The RNG Seeding Issue is Grotesque, Grotesque, Seeding, Issue, Issue, Seeding, Issue

Personofsecrets

For my first turn of the game, I was greeted with the below,



Thanks to the RNG seeding issue, I started the game with 10 gold! This type of thing happens enough of the time, that if you do have a goods shipment, but only see one Delmene contract in the Tavern, it's not a bad idea to "try and get" another contract to appear like maigc.

So anyhow, I purchased the Luxury Exports, then another Luxury exports showed up, so I bought that one too! With my six remaining gold, I purchased Oathman. Pretty strong turn one!

The below image is the tavern after I ended my turn. Yes, another Oathman showed up too. How crazy! It's so random that it's almost like it isn't that random!



And this type of thing happens all of the time, sometimes in more subtle ways. Always play into tavern repeats when you can!

sayswhoto

Three Archer's Volley also showed up in the Tavern.

I'm not going to bother to calculate the probability but this seems like a very low chance event. I would be more interested if something like this repeats. I'm not sure if one event like this can determine faulty RNG as I don't have a background in "software RNG" (I don't even know what the technical term for it is).

However, some noticeable events:

• 4 out of the 5 initial Tavern draws are Hlaalu cards.
• Followed by two luxury exports in a row.
• Followed by two Oathman's.
• Three Archer's Volley also appeared.

As an aside, If I'm going second, I almost always avoid picking Hlaalu. The possibility for two Ebony/Kwama mines on turn one paired with the stating 1 gold Hlaalu card is enough of a potential disadvantage.

Personofsecrets

sayswhoto wrote: »

Three Archer's Volley also showed up in the Tavern.

I'm not going to bother to calculate the probability but this seems like a very low chance event. I would be more interested if something like this repeats. I'm not sure if one event like this can determine faulty RNG as I don't have a background in "software RNG" (I don't even know what the technical term for it is).

However, some noticeable events:

• 4 out of the 5 initial Tavern draws are Hlaalu cards.
• Followed by two luxury exports in a row.
• Followed by two Oathman's.
• Three Archer's Volley also appeared.

As an aside, If I'm going second, I almost always avoid picking Hlaalu. The possibility for two Ebony/Kwama mines on turn one paired with the stating 1 gold Hlaalu card is enough of a potential disadvantage.

I don't notice repeats in every single game, but I do notice repeats in many games. This game was probably the most gross example that I've ever seen. Usually, I just am aggravated by the Hlaalu cards, whether I am benefitting or not, and move on, but this case was especially egregious.

You'll notice this happen with the Mora contracts often due to how devestating the random out of no where damage piling up is.

Seraphayel

I just had a game where every replacement card for the one I bought ended up being a Crow card for 4 coins. At the end of the game my opponent had like 12 crow cards, 8 of them were Tolls or others (yes I lost because I didn’t want to play the Crow game). He finished me within two turns because he was drawing like 7-8 additional cards per round (and wasting 25 coin twice to buy more crap cards instead of finishing early - very skilled play, isn’t it?). I was 30 Power ahead at that point.

Some of ToT‘s RNG doesn’t feel RNG, it feels like fabricated RNG if that makes any sense, clearly favoring one side. I‘ve had matches where there was not one single card from a specific patron in the tavern (in this case Rahjin). How likely is that?

I love ToT, but this mess of an RNG is just fostering my frustration.

spartaxoxo

Games I have had where I was at a notable disadvantage.

They gave me opponent all of the power cards except one. I'm not kidding. All of them.

They gave my opponent a bunch of multiple contract cards every time their Mora card showed up.

They gave my opponent crow combos every single time they were available, and me only once, despite me owning more crow cards than they did. I just kept not getting them together and was not filling out my deck with junk.

Games I have had where I was at a notable advantage.

Had a similar game as the one above where thanks to contract cards I was able to start getting heavy hitting cards quickly. Opponent didn't have a fair chance.

This is why I truly hate Pelin and Mora though.

Personofsecrets

spartaxoxo wrote: »

Games I have had where I was at a notable disadvantage.

They gave me opponent all of the power cards except one. I'm not kidding. All of them.

They gave my opponent a bunch of multiple contract cards every time their Mora card showed up.

They gave my opponent crow combos every single time they were available, and me only once, despite me owning more crow cards than they did. I just kept not getting them together and was not filling out my deck with junk.

