inherent luck

[Yagi]

I've read different things on this subject how some characters are "luckier" then others by a roll determined when your character was created. Is this really true? And if so, what exactly does this affect?

I have some characters that can literally ransack places like the orchard before even pulling enough taps for a single turn in, and that rarely ever pulled named loot anywhere. I have other characters that seem to enjoy a modest mount of luck, fairly regular pulls and rolls.

I have one character that is rediculously lucky. Tomes, named loot, large scales (did 4 double scale completions back to back and still got a scale and a tome on the raid that broke the streak) AND he also rolls 20's like crazy which is why I wonder what exactly this mythical luck roll affects. He's a ranger with only the first fighter haste boost AP and rolls more twenties in a shorter period then melees I have with full haste lines, easily. And before tempest changed, it was even crazier.

Obviously I am not complaining, its just odd and I wonder what is true about this "luck" roll and what and I figured I'd ask now that I have a stable of characters and have played long enough to have noticed distinct variations in pull frequencies and such.

Of course I am of the opinion that there is no luck roll and that my character's apparent luck is just the way the cookie crumbles. But if there actually IS a legitimate luck roll, will it reset upon TR?

[issiana]

I've read different things on this subject how some characters are "luckier" then others by a roll determined when your character was created. Is this really true? And if so, what exactly does this affect?
.......................
But if there actually IS a legitimate luck roll, will it reset upon TR?

yeah i'd say there is. I've rolled characters that only ever sem to pull trash. others that only pull armor, but my two main characters have being tome pullers.

My current main (and only character left now as i'm on the out basically) is a tome puller, and a named loot puller. I always seem to roll well. most days theres heaps of 20's and good loot rolling in. but.. then theres days of not so well. (19 runs to get my torc from DQ for example)

But.. i TR'd and have noticed no difference in the loot pulls. the exact TOD ring for my class on the 2nd succesful run - luck? maybe so. multile full sets of +2 tomes as well - luck? again?? Bloodstone AND spell store ring on same run in desert? - luck? again?? really??

really not sure i buy the lucky player thing. Not when others seem to get garbage all the time.

so yeah I think hidden luck stat may just be there.

[ProdigalGuru]

The "hidden luck roll" is a old wives' tale, and has no basis in fact.

[Ganolyn]

Your character is as lucky as quantum physics makes it.

[Memnir]

Screwy "luck" has been known (http://asheron.wikia.com/wiki/Wi_Flag) to happen in Turbine games in the past.

Is there a Wi flag in DDO? Who knows. I just know that I seem to have pathologically bad luck when it comes to loot, and have since day-one. Likewise I've known others to have silly-good luck. Don't know why, but it seems to happen.

[kernal42]

The "hidden luck roll" is a old wives' tale, and has no basis in fact.

This.

At the end of the day, some characters will have won more rolls than others. That is in fact a property of (pseudo-)random chance; not a property of your character. Furthermore, having had bad luck in the past has no correlation with your luck in the future.

Cheers.
Kernal

[varusso]

Screwy "luck" has been known (http://asheron.wikia.com/wiki/Wi_Flag) to happen in Turbine games in the past.

Is there a Wi flag in DDO? Who knows. I just know that I seem to have pathologically bad luck when it comes to loot, and have since day-one. Likewise I've known others to have silly-good luck. Don't know why, but it seems to happen.

Wow. I actually remember when they finally found this, and the announcement itself. It so happens I was one of the players WITH the Wi-Flag. I can remember walking into Olthoi hives, with people ahead of me, and the olthoi would barrel past them to get to me -- consistently. Which suited me fine, because I WANTED them on me most of the time; made my job easier :D

Other players used to haze me, telling me it was my purple armor that attracted them to me (I was known server-wide for my penchant for purple armor and robes) joking that they thought I was the olthoi queen (even before the queen was actually in the game).

