Do you believe in Luck?

[EverSoar]

Nope..no luck. Its all random chance.

I guess the dice itself plays an important factor. And the way they roll it. but its all probability. NO luck.

One of my pet hates though is, this one character in our campaign. When he isn't involved in something, he decideds he will roll, and when he rolls goood, goes..see.you should have got me to do it, i rolled a 20. Ooo that gets on my nerves. Its not the same situation, or circumstances in which he would have rolled, so chances are he wouldn't have even got that 20.

Just letting off some steam.

 

[Madfox]

On the long run luck is not a factor with dice. In that regard I firmly believe in the influence of observation. Somehow my players tend to complain that I roll so good as a DM. What they fail to realize is that I roll a lot more as a DM, so obviously I will roll criticals more often then them. What I do believe is that luck is factor on the short run. Some people at certain times seem to roll good all the time and others seem to roll bad all the time. Still, no individual has got bad luck all the time no matter what people want to believe.

 

[shilsen]

Nope, I don't believe in luck. But I do admit that it exists.

 

[novyet]

No such thing as luck, just simple probability, or so I tell myself.

 

[Darklone]

Some results

I read a similar thread on another board... Guys there rolled some dice more than 1000 times each... took them weeks.

First of all: No D20 was averaged. Most of the numbers appeared with percentages of 2% or 8% rather than 5% as it should be.

I myself own a set of D6 who roll particularly good. Though my DM always rolls a 1-3 with them.

We have a player in our group who started every major battle with a natural 1. Since his magical sword slowed him in that case... He threw it away.

Another of my players: No Reapersaurus, no urban legend. He rolled 4 times 18, a 16 and a 14. For the third character since we play (10 years, he got about 8 chars in that time). Ok, the other two chars sometimes only had 3 18s. That guy is awful. He always sits at the table, grins and rolls 20s. Not much more. A few months ago he was sleepy... Another player asked him to roll. He hold up his hand and rolled with the die from the other one: 20. Everyone laughed and asked him to roll again. 20. Well. His neighbor makes up for him in statistics. He's the guy who gets the average 9 points character with a 5D6 roll method and drop the two lowest.

My experiences: There are real bad dice. And sometimes real lucky players (who buy lucky dice in my opinion).

 

[Wild Karrde]

No such thing as luck baby. I have some nights where I can't be touched, i hit everything and anil every roll. Then I have a session like last Tuesday where everything, unfortunately, could seem to touch me quite easily and I couldn't hit anything to save my life, and i missed my saving throw against two tanglefootbags. Oh the memories still hurt

 

[Omegium]

I dont believe in luck: it is all about countless factors, like the position of the dice, the exact movement of the muscles in you hand, the height, local wind speed, pressure, and a lot of other things. But I have noticed that there are players with absurbt amounts of "luck". Don't know why, but I guess their luck will turn sometime

 

[EOL]

I'm glad to see that many people have experiences similar to mine. A firm belief in the laws of probablility, but observational experiences that just don't match that belief and an burning, irrational, murderous desire to KILL KILL KILL....sorry what was I saying, oh yeah I was talking about my feelings towards those players who seem to have more then their fair share of luck.

 

[chilibean]

[James Earl Jones Voice]

Don't be so pround of the superstitions the human mind has constructed, the ability to present numerous examples of seemingly non-random behavior in dice is insignificant compared to the power of probability theory.

[Ignorant Overconfident General's Voice]

Don't try to frighten us with your mathematical ways Dr. Mathematico. Your sad devotion to that ancient religon hasn't helped you conjure the missing 1's I should have rolled or given you clairvoyance enough to explain the rolling of multiple 20's ...

[Dr. Mathematico raises his hand to the chalkboard and starts writing proofs, silencing the general and making him choke]

[James Earl Jones Voice]

I find you lack of mathematical training disturbing.

[Irritated Guy in Charge]

Enough of this! Dr. Mathematico put down chalk.

[James Earl Jones Voice]

As you wish.

[Irritated Guy in Charge]

This bickering is pointless. Dr. Mathematico will provide us with an understandable proof of the fallicies of small samping error and selective observation by the time this thread ends. We will then crush superstition in one swift stroke.

 

[EOL]

[James Earl Jones Voice]

Don't be so pround of the superstitions the human mind has constructed, the ability to present numerous examples of seemingly non-random behavior in dice is insignificant compared to the power of probability theory.

[Ignorant Overconfident General's Voice]

Don't try to frighten us with your mathematical ways Dr. Mathematico. Your sad devotion to that ancient religon hasn't helped you conjure the missing 1's I should have rolled or given you clairvoyance enough to explain the rolling of multiple 20's ...

[Dr. Mathematico raises his hand to the chalkboard and starts writing proofs, silencing the general and making him choke]

[James Earl Jones Voice]

I find you lack of mathematical training disturbing.

[Irritated Guy in Charge]

Enough of this! Dr. Mathematico put down chalk.

[James Earl Jones Voice]

As you wish.

[Irritated Guy in Charge]

This bickering is pointless. Dr. Mathematico will provide us with an understandable proof of the fallicies of small samping error and selective observation by the time this thread ends. We will then crush superstition in one swift stroke.

Somehow you managed to sum it all up in one humorous, brillant stroke. Well done!