Games I have had where I was at a notable advantage.

Had a similar game as the one above where thanks to contract cards I was able to start getting heavy hitting cards quickly. Opponent didn't have a fair chance.

This is why I truly hate Pelin and Mora though.

This type of thing is harder to tell, but yea, have had plenty of games with and against decks that are mostly emptying out and then giving the same starting combo for the next turn that player plays. Even have had a number of games where I know 2 or 3 of the opponents cards on top of their deck due to paying attention and then the shuffle fills out the rest of their hand with combos and it happens over and over, despite deck composition, as though the combo cards are sticky.

Again, that type of stuff seems to happen more than it should, but nowhere near as much as the card duplicate issue happens. I think that the power of the repeat card issue is that it isn't dealing with the potentially subjective idea that someone drew perfectly over and over. That's sort of a complicated idea. The repeat card issue has an objective criteria of looking for repeat cards so it is probably less likely to suffer from confirmation biases as the other idea.

benzenexz

Any game concerning randomness is rooted within a game of dealing with randomness.

There was a once my opponent got 2 crow cards from the 2 starting round and he's going to get the next 6 gold crow agent in the next round and there're only contract cards left in the tavern, I got one crow card previously. So I force grab that crow card with Mora in advantage of my shuffle at the end of this turn. He keeps instant grabbing every single crows showing up as to crowball the game, even constantly using mora. But thankfully crow's all he knows, can be counterplayed.

Another time is my opponent get 3 Orgnum with one agent card in the first round, and all rest were contract card, except for the tomeshell, so I got the tomeshell. At last in that game I ended up with 4 cards of Mora, one psijic drawing card and one psijic globe. and my opponent, despite getting all the ongnum, he still holds some other 1G base stuffs. And the game ended up with me winning at 60+. (Usually I was the one to take advantage of opponent's setback of mora to draw more cards and get a hand of pure orgnum)

Point is, it's really to outsmart your opponent when the RGN is against you.

But then again, games of such types are built-in with heavy randomness. If you keep testing, you'll always encouter some rare eevents. there're all types of rare events, and the total probability of them might just be comparable to the “perfect equilibrium” (as 1 type of each card in the tavern, 1 of each deck+ 1 treasury contract).

Personofsecrets

I don't know why I even bother to write this out, because nothing is changing and this issue is so ubiquitious that it might as well be a feature, but here is a recent game for the case study. In the first part to middle part of the game, we had found all of the 2 Festival of Forbearance and the Bardic Veneration. We found all 3 Philanthropy. We found bouth Mournhold Clergy and both Temple Arbiter. We found multiple The Lesson of Ayem.

Other notable duplicates included 2 Stonelore Rockseer and 2 Firesong Haruspex that appeared in quick succession. Both my opponent and I also had received a Forest Wraith. Toward the end of the game, both Currency Exchange showed up one after the other.

Those were not the only duplicates. The opening tavern also had Hierling and Oathman. I think that you get the picture at this point.

To some degree, one may think that as a game goes on, the liklihood of repeats increases and that's true. But there seems to be this seeding issue going on because not only are there duplicates appearing at all stages of the game, but the card duplicates are tending to arrive on turns that are close in proximity. We aren't getting 1 Mournhold Clergy at the start and then another one later at the end of the game, we are getting cards showing up in close timing to one another or sometimes being in the tavern at the same time.

And although these instances should be a possibility. Card duplication can happen. It happens with such high and noticable frequency that it seems like the RNG seeding of ESO isn't quite right. And it seems that way not just for TOT, but also in other aspects of the game.

I shouldn't have to mention how card duplication is a balance issue. Just look at Mournhold Clergy as I pointed out earlier. That card absolutely stomps when there are multiples rolling their effect at the same time. This is a major problem for normal gameplay.

Personofsecrets

@ZOS_Kevin - Please pardon that I'm invoking your attention to the issue that I believe exists in the game. I hope that what I point out in the thread can be investigated and commented on by the design team. Thank you.

Personofsecrets

Back in July, myself and another player discussing the non-stop double Mournhold Clergy draws.

ZOS_Kevin

Personofsecrets wrote: »

@ZOS_Kevin - Please pardon that I'm invoking your attention to the issue that I believe exists in the game. I hope that what I point out in the thread can be investigated and commented on by the design team. Thank you.

