bad great generals

[DaviddesJ]

With the exclusion that it could end up on its third edge, EVERY FLIP is always 50/50, even if it came up a million times in a row heads.

Not really. Some coins are biased, and the more heads in a row you get, the more likely that your coin is biased.

Of course, that's the opposite of the effect that the other poster claimed.

 

[drkodos]

Not really. Some coins are biased, and the more heads in a row you get, the more likely that your coin is biased.

Of course, that's the opposite of the effect that the other poster claimed.

I have actually one time witnessed a coin flip land on its edge and maintain that position. Thus, it was neither a head nor a tail.

It happened on a grass field at a football game.

The moral of the story? There are actually three sides to every story:

Yours, mine, and what really happened.


Given that the coin is not biased, previous results do not affect future results. Regardless of overall odds. Can we agree on that?

Thus, Great General can lose five battles in a row even when they have 98% chance of winning each of those battles. Yes?


It happens.

 

[Goodgimp]

Somewhat on-topic: I've noticed that, since I installed Warlords, I have seemed to lose a good number of battles in which I had a 90+% percent, including a couple where I lost a Warlord unit. (yeah, I know, boo hoo.)

Still, the battles odds seem kind of... out-of-whack. Has anyone else noticed this or have a possible explanation?

I consistently lose at 70% odds, and consistenly win at 30%. It's been going on almost every game, kinda weird.

 

[kcbrett5]

I suggest some learning would be a most appropriate use of said time as I agree that continuing to argue when you are incorrect makes little sense, unless you enjoy the pain, or are unable to suffer embarassment regardless of how foolish and untenable your position.

What I find amusing about this entire debate (and this is typical of most arguments on the internet) is that you are so completely sure of your own correctness that you are unwilling to stop for a moment and even think about the possibility that someone in the world might have a better understanding of the subject than you do. If there is a more certain sign of ignorance in this world, I don't know it.

You are convinced that you are right and I am a moron. I will not attempt to dissuade your opinion on that. I am secure enough with myself that I truly don't care.

I have considered the argument against me, and though it is louder and more commonly held, it is most certainly not true. There are no such things as independent events. If a butterfly flaps its wings in china....

The point is, the entire debate is quite irrelevant to the great general discussion. Since you are unlikely to have 51 Warlords with which to test, I hardly see where it matters. Of course a warlord can lose a battle 5 times in a row with 98% odds. But if the odds are truly 98%, it is very unlikely. I think more likely there is a flaw in the odds calculator, or people are tending to remember the bad more than the good.

 

[Prof Warbles]

i dont think the combat odds reflect first strikes. they greatly change the true chances to win a battle.

 

[Teg_Navanis]

I just want to throw in a random comment I think hasn't been mentioned yet: The random seed is stored with the save file. If you lose a 99+% battle and reload, you'll lose it again unless you do some other *whatever* in between. Dunno if anyone writing here is a regular reloader, but I've certainly seen people complaining about losing 20+ 99% battles in a row or so...

 

[drkodos]

What I find amusing about this entire debate (and this is typical of most arguments on the internet) is that you are so completely sure of your own correctness that you are unwilling to stop for a moment and even think about the possibility that someone in the world might have a better understanding of the subject than you do. If there is a more certain sign of ignorance in this world, I don't know it.

You are convinced that you are right and I am a moron. I will not attempt to dissuade your opinion on that. I am secure enough with myself that I truly don't care.

I have considered the argument against me, and though it is louder and more commonly held, it is most certainly not true. There are no such things as independent events. If a butterfly flaps its wings in china....

The point is, the entire debate is quite irrelevant to the great general discussion. Since you are unlikely to have 51 Warlords with which to test, I hardly see where it matters. Of course a warlord can lose a battle 5 times in a row with 98% odds. But if the odds are truly 98%, it is very unlikely. I think more likely there is a flaw in the odds calculator, or people are tending to remember the bad more than the good.

I do not think you are a moron. I have no idea what level intelligence you actually possess.

I do however know that Roulette favors the house and that previous coin flips DO NOT affect future coin flips. Each coin flip is an individual occurance. Roulette pays numbered bets @ 32 to 1, yet there are 34 slots on the table. Red or Black pay 2 to 1, but the odds are not 2 to 1. The house only needs a very thin sliver in order to ensure winning the majority of plays. I know this because I happened to work at the Monte Carlo hotel in Las Vegas for 6+ years, 2 of them in the pits.