Lugians were particularly autistic around me as well -- back when they were all purplish blue, again leading to more hazing about my purple gear LOL

Thanks for the nostalgic trip :D

EDIT: Oh and I cry **BS** on the whole predetermined loot luck thing. I used to be in a guild where the leader would form Sands BS/RoSS/etc pugs, tell people we would all be rolling on every piece of named loot that dropped (and if they didnt agree, boot), using this as his reasoning, saying that this way everyone would have an equal chance at the good loot, regardless of their pregenerated 'hidden' luck factor. The real reason? He would make sure there were 3-4 guildies in the group (sometimes alts not actually IN the guild in order to disguise this fact), so that the GUILD would have a weighted chance of getting any loot. To his credit, he DID put up any loot for roll, and if a non-guildy won the roll, they got it. But that was still a tad too shady for my tastes.

[locus]

The "hidden luck roll" is a old wives' tale, and has no basis in fact.

It's not? In Turbine games? (Really?) (Wi flag's already been mentioned). It's entirely possible, sure, but hopefully they've learned from past mistakes. Then again the mail system sometimes loses items, the AH screws up, and bags have disappeared, so it's quite likely that that's not the case.

[Deathlos]

Id say there is... my main char has terrible luck when it comes to most high end loot. like scales and +3/+4 tomes. espially when rolling on them. but has moderate luck on like +2 tomes.
While my Alt seems to have a high chance at getting scales, but terrible at getting +2tomes.
Then my bros char has yet to pull a Scale outta the 32shroud runs hes done.

Then i have a friend... who has gotten ultra twinked out gear in no time, Red dragon scale armor, full epic chrono, ToD rings .without even trying that hard, since hes that lucky.. it amazes everyone. he buys like nothing and still gets all of it in record time. and he only has that 1 lvl 20 char.

So Yes, i say that chars do have a inherent luck factor.. considering ive had worse luck on +2 tomes on my second life, it might reset... but more testing needed. and it might be because i did less Vale quests due to having more packs

[MsEricka]

There WAS a post at one time by Eladrin speaking of a luck roll upon character generation. I've looked for it and cannot find it, but I do remember reading it.

[ProdigalGuru]

1. If Eladrin posted on an inherent luck roll, it was likely to confirm that it does not exist.

2. Wi-flag was a BUG, and only affected character aggro. It had nothing to do with loot luck.

3. Anecdotal evidence is NOT evidence. It is opinion.

4. It would be an unfair business practice to give some customers "luck" over others intentionally.

5. Sometimes you roll good, sometimes you roll bad. It's always a random roll.

6. Two player-controlled things affect random loot: Loot gems, and Tharashk Dragonmarks.

[Jonny_D]

best way to test the luck of a new character is to run Korthos. The first part where you meet Jeets, if you get alot of pots from the crates and barrels its a good loot toon, if not reroll :D

[kernal42]

You forgot:

7. Zero things affect named loot.

[varusso]

1. If Eladrin posted on an inherent luck roll, it was likely to confirm that it does not exist.

2. Wi-flag was a BUG, and only affected character aggro. It had nothing to do with loot luck.

3. Anecdotal evidence is NOT evidence.

4. It would be an unfair business practice to give some customers "luck" over others intentionally.

5. Sometimes you roll good, sometimes you roll bad. It's always a random roll.

6. Two things affect loot: Loot gems, and Half-Orc Enhancements.

2. A bug is a bug (though this was technically more a mistaken calculation than anything). Just because THAt bug didnt affect loot, doesnt mean any other bug doesnt either.
3. It most certainly IS evidence. It is evidence of a TREND, which is what we the players report to the devs in order to give them a direction in which to look. Anecdotal evidence is what kept them going back to the Wi-Flag glitch in the first place.
6. + Turbine loot weekends, and its a dragon mark, available to horcs and humans BTW :D Also, higher/lower dif on a quest affects the loot level of the trash loot. It also affects drop rates on some named items.

The rest are correct ;-)

And yes I still say BS on the rumor that some toons/players INTENTIONALLY have any kind of bonuses over others in terms of loot, based solely on generation. I wont, however, rule out any bugs/glitches. Its an MMO. Wierd things happen.

