What percentage is luck involved in a games outcome?

No one understands what I am saying, even when I say it three times in slightly different ways…  :cry:

If one player makes a mistake, then in that game they are the less skilled player, and they are not EQUAL and thus you are not addressing the question as it has been defined.

Two EQUAL F***ING players. EQUAL. Neither makes a mistake, or they both make equal amounts of mistakes. So they are EQUAL. Neither one gets ahead because they are EQUAL. unless you bring in another factor in which they are NOT EQUAL. Then that factor constitutes 100% of the difference that exists between them, because in other respects they are EQUAL.

EQUAL. as in NOT DIFFERENT. They play THE SAME with EQUALLY good strategy.

But then one will have different amounts of luck.

“I can’t see the difference - can you see the difference?” “Price is the difference.”

Can you see the point? I can’t see the point. Unless it is about EQUAL and DIFFERENT.

It’s 90% attitude and 10% aptitude that determines your altitude. if you have a string of crappy dice even though you may still be winning then you are more likely to surrender. so luck determines your morale(attitude) in a sense. i put 40% luck.

@axis_roll:

I might react differntly to a battle outcome in which the odds differed from the outcome (I have more units left than I anticipated, or I have less than anticipated).

These type of outcomes are outside the players level of skill.

Anglo-Egypt sudan on G1 is a PERFECT example of this.  Most players have a GO-NO GO number for UK1 to counter.  To a great exent, the Geman player can not control this number… it’s up to the dice.  Here DICE outcome (‘luck’ if you will) will help determine UK’s response to Germanys outcome.

Do you see the point we’re trying to make that you can not seperate the skill of a player from the variability of outcome of battles in the game?

I think you prove my point - that outcome in Anglo-Egypt is 100% luck (since both players, being equal, would have committed the same forces for that attack and defended the same way), and that’s the point at which (perhaps) that one equally skilled player gets the upper hand and keeps building it through the game.

As you say, it is outside your level of skill - it is luck that makes the difference there.

I also agree that you cannot, in one way, separate skill and luck - the importance of each depends on the size of the other factor - I don’t think you can say, in a vacuum, how important luck is. Luck will be a significant factor between two PERFECTLY EQUALLY skilled opponents (I know that’s only theoretical). Between a very good player and a very bad player however, luck is unimportant - one will simply outplay the other, in addition to managing their risks, and the bad player will lose no matter how good their dice are unless they roll nothing higher than a 3 the entire game.

You can also see this when players blame the dice for a loss - what they are saying is “I’m just as good as my opponent, it was just bad luck that made the difference.”

Suppose I play an equally skilled player 1000 times, and we each win 500 games - you’d have to say we are pretty equal. In that case, each game is essentially a coin toss, which as we know is determined by “luck”. Winning that next game will certainly not prove that I am better than my opponent.

Or did you win game# 1001 because he made a mistake before you did, and you capitalized on it?  It doesn’t mean you are not equally matched, but rather in that one game you managed your resources better than he did.

Does this mean that you are not equally matched?  Even though you both had a 500-500 record?  Does this mean it was pure luck that caused him to forget that my transport was within range of his undefended capital?  At the end of the game will he blame the dice for the loss?

I don’t think so.  I voted 20%

Well depending how you interpret it, it was either a skill difference that resulted in the win, or it was “luck” that you caught your opponent on a bad day. Depends how you define skill and luck I guess.

@froodster:

Well depending how you interpret it, it was either a skill difference that resulted in the win, or it was “luck” that you caught your opponent on a bad day. Depends how you define skill and luck I guess.

skill is how well you make use of your luck.

@froodster:

Two EQUAL F***ING players. EQUAL. Neither makes a mistake, or they both make equal amounts of mistakes. So they are EQUAL. Neither one gets ahead because they are EQUAL. unless you bring in another factor in which they are NOT EQUAL. Then that factor constitutes 100% of the difference that exists between them, because in other respects they are EQUAL.

EQUAL. as in NOT DIFFERENT. They play THE SAME with EQUALLY good strategy.

Nothing about the game is equal.  Imbalanced forces, imbalanced distribution, imbalanced resources, necessary imbalance of strategy.  One player gets to go first and set the stage for coming turns based on what he does.  The game state changes completely from round to round.

Lots of inequalities besides the luck of the dice in A&A that can determine the difference between two players of equal skill.

It’s a silly argument, of course.

~Josh

if there is an equality of skill, then all that is left is the luck of the roll.

Good/Bad dice early on magnifies the “Luck” effect.

Let me pose this hypothetical related to the discussion.

Let’s say you could clone yourself perfectly, an exact double of you with all the same memories, experiences, behaviour, intelligence, everything.

Now sit down to play games of chess with your clone.

Do you think that every game will result in a draw?

Not rhetorical, honestly asking the question.

