Curse

Myrkwid · May 05, 2007, 09:56 AM // 09:56

My three oldest characters, what did they get?
For their first birthday they got jade armors, now for their second, they got windriders.
Yes, all three of them.

Now people will say "hey, it's a gift, don't complain", and I have to say, that's true, but you can tell me what you want. It still shows that there is something really bad coded. I'd bet that's the same reason why the "simulated luck" in gw just boils down to streaks.

Lockpicks? broke all, except for one evening, where six in a row did not break (17% chance to not break).
Chests? An evening just purple ones? Yeahyeah...just "bad luck"
Weird drop distribution?
Monster drops?
(...)

Anyone else experienced this? Or is just my account cursed and to be deleted?

Kas · May 05, 2007, 10:31 AM // 10:31

Imho the random generator is downright broken but balances itself over the course of time.

vixro · May 05, 2007, 10:37 AM // 10:37

3 presents, 3 whiptails. what happened to random?

Odinius · May 05, 2007, 10:53 AM // 10:53

well 3 bone dragons and 3 mini gwen's would make my day

but I can imagine you being exited about what's it gonna be, same same same....boring.

Arduin · May 05, 2007, 11:05 AM // 11:05

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kas

Imho the random generator is downright broken but balances itself over the course of time.

Hopefully that course of time isn't 10 years

All B-day pets were whites for me (got about 7 of them) so I should be getting a lot of Gwen's hopefully.

nugzta · May 05, 2007, 11:10 AM // 11:10

I got 5 siege turtles

Myrkwid · May 05, 2007, 11:26 AM // 11:26

Well, I tend to be a bit aggressive without my morningcoffee

I'm not complaining about getting windriders because they are white. In fact I basically can't complain about that. I rarely use minis, I don't buy/sell them and I vastly preffer creatures over npcs. What I'm complaining about is the randomness, or more the lack of it.
Getting just jades, whiptails or windriders is kind of boring and not fun.

Also I want to point out the main reason for the complaint:
I guess they did not code an extra routine to determine what mini you get. If the same random generator is used to determine all other "random" things in gw, that might be the reason why people experience weird streakes. Like my example with the lockpicks above. Or unequal lootdistribution. Or it might be the reason why some say "hard mode is like paradise, rares everywhere" and others say "Duh? What? I don't even get gold".

Something is definately broken with it, as the number of streakes I encountered in this game can't be explained with pure "luck/ bad luck" anymore and at least some others have experienced it too.
It sometimes feels like the algorithm is using the account name and the current date as input value

makosi · May 05, 2007, 11:33 AM // 11:33

I recieved 3 Fungal Wallows on my main account and a Charr Shaman on my abandonded secondary account.

I know it's a conspiracy theory but I believe its related to farming flags in some way.

BlueNovember · May 05, 2007, 12:11 PM // 12:11

If I toss a coin 10 times and get 10 heads, it does not mean the coin is biased. Same applies to not breaking 6 lockpicks or getting the same 2 minipets twice over.

Conversely, if I tossed a coin 100 times and got 100 heads the coin is certainly biased. Same applies if you had got ~20 lockpicks retained in a row. Granted, retaining 6 consecutive lockpicks is ~0.002% chance, but with hundreds of thousands of people using lockpicks all over the place... perhaps there's some dependance there? Either that or you got quite lucky.

You never said how many lockpicks you broke, but with a 83% chance to break each one, you are expecting to lose quite a few.

Big Suprise · May 05, 2007, 12:14 PM // 12:14

i got 2x turtle too =( same acc.

bamm bamm bamm · May 05, 2007, 12:29 PM // 12:29

For a start, random number algorithms are so close to random as to make no difference, including the probably standard and widely used one that Anet uses, but if you can write a better one without advocating a new PCIe card that measures background radiation, go ahead.

Secondly, your anecdotal evidence means not only less than nothing, but you seem to not understand that 'random' includes the events you describe. The whole point of 'random' and not 'fairly distributed' is so unlikely scenarios can happen. If you only want the mean outcome for everyone, complain about using random distribution at all, not the quality of the algorithm. You might have actually had a point.

Thirdly, do you think that people who got different pets come to this website and say 'Hey guys, I got different pets! I just signed up to say great work on that Random Number Generator, Anet! A+++." But because 20 people are going to post here saying they aren't on the trend line, you are going to have your ill-informed opinion reinforced. come back with 20,000 experiences and we'll have a look.

I blame Izzy. I heard he wrote a custom random number generator that only favors people who aren't me. Fire him.