[TheDjinnFor]

My Barbarian seems to be blessed with accidental luck. When I'm not trying to get things, I get them, but whenever I am trying, I fail! For example, my second casual run of Xorian Cipher got me a free Planar Gird, but I've ran it 80 times since then and got not a single one! Same with the Jorgundal's Collar from Gianthold Tor. But this doesn't just apply to random drops; I was trying to farm a Bloodstone for a month, but the moment I stopped farming it I got two trade offers in the span of less than a week, one for my Jorgundal's Collar and another for like 2 Blue Scales and some plat. Maybe not 'steals', but they were certainly great offers, something I just couldn't refuse.

As a response to the OP, though, it's likely it's just a myth or inside joke, despite what you've 'heard'.

[Thorzian]

4. It would be an unfair business practice to give some customers "luck" over others intentionally.

.

because THAT has stopped turbine in the past ;)

[NaturalHazard]

Then my bros char has yet to pull a Scale outta the 32shroud runs hes done.



took me 36 runs to get a large scale.

[Vint]

I think having a certain guild tag can insure you bad rolls and loot.

[Tom_Hunters]

Screwy "luck" has been known (http://asheron.wikia.com/wiki/Wi_Flag) to happen in Turbine games in the past.

Is there a Wi flag in DDO? Who knows. I just know that I seem to have pathologically bad luck when it comes to loot, and have since day-one. Likewise I've known others to have silly-good luck. Don't know why, but it seems to happen.

I doubt if this kind of bug really exist in most games now.

In summary, most program use a random function to generation a number between 0 to 1. And this number is eventually used to determine 'random' events.
While in the webpage the Wiflagged game has a range of determination from 0 to n(-1), so there are chances you won't ever fall within the 'random' range.
But in fact this bug is easily overcome if we change the function of random generation to random()*(n-1).
I'd be surprised if the game engineers didn't do that.

So I guess that Wiflagged bug is quite rare in fact.
But as for DDO, well, we won't know.



took me 36 runs to get a large scale.
I have a similar figure once :(
But I managed to pull 2 in around 10 runs after I bought 1 from AH and made my Tier III.

[Noctus]

I've read different things on this subject how some characters are "luckier" then others by a roll determined when your character was created. Is this really true? And if so, what exactly does this affect?



If "Luck" is distributed completly equal over a population, aka it is completly random for everyone if you pull something good or something useless, each time you pop a chest, you will have a small amount of people who very often pull trash, and others who constantly luck out with their pulls.

http://classes.kumc.edu/sah/resources/sensory_processing/images/bell_curve.gif


That those two fringe groups exists does not imply that there is a hidden mechanic "cheating" you or "twisting the probabilities", but quiet the opposite.

If the total population participating is big enough (2.000+ members) you will always get this distribution patttern.

To not get some people who just were unlucky or very lucky requires "cheating" through twisting the probabilities and thus this would be a sign of dev meddling in your rolls.



The anecdotal evidence of some people being unlucky or lucky can not support the notion that the random loot generation process is flawed in any way whatsoever. Because it would show the same symptoms if it were working perfectly fine.

Only the absense of such anecdotal evidence would, by backwards induction, lead us to having a solid reason to doubt the true randomness of the Random Number Generator.

[LordMond63]

My characters tend to have what I'd refer to as "luck by association".

When grouping with me, other players are unbelieveably lucky.

Well, it could also be that they are "unbelieveably" lucky only when my own lick (horrible) is the standard.

Still, doesn't the first one sound much better? I think I'll go with that.

[IronClan]

took me 36 runs to get a large scale.

That is very good prof that loot distribution in DDO is highly random (and thus working as expected).

If you have some lucky characters and some unlucky characters: congratulations: you've proven that DDO's random number generator is indeed highly random....

On the other hand if you have highly even (using recorded data, not just our ever so "selection baised" memory) then that would be very good proof that DDO's random numbers are NOT random.

[NaturalHazard]

That is very good prof that loot distribution in DDO is highly random (and thus working as expected).

If you have some lucky characters and some unlucky characters: congratulations: you've proven that DDO's random number generator is indeed highly random....

On the other hand if you have highly even (using recorded data, not just our ever so "selection baised" memory) then that would be very good proof that DDO's random numbers are NOT random.

seems to be pretty random to me, because from 36-40 i got a scale every run,then no more no that toon since.

