Friday, March 9, 2018

Mathletes: Remind me: What happens to the probability of rolling a combined total of a six or less on:

Mathletes: Remind me: What happens to the probability of rolling a combined total of a six or less on:
three dice, take the worst two
two dice, take two
three dce, take the best two
four dice, take the best two
five dice, take the best two

Basically, what happens if "advantage" and "disadntange" replace bonuses in a 2d6 system?

21 comments:

  1. I usually use anydice.com - AnyDice to resolve these existential questions.

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  2. three dice, take the worst two: 68%
    two dice, take two: 41%
    three dce, take the best two: 20%
    four dice, take the best two: 9%
    five dice, take the best two: 4%

    Hmmm.

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  3. Or, this, so I'm not the guy that says google it...

    Chances of 6-, according to anydice:

    5d6, keep worst 2: 90.57%
    4d6, keep worst 2: 82.64%
    3d6, keep worst 2: 68.06%
    2d6, flat: 41.67%
    3d6, keep best 2: 19.44%
    4d6, keep best 2: 9.03%
    5d6, keep best 2: 4.22%

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  4. Oh, we cross-posted while I was feeling like a butthead.

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  5. No worries; I'd forgotten the name of any dice. :-)

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  6. It's a bigger difference than +1 forward. 2d6+1 chances of 6- are 27.78%, and that 8% difference would be mirrored on the -1 side.

    Also, results are LESS swingy, the more dice are involved. They congregate even harder toward the 7-9 result. (Deviation for 2d6+1 is 2.4, for 3d6 keep 2 it's 2.2.)

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  7. Click on the summary button. It shows Mean, Deviation, Min and Max.

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  8. Yeah, I see that. What i really want is to show the 6- options, so i can see a single chart with all the options and show chance of hard moves. Same for 7-9. I get all confuzzld trying to add them.

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  9. Ah. You don't have to add. Use (ignore quotes) "output [highest 2 of 3d6]", or contrariwise "output [lowest 2 of 3d6]" and click on the "at most" button.

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  10. I saw that, too. I just want to see the percentage chance of a 6-. Not the others.

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  11. For 7-9, I'd have to look at the documentation, but at least with the "at most" button, you'd only have 3 numbers to add.

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  12. It's an interesting question that comes up often. I think I'll make something pretty tomorrow, built off the sweat of someone else's brow, if you're not deep into it at the moment.

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  13. I think in practical terms it could get annoying to try and visually spot the two lowest or two highest dice.

    Instead, I think it might be easier to make one of the dice colored differently. That die is always part of the mix. The second die is chosen from the remaining dice (either highest result or lowest result).

    This also simplifies the math dramatically. You just need to figure out the probability of getting the necessary second die roll for each of the 6 possible first die rolls, and average them.

    For penalty it's:

    (5/6)^n/6
    + (4/6)^n/6
    + (3/6)^n/6
    + (2/6)^n/6
    + (1/6)^n/6
    + 0

    For bonus you subtract the probability of failure from 100%:

    1.00
    - (1/6)^n/6
    - (2/6)^n/6
    - (3/6)^n/6
    - (4/6)^n/6
    - (5/6)^n/6
    - 1

    I'm taking n to be the total number of dice minus 1.

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  14. I just spent half an hour trying to find a way of doing this and I don't think Anydice can do it. I think the best option is to run the various options and pull out the percentages yourself.

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  15. Thanks guys! This is all really neat!

    I love that Brian did the math on paper. That reminds me of undergrad so much.

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  16. William Nichols

    30 mins, Googling and fiddling = no progress.

    5 mins with pen & paper = problem solved.

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  17. Yep. Still nothing quite so flexible as dotted graph paper and a pencil.

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