Jecht Scye · May 05, 2007, 12:41 PM // 12:41

What he said^^. More specifically, this part:

Quote:

Originally Posted by bamm bamm bamm

Secondly, your anecdotal evidence means not only less than nothing, but you seem to not understand that 'random' includes the events you describe. The whole point of 'random' and not 'fairly distributed' is so unlikely scenarios can happen. If you only want the mean outcome for everyone, complain about using random distribution at all, not the quality of the algorithm. You might have actually had a point.

william1975 · May 05, 2007, 12:52 PM // 12:52

Well I have had four minipets as first bthday presents so far, they have all been different and all white, I would have liked better ones but its luck, yes i have had awful streaks of bad luck with chests, i opened 14 in a row, over two maps and got all purple, but thats luck, i presume you have 50/50 chance of getting one or other, my lockpicks have not broken about a third f the time with 20% chance, i agree with the other two posts its random it sucks at times, but that happens

Yes i would hate to get all the same pet for presents, but if i did i wouldnt say it was brken, just a tremendous amount of bad luck

then i would try to swap them or sell them

Diddy bow · May 05, 2007, 01:11 PM // 13:11

mini pets seem fine but every gold i get seems to have a firey pre-fix and wardingn suffix O_o

Myrkwid · May 05, 2007, 01:37 PM // 13:37

Quote:

Originally Posted by bamm bamm bamm

For a start, random number algorithms are so close to random as to make no difference, including the probably standard and widely used one that Anet uses, but if you can write a better one without advocating a new PCIe card that measures background radiation, go ahead.

The probably standard one used by ANet, but you don't know, so this comment is worthless.

Quote:

Originally Posted by bamm bamm bamm

Secondly, your anecdotal evidence means not only less than nothing, but you seem to not understand that 'random' includes the events you describe. The whole point of 'random' and not 'fairly distributed' is so unlikely scenarios can happen. If you only want the mean outcome for everyone, complain about using random distribution at all, not the quality of the algorithm. You might have actually had a point.

Again, even the weirdest things can happen, the lottery tossing the same numbers twice in a row. But if such things happen on a frequent basis, then there is no real randomness.

Quote:

Originally Posted by bamm bamm bamm

Thirdly, do you think that people who got different pets come to this website and say 'Hey guys, I got different pets! I just signed up to say great work on that Random Number Generator, Anet! A+++." But because 20 people are going to post here saying they aren't on the trend line, you are going to have your ill-informed opinion reinforced. come back with 20,000 experiences and we'll have a look.

If a small percentage experiences a bug, do you want to tell them "there is no bug, look at the others who don't experience it! COme back with 20.000 others and we might have a look at it." And if you read it, then you might have noticed, that I'm asking if others experiencing the same. But obviously posts in a forum are subjected to fanboism.

Lydz · May 05, 2007, 01:42 PM // 13:42

Quote:

Originally Posted by makosi

I recieved 3 Fungal Wallows on my main account and a Charr Shaman on my abandonded secondary account.

I know it's a conspiracy theory but I believe its related to farming flags in some way.

If that were true I'd have gotten Bone Dragons galore

FeroxC · May 05, 2007, 01:46 PM // 13:46

This link may interest you

:
http://www.rohitab.com/discuss/index...howtopic=24727

Hes using the current time to seed the random number generator. and generating the numbers before the clock ticks over a millisecond resulting in repeats.
But i would hope Anets abit more experianced than to allow that kind of bug.

Westofeden · May 05, 2007, 01:54 PM // 13:54

Quote:

Originally Posted by Diddy bow

mini pets seem fine but every gold i get seems to have a firey pre-fix and wardingn suffix O_o

I have noticed this to. I've been getting a lot of swords axes ect ect with a cripling mod on them.

Dreikki · May 05, 2007, 02:00 PM // 14:00

2 temple guardians, 2 fungal wallows.

(y)

Caoimhe · May 05, 2007, 02:04 PM // 14:04

Quote:

Originally Posted by BlueNovember

If I toss a coin 10 times and get 10 heads, it does not mean the coin is biased. Same applies to not breaking 6 lockpicks or getting the same 2 minipets twice over.

Conversely, if I tossed a coin 100 times and got 100 heads the coin is certainly biased. Same applies if you had got ~20 lockpicks retained in a row. Granted, retaining 6 consecutive lockpicks is ~0.002% chance, but with hundreds of thousands of people using lockpicks all over the place... perhaps there's some dependance there? Either that or you got quite lucky.

While I agree with you in principle, I respectfully differ with you on the assertion that a 1:1 ratio (toss:heads) indicates certain bias, because it really doesn't. It indicates that there may be a greater likelihood of bias, but in and of itself, cannot prove bias. Each coin toss represents an individual event, not a progression of events, so each coin toss is determined only by its toss, not by ones that precede it.

Would 100 straight heads-tosses be extraordinary? Absolutely. Likely? Not very. Possible? Yup. There are more factors that should be considered before considering the exercise biased, though.