[Lithic]

best way to test the luck of a new character is to run Korthos. The first part where you meet Jeets, if you get alot of pots from the crates and barrels its a good loot toon, if not reroll :D

when I first started DDO, I use to do something like this. I'd run through euphonias challenge and if I didn't get at least 3 heal light potions in the first chest, I'd reroll. Star was actually pretty lucky for the most part to be honest... ;)

[Lorien_the_First_One]

There WAS a post at one time by Eladrin speaking of a luck roll upon character generation. I've looked for it and cannot find it, but I do remember reading it.

I call BS.

[Dolphious]

Some people certainly complain about their luck more than others, I wonder if that's a variable set at our birth?

[Myrddinman]

best way to test the luck of a new character is to run Korthos. The first part where you meet Jeets, if you get alot of pots from the crates and barrels its a good loot toon, if not reroll :D

Sometimes (before Veteran Status) I'd have a new toon leave Korthos with almost 100 Starter Healing Potions, and others with only the 3 from the chest in the Collaborator quest. I haven't noticed any of the "luck" patterns of these toons either way, but it's kinda weird.

[My2Cents]

Some people certainly complain about their luck more than others, I wonder if that's a variable set at our birth?

Like everything else, its a combination of genetics, emotional transmission from previous generations, and the formative social environment.

I wonder what items one can craft to affect that.

[IronClan]

Sometimes (before Veteran Status) I'd have a new toon leave Korthos with almost 100 Starter Healing Potions, and others with only the 3 from the chest in the Collaborator quest. I haven't noticed any of the "luck" patterns of these toons either way, but it's kinda weird.

Not weird; normal :D

[SaIamander]

I think having a certain guild tag can insure you bad rolls and loot.

Of course! This, however, is better than having a certain guild tag that insures you roll bad toons.

[hityawithastick]

Like everything else, its a combination of genetics, emotional transmission from previous generations, and the formative social environment.

I wonder what items one can craft to affect that.

I think they just need to get a Greater Heart and respec. :p

[IronClan]

This is a pet subject, I posted this in a previous thread on the same subject a bit ago, apologize if you've already seen it:

http://img35.imageshack.us/img35/2355/randomizeddots.jpg

Which side is random? Or are either or both sides random?

If you flip a coin ten times which of these heads/tails sequences is more likely:
1. HTHTHTHTHT
2. HHHTHHHHHT
3. HHTTHHTTHH
4. HHHTHHTTTH
5. TTTTTTTTTT

And which one is more random?

[Memnir]

I call BS.Indeed.

[steelblueskies]

you do of course realize there is a difference between meeting statistical standards for randomness, and having true random number generation.

this distinction is most pressing in encryption where a method may be statistically random, but predictable through observation.

given we do not in fact actually see the method or values used, but rather the net result of whatever method is employed, and with non repeating variables at that, it would make for a much more difficult time evaluating what may ultimately be an academic distinction for the application at hand.

and we already know the system is cheating compared to true randomness, as with raid loot there is a varying percentage for differing items from a loot table for a given warded chest. and that is one area where sampling and statistical modeling in a simple form works just fine.

a given warded chest may give you a named item, with increasing odds per difficulty as compared to "vendor trash" as well. this may be a simple as using some method to pseudo-randomly generate a 1d100 value and modifying the threshold cases that grant such a reward. over multiple tests it should normalize as indicated to reflect given values.

but assume that a time seed it used. it is entirely possible for a flawed random number generator to exhibit predictable behavior if the event occurrence pattern for an individual is roughly fixed to a narrow recurring time window. and this discounting other commonly used variables.

it could also have a flaw similar to the original final fantasy in which certain predefined sets of actions would always reset the rng seed as a result, and subsequent actions had a much smaller number of possible outcomes for each possibility, making it possible to "save scum" and repeat a process from a saved point using a very small number of attempts compared to the full random result pool, to achieve a desired outcome.

