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**Lord Alz** · 03-09-2015, 06:05 PM

I had 3 high level agents die today in different games with very small chances of death. I wanted to see if this was something that others were seeing today or if I am just suffering from a black Monday. Like lvl14 killing a lvl1 agent small chances with no security present .....

**Beatific** · 03-09-2015, 07:25 PM

(03-09-2015, 06:05 PM)Lord Alz Wrote: I had 3 high level agents die today in different games with very small chances of death. I wanted to see if this was something that others were seeing today or if I am just suffering from a black Monday. Like lvl14 killing a lvl1 agent small chances with no security present .....

Random my a**. The ghost in the machine has it out for you! Rough luck! Be nicer to cipher and rick - just kidding but couldn't hurt! Wink

I lost a level 1 doing a routine recon on turn 1 with no security. I thought 970s were completely safe (thus no advancement). I have got to have a discussion with the local spy university about the lacking quality of their cadets. Can't even get a routine mission done without dying.........you trump that setback. Congratulations! I will stop sulking now. Rolleyes

**kevindusi** · 03-09-2015, 07:29 PM

Were all of these results on the new platform or the old?

Agent vs. agent is, in my experience, one of the more safe missions. a 14 vs. a 1 should be pretty much a lock, though there is always a minimum chance of failure (~3%-5% from what I understand). Hitting three of those minimums on one day seems a bit extreme.

**Lord Alz** · (This post was last modified: 03-09-2015, 07:57 PM by Lord Alz.)

KEVIN,
all new platform, agent 14 vs agent 1 no security. mission failed and agent killed. agent 17 vs agent 6 no security, mission failed and agent killed. the third was not as big a deal but agent 7 bribing, agent killed. Like I said maybe it was just a black Monday for me. I was interesting in seeing if there was a pattern with others, I know random numbers can be brutal sometimes.

**Beatific** · 03-09-2015, 08:38 PM

(03-09-2015, 07:56 PM)Lord Alz Wrote: KEVIN,
all new platform, agent 14 vs agent 1 no security. mission failed and agent killed. agent 17 vs agent 6 no security, mission failed and agent killed. the third was not as big a deal but agent 7 bribing, agent killed. Like I said maybe it was just a black Monday for me. I was interesting in seeing if there was a pattern with others, I know random numbers can be brutal sometimes.

Some insight into the topic. Not sure if we use a PRNG or TRNG here. Probably a PRNG since it is a lot cheaper. Note in the link, however, that a PRNG is not really random. Most notably, if you know one set of numbers in the sequence you can calculate the next set once you know the algorithm. If I extrapolate, I think much depends on the cycle time of numbers. Or, said another way, if there is a repeating cycle, how often would we see the repeats in a game like Alamaze? In theory, if you had access to all the game info, you could possibly discern the pattern and change your planning accordingly. Can't see how that would be possible though without total access. See the "nasty surprise" comment though. Maybe too much thinking on my part here. Still, I have seen similar things (all 4 HP's dying on a side all on the same turn - statistically, assuming a 15% death rate, total possibility would be 0.05%) so am curious myself. If you are truly interested in the subject...here you go. Otherwise ignore my geekish ramblings....

https://www.random.org/randomness/

**kevindusi** · 03-09-2015, 10:32 PM

I have no idea what you just said... but I seem to recall UncleMike saying that the random generator was being changed to "something better". I'm not sure this qualifies, but it could just be bad luck. Unfortunately, in one of the other games that got moved to the new platform today, we had numerous issues. I'd be curious to know if this is widespread or if we just got "one of those".

**Ry Vor** · 03-10-2015, 12:53 AM

Patience requested on some of the issues with moving active games to the new platform. We really didn't even know if we could do that, but Mike has been diligently working on that to make it happen and bring us that much closer to automation.

**Hawk_** · 03-10-2015, 02:06 AM

(03-10-2015, 12:53 AM)Ry Vor Wrote: Patience requested on some of the issues with moving active games to the new platform. We really didn't even know if we could do that, but Mike has been diligently working on that to make it happen and bring us that much closer to automation.

You mean you will stop rolling those two ten sided dice and checking percentages by hand?

**Ry Vor** · 03-10-2015, 02:27 AM

(03-10-2015, 02:06 AM)Hawk_ Wrote:
(03-10-2015, 12:53 AM)Ry Vor Wrote: Patience requested on some of the issues with moving active games to the new platform. We really didn't even know if we could do that, but Mike has been diligently working on that to make it happen and bring us that much closer to automation.

You mean you will stop rolling those two ten sided dice and checking percentages by hand?

There was some jelly on a couple sides. Should be better now.

**unclemike** · 03-10-2015, 05:16 AM

If anyone wishes to investigate the matter further regarding their die rolls (whether good or bad), you may research Java's SecureRandom class for more info.