Luck??

lol why all my cast lot 80%+ are under 500 always between 200-300.... sigh..... are the lucky egg or some +luck item help???

No. SE stated in an interview (I think it was 2007 Fanfest) that none of the "Lucky Items" have anything programmed for them to improve luck.

edit
and /random too

Their response was "There is no program for luck".

hmmmmmm... but are there anything i can do about the cast lot or /random?? always low... and some friend in dyn. they always has hight lotting... they always got the ffa but i think i only won 1 time...

The only way to really test randomness is to do it a few thousand times and look for patterns. Ever look at roulette results at a roulette table? Pretty damned random.

In any case try doing /random at least 2000 times, write each result down, then look at the data to see if there is a pattern of lows or highs or whatever. I think you'll find that your results and your friend's results are just coincidence.

It should be done by a random number generator, and as far as I know in computing it cannot be programmed to be truely random, they make it seem so through programming techniques. If SE said there is no program for luck then there must be no way to modify the programming to change the range of values you get when lotting...

I always seem to do badly on lotting too :( I guess it's just... "bad luck" lol plenty of supperstitions though, like using /random in your mog house until you get a really low number so next lot might be a high one, or lotting right after the first person to lot and even wearing luck gear that SE said makes no difference...

Remember there is no such thing a computer that can generate 100% random. There will be a pattern somewhere.. I think I saw this on a movie or TV show. Seems to be right that something man made could never be 100% random.

I feel for you man...my lots always suck *** on stuff, enough that my LS pretty much calls me the unluckiest guy they know in game. My /random's always suck too. Every once in a great while I pull off an 850+ on something, but never for anything important...

It's so bad...my ls members have twice as many KS as I do, all because of the drops always going to them...drives me crazy.

Random is relative. As long as you can not guess the next number or know where the next number will be statistically than it is random TO YOU.

I could generate numbers right now off the top of my head that would be totally random to everyone else even though I would know which one was next every time.

You can not predict the next number in the ffxi random number generator and you can not even say that the next number will more likely be less than 400 or between 500 and 600.

Don't worry about what you see in movies and TV shows.

Yes, if you had hacked into ffxi servers to see what the current seed, formula, and position was you could predict the next number... but if you were that far you could just hack yourself all the drops you wanted anyway.

Even so, the ffxi random number generator is still truly random because it is being access very frequently by everyone on your server. When you random or lot you would have to predict how long that packet would get to the server and predict how many times everyone in the world would hit that same generator in that time frame plus account for the lag of you knowing where the generator was in the first place.

In other words. FFXI is perfectly random.

It would be nice if you were guaranteed an assault breastplate after doing UG 100 times, but you are not. You could kill a NM a million times and never get a drop, but there are those times where you get 2 drops in a row and that is what makes FFXI exciting.

Zaldon says it best, "You'll get lucky soon, keep trying."

Dilbert says it even better.

Just tried it in my Mog House. "Unable to preform action in Mog House."

Not that it really matters though. XD

lmao serious? I never knew that =o im such a noob now lol

I know people who do it, thought they'd do it in mog house so as not to annoy ppl by spamming /random ... I guess not tho =/

thanks for reply guys wish you all best luck

I would almost guess that the programmers do have some kind of random number generator. But I don't think that it is a preset of random numbers, but more like when you issue the /random command it randomly picks a number at that time.
When I was in school I remember playing around with the random number generator on my TI-85 calculator. You could write a simple program that looked like this:
int rand(1000)
Every time it ran it would randomly give you a random number between the integers of 0 and 999; switching the number the () would alter the range that the number would fall into, starting with 0 but wouldn't include 1000, cause with computers, numbers start with 0.
Most likely, since this is a really simple program, it is most likely similar to what SE uses; each time someone /random, it would run the small program and spit out a number.

