Worst Dice Luck Ever

[Roman]

I am essentially always considered to have bad dice luck by my group(s), but I don't remember experiencing anything like what I have experienced today in a group I have joined a few months ago as a Cleric. Today's session included a mixture of roleplaying and combat and I had to make 8 d20 rolls in total.

The first 6 consecutive rolls were natural 1s! Four of them were rolled in the open and two I rolled so that nobody could see the result but the DM (effectively 'behind the DM's screen'), but the DM decided to show us anyway, because he could not stop laughing at my rolls.

I calculated the probability of rolling 6 consecutive 1s on a d20 to be 1/64 million! This is so low, that I am wondering if all of us at the table having hallucinations of me rolling 6 consecutive 1s is not more probable.

As if that were not improbable enough, the remaining two d20 rolls I made during the session were both 2s...

You know, I don't generally believe in things like somebody having luck with dice or lack thereof, but these rolls are so unlucky and so improbable that it almost makes me reconsider.

 

[Blizzardb]

I don't know if this would be any consolation, but the probability of rolling 8 20s (or any other 8 rolls in order) would be exacly the same as rolling 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 2, 2 in this order. So every time you roll 8 20-sided dice, a very improbable event occures, regardless of results.

 

[Jeff Wilder]

I don't know if this would be any consolation, but the probability of rolling 8 20s (or any other 8 rolls in order) would be exacly the same as rolling 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 2, 2 in this order. So every time you roll 8 20-sided dice, a very improbable event occures, regardless of results.

This is true only to the extent that the results of the rolls are insignificant. In d20 games, rolling a 1 is significant, and thus streaks are noteworthy. By contrast, rolling 12, 18, 4, 9, 4, 13 isn't noteworthy, except in the unlikely event that one were looking for (or to avoid) those particular rolls.

More germane to the OP's story is the fact that his eight d20 rolls only represent a tiny portion of his lifetime d20 rolls, and an infinitesimal portion of everyone's d20 rolls. Accordingly, there's really nothing special about a streak like he describes ... except to the person it happens to (and those who get all shadenfreude-ish from it). It'd be far more amazing if such a streak hadn't happened to anyone on EN World.

That said, if it happened to me, I'd be sharing, too. The worst I can say is that my DM has rolled more natural 20s against my AC 35 dwarven cleric than he's rolled against every other member of the party combined. (Including, last session, 20 (threat) plus 20 (confirm) plus 20 (instant death, which we don't actually use, but enjoy rolling). It's been pretty impressive.

 

[Thanee]

Wow! That's really bad...

Well, at least the tendency is upwards, right?

Bye
Thanee

 

[ppaladin123]

Law of large numbers...not gonna kick in and save your butt after only a 3-4 rolls.

 

[Keith Robinson]

The first 6 consecutive rolls were natural 1s!

We got that beat in our group (for a session, not consecutive), when one of our players rolled a 1 sixteen (16!) times in a single 4 hour session.

Never seen anything like it before. Or since!

 

[Nai_Calus]

Ouch. I feel your pain, I once in Shadowrun rolled a total of like 17 d6s on a test and at the end of it all still only had like two successes. The rest of the night wasn't much better. My group has banned the dice I used that night, rofl.

I've also got a player in my campaign that has absolutely horrible luck. He cannot roll a hit to save his life. He usually rolls 1 or 2 below what he needs to hit, or just plain rolls horribly. I think he's hit maybe twice... And then he rolls 1s on his damage rolls.

It doesn't help at all that his build is terrible, especially since I didn't get a chance to review his character before we started since I didn't see it until 5 minutes before we started because his communication leaves much to be desired. He's a Scout, human so he has no useful racial weapon profs, 10 STR, always trying to use his *shortsword* instead of his shortbow, keeps forgetting to use his skirmish ability... Maybe the bad rolls are a sign from the D&D Gods that he needs to make a new, viable character. >_> Oh well, the 80-foot deep well-camouflaged spiked pit trap with the spikes smeared with Black Lotus Extract and filled with Rust Monsters that he will undoubtedly fail the roll to find will take care of him.

 

[Bold or Stupid]

Another SR one, I once saw a total of 12 ones from 22 dice. Major critical failure. The character dropped both his knives, fell face down I the mud, being in melee this was from his opponents return attack. One of the knives killed a turkey, I felt the epic fail deserved it.

 

[webrunner]

It isn't ones, but once during a session I hit a target exactly once over the course of two encounters. Fortunately I was a battlerager fighter so I was still being useful as a meat shield with a mark.. but missing combat challenge every time was a pain.

 

[DEP]

You think thats bad! I was running the first bit of the Armageddon Echo and the encounter with the forest drakes I 20-20-20 a PC who just made a new character.

We all laughed at that because it was funny and it is the first time ever I rolled that! The party feared the dice for the rest of the night. They had nothing to worry about because...

For 5 rounds in a row, 6 Dretches, and 4 Drow rolled 1's...I dont know what the odds are of 10 enemies rolling 1's for 5 rounds are but when the players saw this happen they laughed at me...

I guess it was revenge for the last session where I crit on every other attack and the triple 20 that session.