(Un)Lucky with the dice - How can it happen?

[Mercule]

I've known people who have uncanny good luck and people with uncanny bad luck. Our monk can't ever (okay 90% failure), but does just fine with all other randoms.

On a similar note, has anyone ever played Settlers of Catan? _Every_ game of it I've ever played has had skewed luck. This is true even with different sets or grabbing dice that didn't come with the game.

It uses 2d6 and I've seriously played games where 3 has come up more than 6 and 8 _combined_. Also where 12 came up more than 7. How does 9 come up 6 times in a row? It's so bad that we've decided that all sets are enchanted at the factory with what we've dubbed "streaky dice". The _one_ game we played a couple of weeks ago that seemed to have a normal probability really weirded everyone out.

 

[Creamsteak]

On this subject, tonight was interesting. While playing a Dex 4 Call of Cthulhu character, I managed to single-handedly defeat some kind of infected and controlled police officer. It was... odd...

At first, I ran down the stairs, horribly failing to see in the darkness, falling down the stairs, and then: in my moment of zen, I headed right back up those stairs to confront the man/beast.

My charisma was pretty high, and I tried to 'bluff' the enemy into thinking I was someone else, and someone tougher (I spoke with a deeper more resounding voice and all that), and managed a 26 total (after modifiers)...

Then I managed to disarm him, shoot a couple failed rounds into it, jump out the broken window into the fire escape, propel the beast/man over the rails when he jumped out (as part of a 'trip' attempt), and send him 40 feet into pavement... killing the thing.

The entire time I never rolled lower than an 18, and it was probably a good 15 checks involved over the course of the battle. My initiative however, was 0, so I didn't exactly come out that well. I lost 2 (read: 1/3) hit points... and it could have been much worse.

 

[mistergone]

I have been rolling legendarily bad in my current game. I mean amazingly bad. The other players find it hilarious. Which doesn't help any. I figure it's karma. They keep telling me to go buy some new dice. I don't seriously think that will help, as it never has before. Gamers are funny. A lot of us "pre-roll" our dice before the game, just to see how they seem to be rolling. Every time I roll a 20 when I'm not rolling for any reason other than to just roll the die, I really feel like I just burned up another 20 out of that die.

 

[demiurge1138]

Two words:
Negative thoughts.
If a player rolls badly a few times in a row, they'll continue to roll badly if they assume a bad attitude about it. Call it psychosomatic die-rolling influences or call it ki, a good attitude can severly help a person's "bad luck".

Demiurge out.

 

[Numion]

A couple of reasons for this:

1) People tend to remember bad things better.

2) People tend to give more weight to perceptions that strengthen their preconceived hypothesis ('I've got bad luck') and disregard perceptions that go against it.

3) It's as likely to roll a serie of "1, 1, 1, 1, 1" as it is to roll a serie of "10, 13, 4, 7, 18", even though at first glance the former might seem less likely.

4) Dice have minds of their own...

 

[Arthur Tealeaf]

Just to add a story to my own thread: In an Elric campaign I am currently playing in, something incredibly funnt happen. As you all know, (old) Elric! uses %dice for everything. And you want to roll low, so 01 is critical, 99 or 100 is fumble (baaad fumble). And the story: We had ended up in a fight fight with some female soldiers on an airship dock, and was getting ready to attack in the first round. One of my friends gets to fight two women, but before he has a chance to react (they had higher initiative) the first one gets hair in her eyes, slips and smashes her elbow in the ground, crushing it. Wow! Then the other one moves to attack, but trips, smashes her knee in the ground, crushing it, and fall onto her sword, breaking it. My friend, who has not yet been able to react, lops off the head of one and ties up the other. That was great.

Ps. To both crush her knee and break her sword she must have rolled 100 on the fumble table

 

[Bugaboo]

What others have said or hinted at already:

"Luck" is a matter of perception. What's lucky to one person is mere coincidence to another. "Probability" is only a mathematical prediction of *likely* random outcomes, given a large enough sample within the bounds of the action, modified by our assumption of certain details (i.e. the die is balanced, the roller has no uncanny skill, etc.)

Long-term gamers tend to forget that we can observe probability in action, but we can't depend on it to provide any particular outcome to meet our expectations.

I would say that when Probability appears to fail, we call the results Luck instead.

Perspective, buckos. Perspective.

 

[alsih2o]

i thought bugaboo only started threads!

 

[Chriskaballa]

There are ways that most people think solve bad luck that never worked for me. Some people tell me to kiss the dice. They tell me to say different things to the dice. I've heard everything there is to hear and I've done everything short of asking my local priest to bless my dice. No matter what I do, I still can't get good rolls. I play a 14th level cleric in the campagin I'm surrently in, and in the last 9 weeks (read as: 15 or so combats) I have not hit with a single touch spell! I managed a few crossbow bolt hits and a whack or two with my mace but that's it! I tried using spells like Flame Strike and Blade Barrier that don't need attack rolls, but, as (my) luck would have it, I just roll low damage.

The DM refuses to give me a hand up even though this bad luck has been so persistent...

I feel for all the other people with bad luck.

~Chris

P.S. Anybody with tips/things to ask the DM for/ways to deal with this bad luck, you're welcome to E-mail me at lowellc@optonline.net

 

[ichabod]

On a similar note, has anyone ever played Settlers of Catan? _Every_ game of it I've ever played has had skewed luck. This is true even with different sets or grabbing dice that didn't come with the game.

It uses 2d6 and I've seriously played games where 3 has come up more than 6 and 8 _combined_. Also where 12 came up more than 7. How does 9 come up 6 times in a row? It's so bad that we've decided that all sets are enchanted at the factory with what we've dubbed "streaky dice". The _one_ game we played a couple of weeks ago that seemed to have a normal probability really weirded everyone out.

The thing about settlers is that you make maybe 60 or 70 rolls per game. Now there are 36 possible rolls of 2 dice, so you are rolling a little less than twice for each possible roll. Given that, the odds are actually low that you will get an even spread. Try rolling 12d6, and seeing how often you get one number that comes up more often than two others or three others. It will happen almost every time. To get an even spread, you need a large number of events compaired to the number of possibilities. Settlers (and many other games) just does not provide that many dice rolls.