Thanks for invoking my name! We'll get this passed along to the team tomorrow. Thanks for flagging this.

Personofsecrets

ZOS_Kevin wrote: »

Personofsecrets wrote: »

@ZOS_Kevin - Please pardon that I'm invoking your attention to the issue that I believe exists in the game. I hope that what I point out in the thread can be investigated and commented on by the design team. Thank you.

Thanks for invoking my name! We'll get this passed along to the team tomorrow. Thanks for flagging this.

Thank you - hoping to find out the most embarassing possibility that I'm just noticing something that isn't really happening. Would be interesting if the team has game data regarding tavern reveals.

maxxiestackhouse

While you’re at it ZoS take a look at how cooked RNG is! I had a game tonight where I’d hit 54-12 opponent (PvP ranked) had one turn left and wouldn’t you know it the ‘RNG’ gave my opponent 4 yes that’s right FOUR extra patron use cards in his ONE remaining turn so they could win……

DragonRacer

maxxiestackhouse wrote: »

While you’re at it ZoS take a look at how cooked RNG is! I had a game tonight where I’d hit 54-12 opponent (PvP ranked) had one turn left and wouldn’t you know it the ‘RNG’ gave my opponent 4 yes that’s right FOUR extra patron use cards in his ONE remaining turn so they could win……

I had one of those games in ranked PvP a month or so ago. We were on the last hand me leading something like 45-5 so thinking I have it in the bag, right?

Right?

Well, the Tavern decided otherwise and ON THE LAST HAND gave this person every single Pelin contract agent card and Rahjiin prestige-killing/card-discarding contract action card humanly possibly. It allowed them to knock me back under 40 prestige, thus extending the game, and every time I used most of my power to get rid of the Pelin contract agents, the Tavern would replace them for my opponent and/or give those 3-4 power contract action cards. Within 2-3 hands after my sure 45-5 win, the opponent made the biggest comeback in human history and beat me... because the Tavern decreed I should lose via the cards it offered my opponent and not to me at the end.

I almost deleted ESO entirely. Probably would have if I wasn't the GM of a trading guild and had 499 people relying on me to win a trader every week. I was that angry.

Seraphayel

I guess we all know these type of situations and they just feel unreal. They feel so fake that you really think the RNG decided to help your opponent win and beat you.

El_Borracho

Maybe its since this post, but I have been seeing a lot more duplicates appear in the tavern on a regular basis. 2-3 on the board at one time, and a fair number of picking a card only to have the same card appear in its place.

Personofsecrets

El_Borracho wrote: »

Maybe its since this post, but I have been seeing a lot more duplicates appear in the tavern on a regular basis. 2-3 on the board at one time, and a fair number of picking a card only to have the same card appear in its place.

It seems like I have at least one game every few days where multiple Mora contracts are popping up in a row. In the past couple of weeks I've had 2 games where the contracts all popped up on the first turn of the game.

maxxiestackhouse

DragonRacer wrote: »

maxxiestackhouse wrote: »

While you’re at it ZoS take a look at how cooked RNG is! I had a game tonight where I’d hit 54-12 opponent (PvP ranked) had one turn left and wouldn’t you know it the ‘RNG’ gave my opponent 4 yes that’s right FOUR extra patron use cards in his ONE remaining turn so they could win……

I had one of those games in ranked PvP a month or so ago. We were on the last hand me leading something like 45-5 so thinking I have it in the bag, right?

Right?

Well, the Tavern decided otherwise and ON THE LAST HAND gave this person every single Pelin contract agent card and Rahjiin prestige-killing/card-discarding contract action card humanly possibly. It allowed them to knock me back under 40 prestige, thus extending the game, and every time I used most of my power to get rid of the Pelin contract agents, the Tavern would replace them for my opponent and/or give those 3-4 power contract action cards. Within 2-3 hands after my sure 45-5 win, the opponent made the biggest comeback in human history and beat me... because the Tavern decreed I should lose via the cards it offered my opponent and not to me at the end.

I almost deleted ESO entirely. Probably would have if I wasn't the GM of a trading guild and had 499 people relying on me to win a trader every week. I was that angry.