it's a fun area of study, gotta give it that. but they'd have to be brain dead to make a random system where a user controlled value which was set once then left unchanging was part of the method used. the only system i can think of involving anything like this( that might be easy to look up for you people) is the paired key encryption schema's, and for something useful from that they'd have to constantly change their value in the pairing, not to mention independent seeds and calculations for each toon, evolving each roll or over time. that would not be terribly efficient compared to one rng routine running all the time, or a hardware device( of which there were a few psrng's incorporated into intel hardware standard in the last few years) and simply pulling a value from that as needed.

again we have no idea how it uses such a value to determine outcomes, so even if we knew it was using an intel processor with a given rng on chip as a value source, and even assuming that the output of the device could be predicted through observation, you still have multiple layers of obfuscation between you and the actual values. ever. and the number of samples in an uncontrolled environment, to ultimately begin reverse engineering the method used, and the source in order to predict it, while theoretically possible, is totally impractical.

it becomes then more an issue of what you believe? do you play the lottery because you think you might win?

i remember stratics work on odds for diablo 2 on the ladder realms. where even data mining the single player engine could not ensure knowing how the system worked on THEIR servers, or the actual odds of any given thing from anywhere. i recall getting reasonable approximations through community data contributions, and eventually one started seeing data-logging bots automatically farming endgame instances nonstop in swarms. then again i also remember getting a crown of ages, which i think had a drop chance of something like 0.000073286% from same end boss. (7:100000 or 1:14286 if you want odds per test). the idea of trying to work out how the rng actually worked and seeded in order to predict or manipulate outcome was essentially futile there too. aside from inbuilt mechanics like magic find and knowing where your odds where best anyway.

and while it was not intended that attempting diplomacy on a chest would affect results, there's no certainty on our end that i doesn't either, and that means one way or the other. sure you can run two sets of tests and get normalized statistical data. you can even expand that to multiple times and multiple toons, on multiple accounts, with multiple party sizes, skill levels, and so on. but it takes a significant number of test cases to establish middling statistical "confidence" that all your results aren't coming up heads in an outlier pattern, during the tests you perform. and if time is a factor at all then one certainly modifies the outcome simply by taking the time to perform an otherwise useless action.

ah but i have wandered again. anyway, here's hoping it gives some google happy people some interesting reading, and looking into, and the rest some grounding. suppose one might be able to draw conclusion by knowing what they use as a server, monitoring data fragments with the right hardware from the servers, looking deeply into how the client works, and making measured tests on response times when varying numbers of tightly time coordinated players looted the same set of chests. (was thinking of lag at the first chests in part 1 of shroud as everyone loots in close succession, might give a clue on the amount of work being done to generate and send information on the loot, which might in turn make it feasible to develop some sense of how much processor time a single loot gen took statistically, and then how much code would fit in that amount of time, but that would be a supremely advanced exercise. and i'm thinking out-text again). in any event most of the data you would need would be illegal to obtain, and in places and cases it would not be, it would be against terms of service.

which brings me back to the end point i lost for a bit with tangents, expositions, and theoretic extrapolations: unless they tell you you will not know for certain, but over a long enough timeline it *should* be moot. don't let it eat you alive or worry you to death. they even added extra loot mechanics to up you chances of getting what you are after.eventually. if enough people are dissatisfied with the rate the overall odds predict, they may change, but not on individual samples. and a big human error is drawing conclusions from too little data to support them. depending on situation we have quite a few words for that situation, and pretty much none of them are "good".

[ceiswyn]

...don't mind me, I just realised this post was talking rubbish...

[elujin]

took me 36 runs to get a large scale.

my bard almost always pulls a large devil scale i need outer mats dman it :D

[fuzzy1guy]

Still... i swear theres some sort of luck attached to various characters. Some of them pull better/worse consistantly.
Which makes it easy to pick which character to take in a run where i dont need any items. But guildies do. Take the lucky toon. They get EVERYTHING!


And one toon i swear ticked off a gm at some point. And now has a permenant -loot. Arrows and @%^@^% khybershards... i hate those.
Average luck toon turned into the worst luck toon yet.

[Samadhi]

The "hidden luck roll" is a old wives' tale, and has no basis in fact.

You should read some more history. There is another game, coincidentally made by Turbine, where it came out after years of Turbine denying it that there in fact WAS a hidden luck roll as you call it, and that it was having a huge effect on the game.

