Curse

ectospasm · Dec 10, 2006, 04:03 AM // 04:03

Quote:

Originally Posted by floppinghog

if it makes you feel any better.... i've done 8 full Deep runs and well, i never got 1. NOT ONE green from kanaxai.... and some groups were short 3-2 ppl
(first completion was a group of 6 only - lost half the party due to a number of reasons)
when we actually killed him too (meaning not all 8 runs were a full party of 12).

unlike your tombs visit for older greens, i lost out of expensive greens 8 times (oh and remembering one of them the same guy got 2 of the 3 possible greens at once, talk about lame?).

now that is bad

xxSilhouette · Dec 10, 2006, 04:06 AM // 04:06

Well ive been on runs to get greens before, and one person in the group will get 3, 4 or even 5, and everyone else gets 0 or 1. But at the same time, i have my lucky days too, where i get the 4 or 5 greens.

But at the same time, it doesnt really matter to me if i get the drops or not, beacuse im really doing it for fun. I still go with my alliance to SF and farm, and a lot of the stuff we get is completely worthless, but its fun.

reetkever · Dec 10, 2006, 01:05 PM // 13:05

Hmmm after doing Sorrow's Furnace for 30 times, I've gotten 1 green (Flint's Fleshcleaver). I did UW about 50 times, 0 ecto's, only a golden Eternal Shield with armor + 15 (vs Giants)

In Factions/Nightfall, I haven't gotten a single green from a boss, except from low-level bosses.

My best drop in ages would be a Silver Dye, which is 300 gold at trader now :I

Oh, other people in my party get 2 ecto's per run, max damage rare skinned weapons etc.

Also, the drop system is NOT random. What if player 1 and player 2 are killing stuff in ascalon. player 1 is heavily farm-locked, and has gotten both warnings. This means this player will get about no more drops. Where do these drops go? Yes. To player 2.

Antheus · Dec 10, 2006, 01:43 PM // 13:43

Quote:

Originally Posted by FeroxC

You see what happens is, the computer cant realy create truly random numbers so most the time they use an algorithm to create the number based on a seed number.

To get the seed number they often use functions like this:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/de...ttickcount.asp
GetTickCount

The return value is the number of milliseconds that have elapsed since the system was started.

So what happens when you kill aload of monsters at the same time ? same seed so the same number is "randomly generated" oh look he got all the greens.

However i doubt the monsters died at the exact same time he probably just got lucky

Seed is initialized once and once only. After that, seed is updated by the algorithm.

The only way drops could be skewed, is if GW doesn't use random allocation scheme, but uses some weighted algorithm, that determines drops based on past actions.

If such scheme exists, then I have been unable to notice even slightest deviation in all the solo farming runs I did. The total ammount of loot collected over a period of 10, 20 even 50 runs during the period of a year has been constant. This goes for desert (minotaurs/griffons, later scarabs/minotaurs, FoW spider run), where the total ammount of money earned from drops is extremly even, the number of shards dropped during spider per run, and the total ammount of money made from hekets during a run. The ammount doesn't change between runs, after several consequtive runs, or even after using same/different characters. Never, in even slightest, did I notice any kind of bias. The only deviation from total ammount earned comes from a rare rune that currently has a high price, or from odd high-priced mod. But the remaining value of loot is constant.

There are no good or bad random number generators. They are either random, or they aren't random. And unless someone provides a statistically supported proof (note that for rare drops, you'd need a sample size of 1000 or even more runs, along with reference sample), loot is and remains random.

Myria · Dec 10, 2006, 03:24 PM // 15:24

Quote:

Originally Posted by Antheus

And unless someone provides a statistically supported proof (note that for rare drops, you'd need a sample size of 1000 or even more runs, along with reference sample), loot is and remains random.

One could just as easily, and with equal validity, claim the reverse. Especially given that statistical randomness is generally something that needs to be proven to exist, not a given to be disproven, and that we have no idea what methods are used for loot distribution or if they're even intended to be random.

Antheus · Dec 10, 2006, 03:38 PM // 15:38

Quote:

Originally Posted by Myria

One could just as easily, and with equal validity, claim the reverse. Especially given that statistical randomness is generally something that needs to be proven to exist, not a given to be disproven, and that we have no idea what methods are used for loot distribution or if they're even intended to be random.

My point is, going on a tombs run, and seeing one person get 3 greens is nothing. Nada. Of course, someone at some time will post it on forums, screaming how the game is cheating.

A party goes into DoA. Same person gets 3 gemstones.
Is everyone else now more likely to get a gemstone?
Is that person less likely to get the next gemstone?

If you do UW ecto run, is something wrong if you get 0, and other person gets all 4.
If you do 10 high-end area runs with 8 people, and everyone except you gets at least one gold item from random drop, while you get none, is something wrong with loot system?
If you go into solo into FoW 5 times, and each time you don't get a single shard, is the system broken, since by now you should have at least some shards?

If you even think of answering yes to any of these questions, look up the term: Gambler's Falacy.

Myria · Dec 10, 2006, 04:02 PM // 16:02

Quote:

Originally Posted by Antheus

My point is, going on a tombs run, and seeing one person get 3 greens is nothing. Nada. Of course, someone at some time will post it on forums, screaming how the game is cheating.