I too seem to suffer from horrible lots and randoms. I am starting to think that it might not necessarily be the computers fault, but just my innate horrible natural luck shining through even in a videogame.
Maybe our luck isn't due to the games program but to our own real life luck? I can attest that in real life my "luck" is just as bad; I never win anything and on random drawings I'm the least likely to be picked lol
In short, it might not be the computer at all, just the divine powers that be seeing to it that you still can't win, even in a videogame lol.

If this is true, then it is horribly depressing. I wanna win, dammit, if not in rl, at least in a freaking game! ^^

I feel your pain lol
I am getting to be well known for always having the worst /randoms and lots.
My Treasure Hunter is broken too... but only when I am trying for drops for me! When I help others go for drops my TH works just fine...
I told my Nyzul group that I would be the last member to see a piece of Nyzul gear... and I was right! (I still don't have a piece as of this post lol)

Buying lottery tickets and planning a trip to Vegas are 2 things you'll never catch me doing lmao

But if you think about it, doesn't it seem a bit strange that some people always seem to win lots and randoms and others (myself included) always seem to lose on the luck? I don't think that it could be the game but that fate has deemed us as the losers and it is fate that sees to us getting crappy numbers too /cry

Lady Luck <Can I add you to my friend list?>

I'm sorry Devek, but this is completely false. There is nothing relative about randomness in the mathematical sense. Just because people can't predict the next number in a sequence doesn't mean the sequence is random. For instance, I urge you to try generating random numbers of the top of your head like you mentioned before. Rattle off 100 "random" numbers between 1 and 10 and have a friend write all the numbers down. I'd be willing to bet that certain numbers will have many more instances than other. If it was random, each number 1-10 would have about 10 instances give or take.

In a mathematically random sequence every number in the range has an equal probability of being chosen each time. So, as a general trend the larger the sequence gets, the closer it will get to having an equal amount of each number in the range.

The beauty of it is that nothing man-made can ever produce a truly random sequence. Just like we can't truly create a line or a circle. These are ideas that are perfectly logical, but cannot be created physically.

All that being said, any computer based random number generator will give a good enough impression of randomness for us to call it random.

Sorry for the rant, but its not every day that I get to put my Master's Degree in Mathematics to good use.

lol you go SGT!

Voch , ppl that dont believe in luck and are positive... "have" all the luck. ;) Just like me lol

Who said I wasn't being positive?
I am positive!
I just figure, if I hang in there long enough, everyone else will eventually get what I am losing lots on and there'll be no competition, then I'll get it lol
That is pretty much how I got passed the first Limit quest; after being stuck at Lv 50 for about 2 months, everyone I knew was higher level and farmed the Ancient Papyrus just for me =)
I just went and started leveling other jobs to pass the time cause I knew that it would eventually happen.
If I were negative, I don't think I'd have made it this far in FFXI; this spring will be 5 years since I started and I have been having a blast regardless of not always winning.

I'm a comp sci guy, I like to deal more in the practical sense.



I already hit that point, but in case you missed it.





I could list the number 5, 100 times in a row. If you were unable to predict it or know that I was more likely for me to do that than something else, it is random.

I used to be the falls creek paper/rock/scissor champion. People think that game is all luck, but not after I tell them "Pick rock, I dare ya!"

No computer-generated "random" number is random. They are considered pseudorandom because they are generated with an algorithm and typically use the computer's clock as a seeding variable in its equations. Any computer system's random number can be calculated given the underlying algorithm, but due to the enormous possible complexity of the algorithm, it would be impossible to reverse engineer and use against the game itself. This is assuming that the calculations for the random numbers are performed on the server rather than the client. In order to be able to dupe a server-side random number generator into giving you a desired number, you would have to reverse-engineer the algorithm, and send the request for the random number so that it arrives at the server and is calculated by its CPU at exactly the right millisecond.

I realize I basically retyped Devek's post, but this is how it's done. Devek and Sgt are both correct (randomness being relative and there being no truly random numbers), but I have this lingering suspicious that Sgt merely wanted to flaunt a degree since Devek previously stated there is an underlying formula (which implies that it's not actually random). Randomness is relative because - by definition - we don't see the pattern.