I also have a sure fire system to get money from the Casinos: work there and have them pay you a salary.

In my many years on the planet I have seen many UNLIKELY things happen repeatedly. Unlikeness does not mean something will not happen.

I simply point to Human evolution as proof that things which defy probability, and are deemed by many to be highly unlikely, actually do happen.


As for reloads and Great Generals: I am not referring to reloads but to multiple and separate encounters. ALSO, you can change the random seed on reloads, and then the results ARE different.

Just sayin.

 

[DaviddesJ]

You are convinced that you are right and I am a moron.

No, you have a poor understanding of probability. But that doesn't make you a moron; it just means your education is lacking. The ancient Greeks didn't understand probability, either. But they weren't morons.

 

[DigitalBoy]

There are so many problems with this logic I don't know where to begin.
1st-if you land on heads 50 times in a row I am betting my life savings on that 51st flip being tails. You cannot view it independently like you suggest. True, the odds of the 51st flip are still 50/50. But the odds of hitting 51 in a row are astronomical. This is why you can win at roulette betting only black/red, high/low, and odd/even. If you dont believe me, try a simple experiment. Flip a coin continuously until you get 5 heads or tails in a row. Then record what the 6th flip is. Repeat this as often as you want until you have a large enough sample. Then see what all of your 6th flips were and I guarantee you they will not be 50/50. Try it. You will see.

You are correct. The odds of getting 51 heads in a row are very small, one-half to 51st power, if I'm not mistaken.

On the other hand, the odds of getting 50 heads in a row and then a tails are equally small.

2nd-Humans are not a bag of paperclips. Contrary to biblical genesis, we were not conjured out of thin air, but evolved over a period of millions of years from a single cell organism. Of course paperclips cannot assemble themselves, they are not alive. DNA however, is extremely good at assembling itself and copying itself.

DNA is very good at replicating itself, but evolution on the bacteria -> human scale require more than just self-replication. It requires genetic mutations, which are in themselves "unnatural" freak occurances.

 

[DaviddesJ]

It requires genetic mutations, which are in themselves "unnatural" freak occurances.

That's a bit of an exaggeration. Meiosis seems to have a higher error rate than it could, presumably because a higher mutation rate (up to a certain level) is beneficial. Most mutations are neutral; the negative ones tend to produce unviable germ cells, and the positive ones have some chance to propagate.

You have approximately 10 mutations from your parents (copying errors during meiosis), as does every other human. Those mutations are not "unnatural".

 

[Pantastic]

There are two slots that are neither red nor black on a roulette wheel, and that is why the odds are always in the house favor even on red/black bets.

FYI, it's normally 2 in the US but 1 in Europe. It doesn't really change the fact that the house will win, but it does alter the probabilities a bit.

Going back to the '5 heads in a row means it's unlikely the new flip will be heads' bit, why is it only 5 in a row that modify the next coin flip? Getting THTHTH is hyst as unlikely as HHHHHH, so would you expect your next flip not to be H if the alternated? Even getting TTTTTH is exactly as unlikely as HHHHHH, so apparently if you get 5 tails in a row, you should expect the next flip to come up T since it would be unlikely to be H.

 

[DsevenO]

FWIW, the poster who made that particular claim has 28 posts over a period of 3.5 years.

Forgive me - how does this affect the relevance of my observation?

 

[DaviddesJ]

Forgive me - how does this affect the relevance of my observation?

It makes the observations more significant because you have a history of posting here. If someone observed a very unusual sequence of combat results, they might go looking for an explanation and join this forum just to post about it. Thus, unusual results are more likely (less unlikely) for a new forum participant than for an existing participant.

 

[EdCase]

To the crazy "coin flippers". You are talking at cross purposes.

There is a 50/50 chance on each coinflip..but there is also a calculation of odds that can be made based on how may times the coin will land a certain way. These odds get longer the further into a sequence you get.
So you are in fact both correct.

With regards to the OP though ... I personally have not really noticed anything to be "out of whack".

 

[DsevenO]

It makes the observations more significant because you have a history of posting here. If someone observed a very unusual sequence of combat results, they might go looking for an explanation and join this forum just to post about it. Thus, unusual results are more likely (less unlikely) for a new forum participant than for an existing participant.