That point seems both self-evident and irrelevant to the point I was attmpting to make. Since neither you nor I know if the loot distribution system is random or is even meant to be random, saying that it is random until someone proves otherwise and anyone who disagrees is engaging in gambler's fallacy makes no sense to me. Granted, ranting in a forum about the game 'cheating' makes just as much sense, but for all we know it's supposed to 'cheat'. For all any of us knows loot assignments are based on the amount of damage done to a monster multiplied by the amount of energy expended by the party and divided by the current phase of the moon. Drop all but three digits, for anything eight or under assign a drop to that number player and for anything over eight there's no drop.

Believe me, I've seen sillier systems.

That, and I've rarely seen a supposedly random system that truly was in any meaningful sense.

Former Ruling · Dec 10, 2006, 08:04 PM // 20:04

You did tombs runs for the greens? What?

:\ Sorry I couldn't force myself to read 3 pages after that.

I did read this last page though, and, no "Random" isn't "Random" in the true sense of the word.

Computers can never have "true randomness" because theres always a code that originated the results and that code is predictable. Most use some form of Random Number Generating algorithms which are Inherently flawed at being random since they all have patterns or Deterministic Factors (like the complicated Energy Used divided by party members times damage blah blah blah equations some people claim GW has).

But that really has little to do with someone raging a forum about a guy getting 3 greens :\

"luck"?

ectospasm · Dec 11, 2006, 12:18 AM // 00:18

Quote:

Originally Posted by Former Ruling

You did tombs runs for the greens? What?

:\ Sorry I couldn't force myself to read 3 pages after that.

I did read this last page though, and, no "Random" isn't "Random" in the true sense of the word.

Computers can never have "true randomness" because theres always a code that originated the results and that code is predictable. Most use some form of Random Number Generating algorithms which are Inherently flawed at being random since they all have patterns or Deterministic Factors (like the complicated Energy Used divided by party members times damage blah blah blah equations some people claim GW has).

But that really has little to do with someone raging a forum about a guy getting 3 greens :\

"luck"?

maybe it would help if you read the other 2 pages. thats why people get into arguments here so much is cause their too damn stupid to actually read something, then they go off making assumptions on bits and peices of information.

lacasner · Dec 11, 2006, 12:20 AM // 00:20

Yup, its called ignorance, and its a much bigger problem in this world than any other.

Grais · Dec 11, 2006, 01:20 AM // 01:20

Quote:

Originally Posted by ectoplasm

Also, I was going to sell an axe to someone who only had 124k I sold him a cheaper one instead. The next day he had 4x that amount and was ready to buy the expensive one. I think he farmed it overnight, dont you?...

Seems like your doing allright.
I dont know what your complaining about as youve allready got A LOT more money than probably 75% of the player pop will EVER have. Sounds too me like you've gotten some pretty sweet drops or your ebaying ?
When the Darkness(The Tombs I guess) were first introduced I started a similar thread and it went on for 70-80 pages. I had the same thing happen as the OP several times and was hurting for it....but, as I made many more runs things seemed to even out a bit as a couple of times I was the one recieving three greens, cest la vie!!!
Does the drop system leave you wanting at times, for sure it does, but oh well, its never really hurt my enjoyment of the game, UNLESS I let it.

strcpy · Dec 11, 2006, 02:34 AM // 02:34

Quote:

Originally Posted by CyberNigma

strcpy (did he change his name to srncpy yet? :-)

Why in the world would I do that?

Like others have said - it technically is not random. Digital computers do not do random, can not do random. There is even evidence (and it's where I tend to lean) that there is nothing without pattern, "random" just means that we can not decipher it.

Game wise, you could take a very simple random number generator (say, rand) and choose seeds in such a way that no human is ever going to learn to game the system. Games, and random loot assignment, have been around long enough and had enough people trying to game the system that there are standard techniques for them that are "random" (that is - you aren't going to learn to predict drops accurately) - it is not something that is redone for every game. They aren't hard to find - go look in Knuth's The Art of Computer Programming in the semi-numerical algorithms volume and you will find a ton of them. It is a fairly mature field that has had years of people trying to game it.

And there will be many many people who think they can game it, think they just noticed them. You better have a long log of drops shown against a control - otherwise you are like a gambler at a casino that "figures out how it works" because they won a bunch of money the last three or four times they tried it. Yep, sure, lets see how you do over the next few goes - even the real statistical attacks against casinos have long loosing streaks you have to have enough capitol to cover. Those either take in the millions of points of data to be accurate or depend on that fact that you you have x number of unique cards that can not be drawn twice (card counters depend on the used cards not going back into the system and being reshuffled every few hands - something that is done now).

Here, the game is geared towards you winning in the long run anyway (opposite from casinos). Proper seeding and one of the more modern Pseudo-random number generators and you have a harder to game system than a roulette wheel (which isn't even close to being random enough to be cryptographically secure). Trust me, if amateur game programmers (I knew it when I was in high school in the early 90's from reading game development books) know these things industry veterans of 15and more years also understands them quite well.

And, I can assure you from having played games that are not random - people will take advantage of it. Leave because they know they aren't getting the drop they want, intentionally letting people die so they get what they want, wiping the whole party in spite, aggroing something the part must kill first in order to force the drop to go to them, all sorts of things. You do not want a known drop system and if everyone gets something at the end then their worth becomes nil - making more complaints that the rewards are not rewarding.

Ulivious The Reaper · Dec 11, 2006, 02:41 AM // 02:41

why complain, you can safely say you made more cash from the run then he did from those greens?