If we were to be incredibly logical about randomness, it could be argued that nothing at all is truly random since everything has an underlying cause. Discussing the randomness of computer-generated numbers with a computer programmer would be almost analogous with discussing random human behavior with a psychologist. It's better to view randomness as unpredictability when analyzing any system. Once an underlying pattern is discovered, results become predictable, and therefore they are no longer random.

In response to the OP: Pause approximately one millisecond before hitting that "cast lots" and see if your luck improves. /wink

I heard something a while ago about the 'sin graph' (pronounced sign, for anyone who thought I was getting evangelical =p).

As i understand it, imagine a vertical list of all numbers 0-999. Then imagine a coloured cursor that will highlight one number on this list. The cursor is moving up and down the list from one end to the other, so fast that it would defy human eyes to see it highlighting any one value.

I believe when someone inputs the /random or "Cast Lots" command, whatever value this 'cursor' is highlighting at the time of the command's execution will be generated.

I heard this somewhere long ago back when I was running my /random Casino (Say what you like, people loved it!XD Probably got a helluva lot of blist entries still existing today as a result though, talk about karma ;_;).

Any thoughts, burgeoning mathematicians?

Edit* Obviously this sin graph would take the form of an incredibly complex formula rather than the imagery above, but it seemed like a better way of explaining.

So I guess you can throw out the 4 leaf mandragora bud then... of w.e SE says " Promotes good luck"...



... I guess we can chuck anything like this lil puppy out the window then for a Theif with TH then....

Shame on you SE for faulty Advertising then!

.. even though fan festival 2007.. "2007".. wth were you guys b4 that?

Def. kept all of us in the dark b4 then. Hmmmm...

If anyone wants some in depth info on random number generators (or RNG), the wiki page is pretty good:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Random_number_generator

I think the descriptions here are pretty good, but I'll make a couple really short examples which I hope may drive home the point.

Let's say I have a sequence of numbers from 1-5 that I claim is truly random: 4143512253. This sequence meets the evenly distributed definition of randomness which is a desirable goal, but not all RNG are exactly even.

To start using my RNG, you need to initialize it with a seed. A common way of choosing your seed randomly is to use the current time of day. Look at your current digital clock and use the minute digit as your seed. Let's say for arguments sake, your seed is 4. Given that you initialize my RNG with a seed of 4, the first time you ask me for a random number I'll give you 5. The next time 1 then 2 then 2 again then 5. Once I reach the end of the list, I wrap around to the beginning. Once I've given you all ten values, I just repeat them over and over again.

That's exactly how most computer pseudo-random numbers work except that their sequence isn't 10, but more likely 10,000 or a good generator may be a sequence in the billions.

Now you may ask, if I picked a random seed using my clock and you say that was good, why not just use the clock all the time? The time is a nice starting point, but under some situations using it repeatedly would give very predictable (and hence not random) results. Try counting to from 1 to 10 repeatedly at a uniform speed and having a friend pick the number you are on every second. Depending on your counting speed, the numbers will generally be spaced out by 5 or maybe 8 or whatever your counting speed is, and that is very predictable. Computer clocks count a whole lot faster, but in some situations the problem still exists.

True random number generators are generally based on environmental factors which are pretty much random like for example taking a cubic centimeter of air and counting the exact number of nitrogen atoms in it. Another example is measuring exact voltage under a given current. These are better, but are sometimes too slow to measure to be useful.

There was once a theory going around that the random generator relied on the game clock and it was supposed to reset to 0 on even numbered minutes. That means that if you typed /random or cast lots right before the time changed to an even number you should have a higher lot. I tested this theory many times with minimal success, the problem was that the time doesn't stay consistent since the minutes seem to fluxuate. One method would be to count the seconds in your head and right before you hit 2, 4, ect. cast your lot. Sometimes it would seem to be close other times it would be way off, so I'm sure there are other variables factoring in to the formula. Of course if it were that easy I'm sure this would have been figured out by everyone and it would have screwed up the entire drop system.