Just curious When I originally posted this observation I didn't realize what a hot-button issue statistics was around here - some very interesting comments so far.

 

[kcbrett5]

No, you have a poor understanding of probability. But that doesn't make you a moron; it just means your education is lacking. The ancient Greeks didn't understand probability, either. But they weren't morons.

I have a complete understanding of probability. That isn't the issue. Of course the odds of any individual flip are 50/50. There are only 2 possible outcomes. But this isn't a question of simple probability or statistics.

You can observe that I am right by experimenting yourself. There is nothing magical about 5 flips as some of the "weaker" arguers are suggesting. I simply picked 5 because you can actually get 5 in a row in a reasonable amount of time. If I said you had to wait until you got 50 in a row before you started recording results, well lets just say I don't think I will still be reading this message board by the time I got any responses. You can check this equally with 2 in a row or 3 in a row, you will just need to have more data points to make a significant observation. To those of you suggesting there are magical rays that affect coin flips, your comments are shortsighted, condescending, and tragically uninformed.

The problem is that the math behind this everyday "intuitive" observation is far more complicated than simple probabilities. I would have to teach you quantum physics to understand it and I have no desire to do that. If you are really interested I can suggest some reading material however.

And of course roulette favors the house. There are several reasons for this. First, the zero slots mess everything up. Second, the tables have maximum bets. I don't need to have worked at a casino (much less spent 6 years studying said casino) to figure that out. All casino games favor the house, unless you are playing against humans.

Look, this isnt rocket science. You know it intuitively, but you are struggling because the basic math disagrees with the premise. Just try it. I am not suggesting anything that isnt well known already. Just do a little research if you dont feel like flipping coins.

 

[SoxSexSax]

I think all we have here is a failure to communicate. KCBrett is arguing one point, everyone else is arguing another.

The point KCBrett is arguing is that the sequence 50 heads v 1 tails is more likely to come up than 51 heads. This is correct.

HOWEVER, it is ALSO correct that, having got 50 heads, the next flip is still 50-50.

Both these facts are easily provable, use google to save me the effort please.

What I WILL add though is that, while KCBrett is correct in his overall assumption, he would still be foolish to bet his life savings on that 51st flip. He is correct in assuming that, in the long run, the sequence of 50 heads and 1 tail is far more likely than the 51 heads, BUT that NEXT SINGLE FLIP is still a 50-50, which means exactly 50% of the time he would go broke. If he chooses to argue with this, please provide the detailed forumlas your are using so I can critique them.

 

[porkdiesel]

this topic has turned into a giant cluster f*ck of "facts" and "opinions"!

MAKE IT STOP!!!!!!!!!

 

[Teg_Navanis]

Look, this isnt rocket science. You know it intuitively, but you are struggling because the basic math disagrees with the premise. Just try it. I am not suggesting anything that isnt well known already. Just do a little research if you dont feel like flipping coins.

"Intuition is the human ability to instantaneously misrecognize a situation". In statistics, "human intuition" usually consists of misconceptions, selective perception and wrong pattern-making. You seem to be misapplying the Law of large numbers.

I'd really like to have you as a regular guest in my casino without maximum bets, you'd make a good income source... how often can you double your bet until you're busted?

What I find amusing about this entire debate (and this is typical of most arguments on the internet) is that you are so completely sure of your own correctness that you are unwilling to stop for a moment and even think about the possibility that someone in the world might have a better understanding of the subject than you do. If there is a more certain sign of ignorance in this world, I don't know it.

You are convinced that you are right and I am a moron. I will not attempt to dissuade your opinion on that. I am secure enough with myself that I truly don't care.

What I find amusing is that you're doing exactly the same, but still condemn others for it...


Edit: To write something constructive. If you're playing with my Unit Statistics Mod, you might notice things that escaped your attention before due to selective perception. Perhaps you have a unit that won 10 50% fights, or one that won in defense with less than 1% combat odds (and you didn't even notice 'cause it was during the AI turn). Improbable events tend to happen fairly often in every single game, but they are not all to your disadvantage as some might think.

 

[Halberd]

I have to say... as a long-time lurker on these forums... this one has absolutely made me PMSL. Thanks guys!