This doesn't inherently mean Turbine did the same thing for DDO, granted, but your assumptiveness is just wrong here. There could very, very easily be a similar "supposedly random but not really" value used in loot values; esp in toons "lucky at raid loot" or "lucky at tomes" but not other things. If you have ever programmed, you would know that, outside of quantum programming, there is no such thing as a truly random number.

http://asheron.wikia.com/wiki/Wi_Flag

[Anneliese]

You should read some more history. There is another game, coincidentally made by Turbine, where it came out after years of Turbine denying it that there in fact WAS a hidden luck roll as you call it, and that it was having a huge effect on the game.


However, it only applied to monster aggro.

Also, you could easily repeat the effect over and over. All you needed to do was to enter a dungeon with a friend and notice the mobs flying towards you.



It is difficult to test this in DDO, because it takes a long time to generate, say, 100 raid loot pulls from one character in a row.

In Asherons Call, you could do a test of a similar scale in ~1 hour if you had 2 characters whose difference in "Wi-Flag-Value" was high enough.

[aerendhil]

I'm well aware of how statistical laws work, and you can't justify the randomness, because :

1) you suppose that the loot generator uses a binomial distribution. which you cannot say unless checking the code.

2) Even if using that kind of distribution, a software uses a hard-coded array of numbers , and then uses a pattern to generate a so-called random number. That pattern may be coded as to depend on any kind of parameters(say, the creation date of a character, for exemple)

So, after running 20 Shrouds on my main without pulling any LDS, plus a few Shrouds with a reroll, and adding the quests in Amrath and Devil Assault, I DO believe that their random generator is not functionnal.

[Ganolyn]

Is there a Wi flag in DDO? Who knows. I just know that I seem to have pathologically bad luck when it comes to loot, and have since day-one. Likewise I've known others to have silly-good luck. Don't know why, but it seems to happen.

I have a friend I occasionally go gambling with and it seems no matter how sober, focused and researched I am into the game to improve my "odds" of winning, I usually come out a little ahead or a little behind.

He, on the other hand, can get as drunk, distracted and clueless as he likes and usually comes out way ahead just by dumb luck. I once saw him win about $3000 on roulette while he was busy hitting on a woman and telling the croupier to let it ride everytime he disturbed him.

Do I assume the games are fixed for him or against me? I don't know either way, but I still make him pay for everything! :D

[bryanmeerkat]

If you put an x in your name it doubles the amount of treasure you find in PvP quests ;)

[varusso]

I have a friend I occasionally go gambling with and it seems no matter how sober, focused and researched I am into the game to improve my "odds" of winning, I usually come out a little ahead or a little behind.

He, on the other hand, can get as drunk, distracted and clueless as he likes and usually comes out way ahead just by dumb luck. I once saw him win about $3000 on roulette while he was busy hitting on a woman and telling the croupier to let it ride everytime he disturbed him.

Do I assume the games are fixed for him or against me? I don't know either way, but I still make him pay for everything! :D

Except the gambling dens arent using numbers generated in a program to determine 'random' results, and therefor cannot be skewed in any direction by a dropped decimal or misplaced number, etc. (Unless of course you really DO think you are Neo :p )

Some might argue outside factors such as karma, being born under a certain configuration of the stars, etc. But as a whole, RL randomness does not compare to computer-generated randomness. In real life, everything actually DOES happen for a reason, if you get to a high enough vantage point, where you can see all of the factors that contributed to exactly where and how the dice will land, based on complex mathematical equations that evaluate force of the toss, angle of the table, stray breezes from fans in the room, as well as psychological evaluation of the mood of the thrower, which can affect the direction of his toss, and a myriad of other things that I could not even begin to think to account for. The best we can do in a program is to hope to simulate as many of these variables as possible -- or eliminate them in order to simplify the equation itself.

Either way, i dont believe any toons are generated with inherent luck or lack of it, but I dont discount the possibility of any glitches along the way. I also accept that, in a world where we cant hope to explain all things, some people DO have better luck (IRL) than others (for whatever reason).