Putting on my conspiracy theory hat, I noticed that there is a certain player in the end game who always picks the same two decks every game, with one of them being druid, had on unusually good RNG for their draw combo. They tend to buy a "poor" deck, as in, always buying the "good" cards and end up with a very large "bad" deck from a strategy perspective, and yet the "correct" cards come into their hand almost every time. I actually was going back and forth with another player on discord where they noted a similar thing, and if this person had 20-30 cards in their hand of every color mixed and matched (plus bewilderments), the druid cards came into their hand at the same time, even if they only had 2 or 3 cards of that color, every game, even if the probably was really really low.
While pattern recognition is somewhat suspect and this is anecdotal, the odds of any particular hand coming up when you have 30+ cards should be an astronomical number due to factorials of a truly random set. So, when the "unlikely" combo happens with a strange amount of regularity, you do start to wonder if there's a seeding component to tavern/draw RNG vs. true and pure RNG.
This was actually a large part of why I started moving to Rajhin for every game, as adding bewilderments is sometimes the only way to break up a players snowballs on decks like crow/druid/mora etc.
And going into the game at large, in all the years and hundreds and thousands of times I've cleared vAS+2, to this day, I've never gotten a poly drop. Yet I've been in runs where the same person gets a poly in back to back runs, one time even 3 consecutive runs. While it could just be totally random luck, that sort of pattern is... dubious... I've been in farm groups where we clear 20+ times in an evening, and I've been doing that trial for YEARS... so it's not exactly a small sample pool I'm drawing from.
I don't work in an area that gives me expertise towards this, but yeah, I am aware that truly random number generation is rare. Also, to be very clear, I'm not claiming this person did anything untoward, and they might not even be aware of what is happening. But you can definitely pick up on some patterns that "should not" exist, and if you start playing thinking that "this might happen," it's wild how frequently it happens. Like "wow, wouldn't it be crazy if I could single hand proc kwarma mines?" and then you go for it and it happens. Your example is valid, I've seen it a disproportionate number of times relative to what a factorial set of of variables should allow.
spartaxoxo wrote: »The only way to know is to keep track of these things across a large sample size. Bias affects all of our observations.
El_Borracho wrote: »spartaxoxo wrote: »The only way to know is to keep track of these things across a large sample size. Bias affects all of our observations.
Very true. And players tend to remember the negative more than the positive. But there is something to be said for repetitive incidents that should be unusual. For instance, I played an NPC this morning who picked Pelin and Rahjin. He lucked into Grand Larceny on his first turn. At round 3, the bucket consistently populated on his turn. He picked the bucket, burned a coin card, and the bucket was replaced by Siege Weapon. 3 turns in a row. When I picked the bucket, another bucket appeared. By round 5, I was getting wrecked by 3 Siege Weapons in a row, and wouldn't you know it, he had enough coin every time to buy that timely Shield Bearer that kept populating because he also had Grand Larceny. Game over by round 7.
My cards? Oddly, the only Pelin card that populated after I took a card was Knight Commander. Crow and Red Eagle were the other 2 patrons. No Crows. All Red Eagle contract agents and actions and tavern cards. Not one Midnight Raid. Tried to keep up with Rahjins to attack his prestige. Fail. I also make it a habit to not take a cheap tavern card at the end of my turn to avoid the NPC getting a good card, so I wasn't setting the NPC with his bucket-Siege Weapon draws.
Normally, when the NPC uses Red Eagle to burn his deck away as you win. But something has been going on when the NPC picks Pelin. Its turned into a predictable onslaught from the jump, as it has been doing recently. Its also more than bad luck, as I don't see this NPC behavior with other decks. But with Pelin, its a constant destroying a coin card with bucket or a cheap Rahjin/Red Eagle card then reveal Siege Weapon or Midnight Raid that I have yet to duplicate on my end in that situation.
I don't really mind, as its an NPC game, but I do find it interesting and unusual
AnduinTryggva wrote: »tbh I long came to the conclusion that we have a fake random number generator in that there is quite some portion of non-randomness in it. Specifically with ToT.
El_Borracho wrote: »@Pixiepumpkin the NPC deck shuffling (without Almalexia or Celarus) is very interesting to say the least. As in when you see the NPC pick up Armory or Midnight Raid, or even Grand Larceny, and you say to yourself "well I'll be seeing that next turn." While you say to yourself, "I know I picked up Siege Weapon, when do I get to play it?"
I like your point about the Harvest Season cards. I thought it was just me as well, but I have see a lot of those pop up back to back to back with the NPC. Most of the time I'm happy to see it, like when they use the scales to eliminate a card I don't want. But there has been a recurring situation I've noticed when Pelin or Ansei is one patron and Hlaalu is the other patron. The NPC will play 2-4 Harvest/scales cards in a row while they have a Hlaalu agent or card in their hand, unplayed, that has the ability to scoop up a 6 coin value card. "How fortuitous," I say to myself as they shuffle the tavern with Harvest Season or scales until the card they really want appears.
Again, I have waited to see what is underneath a card in the tavern when I have one of those Hlaalu cards ready because sometimes you get lucky. But I have yet to spend 9-11 coins to shuffle the tavern until Armory appears. I don't believe the RNG is written to make those specific incidents occur, but there has to be something to explain this unusual NPC behavior.