On FreeBSD we take interrupts from things like the network card and disk to put it in to entropy pools. Any device driver simply calls entropy_harvest() with whatever and it works out.

The entropy pool is used to reseed the RNG over time, and as long as the device is hooked up to the network and is being used it has a steady supply of entropy.

Some people say that an attacker can maybe isolate the machine and blah blah, but that is not really true. The entropy pool is saved across machine restarts and even if an attacker were to compromise your network switch and isolate the machine from usage they would have to know the state of the entropy pool when they isolated the machine to have any chance of success figuring out the internal state of the RNG.

Even if the machine was never allowed on the network.. when I install the OS on the machine it started collecting entropy from every letter I typed on the keyboard. The attacker would somehow have to guess how fast I typed in the root password and all the entropy collected by the machine since it was first set up. That simply isn't possible.

Not all network cards and devices generate entropy in the same way.. and network usage patterns are determined by the entire world's whims to access you or not. Because of this, these machines can generate numbers that are truly random because even armed with all the knowledge in the world about the machine in question, it is simply not possible to say with any statistically certainly which numbers will or will not pop out next.

Your description of sequences isn't how it works on freebsd, but I really don't know how to explain how that works. All I can really say is that you need to be careful about making any effort to have a random distribution. I will say that the freebsd one is just as likely to spit out the sequence 5,5,5,5,5 as it is likely to spit out 1,2,3,4,5.

One more thing people forget too.. is that when you asking the operating system for a random number you are not actually getting a number.. you are getting a series of bits.

100 in binary is 1100100. So you would be asking the operating system for 7 random bits to generate a random number between 1 and 100. The problem is that 7 bits actually returns the numbers 0-127. You need to know what you are doing when you take a number that is between 0-127 and convert it to 1 and 100.

Finally (sorry for the tl;dr) it isn't logical to say that everything in the world is predetermined. If you want to claim that the burden of proof would be on you, and you can't logically prove that everything is predetermined so it simply isn't logical to say it at all.

If you were to say that there are pink unicorns living inside the sun, I would simply have to say that there is no evidence to support that and I would win the argument. Logically, there is no burden for me to prove that unicorns don't live in the middle of the sun.

I went off on a tangent before, but my main idea is that randomness is not relative in the mathematical, practical or any kind of sense. Either something is random or it isn't. There is no "its random to me" or "its random to you." Just because someone can't predict the outcome doesn't mean its random. If this was the case I could create random numbers like this. 5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5, etc... You don't know that I'm going to pick 5 again. You have no idea what I will pick next. So, since you can't predict the outcome, this sequence would be "random to you"

Also by this logic SE could have something like a favorite players list that always gives them higher lots. None of us know or can predict the outcome so it would be "random to us"

BTW whoever said that they suspected me of flaunting a degree, get a grip. I can't think of much else I care less about than impressing people on the internet. I like talking about math and I know a little something about it. That was all I was saying.

Lol, Devek after going back through, I realized that I talked about pretty much the same stuff just now as you did before. The fact still remains that your idea of random is not practical or useable at all.

If 100 5's are picked in a row, there is no logical evidence to support each choice having an equal probability of being chosen.

The best way I can describe it is like the stock market. As time goes on, the stock market will always rise. A random number sequence will always come closer to having an even distribution of all choices. There will be very, very many deviations from the trend both big and small. You can't tell what will happen the next minute, hour, day, year or 10-year period with the stock market, but as a general trend it will always rise.

Just to reiterate, there is no objectivity about randomness. It doesn't matter who knows or who doesn't. Either its random or its not.

This is how I understand it too. I made a simple RNG a while back and it was basically a pattern of numbers mixed in with another pattern of numbers mixed in with another pattern of numbers, seemingly giving the effect of randomness. Was done in a higher level languge though and was just a simple exercise not a proper RNG the likes of which SE will use.