in the on-line game people keep clicking without checking the outcome. And surely you play much more games here than on a real board, so you can much more often see something extreme here than on a board. Well it's correct, it's just what we expect (mathematically). Don't you?

There are always a few people complaining about dice but they always are a very small minority. Why the rest of the community has nothing to complain about? I mean, if dice were unrealistic as you said I would stop immediately to play and I would ask Cireon and Matty to fix them. But I can't see anything unrealistic. Do you think to be the only having bad luck? So is there a conspiracy against you? :D I can't believe something like that. It's just that all the others do not write in the forums everytime they got bad dice. Just that.
«God doesn't play dice with the World» ~ Albert Einstein
God_of_War wrote:
Run the test of 45 vs 20 and let me know how many times you get kill only 15 and die 45. That' what put me over the edge.

Just saying. It simply feels bugged at times where you can't do anything to kill a certain spot. No matter how much you "switch it up" wait, attack other areas, etc...

I believe you, but you also have to believe us too. :)
Hi there!