DragonRacer wrote: »

maxxiestackhouse wrote: »

While you’re at it ZoS take a look at how cooked RNG is! I had a game tonight where I’d hit 54-12 opponent (PvP ranked) had one turn left and wouldn’t you know it the ‘RNG’ gave my opponent 4 yes that’s right FOUR extra patron use cards in his ONE remaining turn so they could win……

If Anniversary event wasn’t a week away I would have walked away from ESO 😂

Personofsecrets

Would be nice to have the long going first / going second streaks also investigated.

Personofsecrets

It just it just it just it just it just it just it just keeps happening folks!

maxxiestackhouse

Personofsecrets wrote: »

It just it just it just it just it just it just it just keeps happening folks!

Can confirm I was his opponent. @ZOS_Kevin seriously dude this gave my opponent 10 coins on turn 1! How the hell cna I win that match?

Personofsecrets

Just got another double Delmene contract in the starting tavern.

Personofsecrets

Second turn of the game and 3 Philanthropy have appeared in the Tavern.

Personofsecrets

Another game with all 3 philanthropy early on...

Personofsecrets

Three Stonelore Rockseer by the 2nd turn of the game.

El_Borracho

Had one yesterday with 4 Black Sacrament cards in the tavern. Followed by 3 Stubborn Shadows, followed by 3 Barterers. Something is way off

valenwood_vegan

I don't play ToT anymore, but these "impossible" RNG issues seem to show up throughout the entire game. Be it getting the same exact shoulder piece many times in a row from an undaunted vendor; failing an 85% "force lock" chance 8 times in a row; getting four purple furnishing plans within an hour, then none for a month; getting a master writ from every daily writ reward box one day and then none for days; etc.

The above are all possible outcomes, but should not be frequent outcomes.

But I imagine it's incredibly frustrating as applies to ToT, yeah, and certainly worth investigating in that context.

Personofsecrets

valenwood_vegan wrote: »

I don't play ToT anymore, but these "impossible" RNG issues seem to show up throughout the entire game. Be it getting the same exact shoulder piece many times in a row from an undaunted vendor; failing an 85% "force lock" chance 8 times in a row; getting four purple furnishing plans within an hour, then none for a month; getting a master writ from every daily writ reward box one day and then none for days; etc.

The above are all possible outcomes, but should not be frequent outcomes.

But I imagine it's incredibly frustrating as applies to ToT, yeah, and certainly worth investigating in that context.

Absolutely agreed. I've noticed this issue for a longgggggg time.

One place is with Crown crates. Open a bunch at a time and I either get nothing or I get constant wild cards. When an Apex reward shows up, it's not rare for another Apex to arrive. Have even had the same exact Apex reward show up multiple times during different crate seasons on the same batch opening.

The RNG seed just isn't being reset in between RNG events in my opinion. Who knows what else this effects. Even some hardcore raid teams will reset instances if they get the same bad RNG a couple of times in a row due to being stuck in a "bad" instance. There shouldn't be any such thing as that, but oh well.

The way that the issue manifests in TOT, with some powerful cards being much better in duplicates such as Philanthropy, Stonelore, Midnight Raid, the Sorcerer-King 2 drops, Crow cards, and much more creates big time lopsided games.

El_Borracho

Another update, had an NPC match today where I was able to get 3 agents up in one hand, with 2 of them being contract agents. Wouldn't you know it, the NPC pulled 3 straight Black Sacrament cards on his turn. What luck...

Personofsecrets

valenwood_vegan wrote: »

I don't play ToT anymore, but these "impossible" RNG issues seem to show up throughout the entire game. Be it getting the same exact shoulder piece many times in a row from an undaunted vendor; failing an 85% "force lock" chance 8 times in a row; getting four purple furnishing plans within an hour, then none for a month; getting a master writ from every daily writ reward box one day and then none for days; etc.

The above are all possible outcomes, but should not be frequent outcomes.

But I imagine it's incredibly frustrating as applies to ToT, yeah, and certainly worth investigating in that context.

Case in point, this happened from maybe 15 to 20 containers all opened at the same time...

spartaxoxo

I wish I had recorded this but....

I was in a match against a crow user. I didn't want them to get the 6 coin Crow card that's all card draws. So I used the 1 coin card that lets you remove a card from the tavern. The two cards replaced was another copy of both. I again cleared it, and the card that replaced it was the other similar 6 coin card that grants power. I used the Druid patron to replace that and that one was a duplicate as well.

I still ended up winning the match but I was not happy, I can tell you that.