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May Daggermaster Nerf Rumour
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<blockquote data-quote="Obryn" data-source="post: 5154824" data-attributes="member: 11821"><p>This is simply wrong in so very many ways. I strongly urge you to pay attention in your math and statistics classes.</p><p></p><p>On some 20-roll samples, it will come out like your ... "spreadsheet." On some 20-roll samples, it won't. On some, the axe might crit 3 times or 0. On some the Dagger might crit 10 times, or no rolls will be above 9. The key is to work with probabilities in such a way that this individual variation in samples will even out. Your sample of 20 rolls isn't a characteristic one; it's far better to either run a huge number of rolls (aka the Monte Carlo method, which requires a lot more than 20 events), or use relatively simple probability (aka <strong>math</strong>) to determine the average results of an infinite number of rolls.</p><p></p><p>Quick analogy....</p><p></p><p>Your assertion that 20 attack rolls is "just fine" to prove your point would be like me flipping a coin 20 times, noticing that it came up Heads 13 times, and saying that it proves my point that Heads will come up 65% of the time any coin is flipped in the future. Clearly, you'd say that I'm off my rocker, and that it'll come up heads 50% of the time.</p><p></p><p>Variations like this are extremely likely in small samples. If I were to flip the same coin (for example) 10,000 times, it will come up Heads about 50%. It still might be something like 5,051/10,000 or 4,963/10,000, but the large sample size brings it closer to the mathematical realities of the situation. On 1,000,000 flips, it will be even closer to 50/50. On a theoretically infinite number of flips, it will be 50/50.*</p><p></p><p>-O</p><p></p><p></p><p>* Quick aside, sblocked, that has nothing to do with the discussion above.</p><p>[sblock]Actually, with a coin flip, it's not quite 50%. You're <strong>always</strong> better off calling the side that's facing up during the flip, if it's going to land on the ground. Or, calling the side that's facing down before the flip, if it will be caught and flipped over one more time.</p><p></p><p>Basically, when a coin that was heads-up is flipped, it might go HTHTHTHTHTH or HTHTHTHTHTHT or some variation thereof. At no point during the flip will there be more tails than heads in the sequence, assuming Heads was up at first.</p><p></p><p>But this is neither here nor there for the mathematical ideal of a coin flip, which is really what we're talking about. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile :)" data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /></p><p>[/sblock]</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Obryn, post: 5154824, member: 11821"] This is simply wrong in so very many ways. I strongly urge you to pay attention in your math and statistics classes. On some 20-roll samples, it will come out like your ... "spreadsheet." On some 20-roll samples, it won't. On some, the axe might crit 3 times or 0. On some the Dagger might crit 10 times, or no rolls will be above 9. The key is to work with probabilities in such a way that this individual variation in samples will even out. Your sample of 20 rolls isn't a characteristic one; it's far better to either run a huge number of rolls (aka the Monte Carlo method, which requires a lot more than 20 events), or use relatively simple probability (aka [B]math[/B]) to determine the average results of an infinite number of rolls. Quick analogy.... Your assertion that 20 attack rolls is "just fine" to prove your point would be like me flipping a coin 20 times, noticing that it came up Heads 13 times, and saying that it proves my point that Heads will come up 65% of the time any coin is flipped in the future. Clearly, you'd say that I'm off my rocker, and that it'll come up heads 50% of the time. Variations like this are extremely likely in small samples. If I were to flip the same coin (for example) 10,000 times, it will come up Heads about 50%. It still might be something like 5,051/10,000 or 4,963/10,000, but the large sample size brings it closer to the mathematical realities of the situation. On 1,000,000 flips, it will be even closer to 50/50. On a theoretically infinite number of flips, it will be 50/50.* -O * Quick aside, sblocked, that has nothing to do with the discussion above. [sblock]Actually, with a coin flip, it's not quite 50%. You're [B]always[/B] better off calling the side that's facing up during the flip, if it's going to land on the ground. Or, calling the side that's facing down before the flip, if it will be caught and flipped over one more time. Basically, when a coin that was heads-up is flipped, it might go HTHTHTHTHTH or HTHTHTHTHTHT or some variation thereof. At no point during the flip will there be more tails than heads in the sequence, assuming Heads was up at first. But this is neither here nor there for the mathematical ideal of a coin flip, which is really what we're talking about. :) [/sblock] [/QUOTE]
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