~Josh

I don’t think every game would result in a draw. First, white has a slight advantage because it moves first. Secondly, you might not be as good at playing one side or the other. Thirdly, I believe there are random elements in our decisions - you might be distracted by something that the other you isn’t, and sometimes you just happen to see the right move and sometimes you don’t.

When the computer plays chess against itself, does it always win? Most chess programs probably also contain some randomness by design, to keep things interesting.

I have posed in the other thread on this topic, what would happen if the TripleA AI played a game against itself? Would it always be even? Well, no, because eventually the dice would favour one side or the other. But if it played No Luck, with hits determined purely by punch, maybe it would tie, unless the AI is more adapted to playing one side or the game isn’t perfectly balanced.

Interesting to think about…

@froodster:

I don’t think every game would result in a draw. First, white has a slight advantage because it moves first. Secondly, you might not be as good at playing one side or the other. Thirdly, I believe there are random elements in our decisions - you might be distracted by something that the other you isn’t, and sometimes you just happen to see the right move and sometimes you don’t.

Which are things I mentioned that result in the “other you” losing, and NOT luck. The other you simply made more mistakes than the “real” you did.

Equal skill does not mean perfection. One of “you” is bound to screw up sooner or later.

Squirecam

But then, is the other “you” equally skilled as you on that day? If it’s not luck, it must be skill, or does “making a mistake” mean some third category? I say that the player who makes a mistake is, in that particular game, playing with less skill (perhaps they are usually better but are not playing their best, but the fact is the outcome is a less skillfully played game.

So once you define one player as making more/earlier mistakes, you are no longer discussing equally skilled opponents. I am talking in THEORY about what would happen if you had equally skilled players - whether those could really exist is irrelevant. These players are an abstraction created for the purpose of a thought experiment. If you want to talk about a different theoretical situation that’s fine, but if your imagination can’t fathom the concept of equal players then we simply won’t be able to discuss the implications of equally skilled opponents for this skill v. luck debate, mr. squigglygams.

But I also think there is an element of luck in whether your opponent will make a mistake. There is a randomness in our decision making. I think the rate at which you make mistakes is a measure of your skill, while simple luck determines when you make those mistakes. Ie. if you tend to make a dumb move once every six moves, it won’t be every sixth move that you screw up on - it is randomly distributed.

@froodster:

But then, is the other “you” equally skilled as you on that day? If it’s not luck, it must be skill, or does “making a mistake” mean some third category? I say that the player who makes a mistake is, in that particular game, playing with less skill (perhaps they are usually better but are not playing their best, but the fact is the outcome is a less skillfully played game.

The Colts won the superbowl, and are a “skilled” team. Yet they lost to teams of equal or less skill, when they played bad (i.e. made mistakes). If you want to say they were “less skillful” on that day, so be it. Then under your scenario the “more skilled player” won.

But I’d just say it was more the mistake/less skill aspect that caused a loss, vs pure luck.

But to just say “equal skill” is leaving out an important fact. These players are equally skilled, BUT NOT PERFECT. So they will still screw up.

Luck should ONLY be the sole determining factor if/when God plays himself. Since his moves are perfect, it is only the dice which determines the outcome. (Or, perhaps Dice + inherent game balance, as the allies have an advantage in the game)

As for a AI which is “perfect” which could test the theory, like I said earlier, I’d reserve judgment until I saw one. Which wont happen in my lifetime, if ever.

Squirecam

So is it luck or skill that determines which of two equally skilled players will screw up first?

It can’t be skill, since skill is equal, as defined in the question. That leaves luck. Not the luck of the dice, but the luck of who was daydreaming about Pamela Anderson and who was focused on the game.

Frood, I think you are splitting hairs at this point.  In any case I reword the question as “equally matched” rather than “equally skilled” just to be sure.  Regardless of how it is worded, sounds like most posters are defining it as going into the game, the odds-makers in vegas give either player a 50-50 chance of winning.  Hence equally matched.  Anyone can look at a game after the fact and pick the winner (hindsight is 20-20).  And for example I can confidently state that the Colts were always the superior team and were more skilled than the Bears.  However, I had picked the Bears to win the superbowl so what does that mean?  I had a favourite quote from my university rugby coach who said “On any given day, any one team can beat any other team”.

If the odds makers were undecided going into the superbowl (ie. 50-50), then would we all be sitting here saying the Colts won only because they were luckier?  No, we’d still be saying they won because they out played the bears and were a much better team on the day.  Maybe if they play 99 more Superbowls against the Bears then the Bears win 50 of them, but on that day the Colts were better and it has nothing to do with luck.

Good analogy.

Well maybe I am talking about something else entirely. Perhaps my big mistake has been using the term “skill” rather than “skillful play” or even simply “strategy”

Basically I am saying that the question of “How big a factor is luck” cannot be answered that simply. The degree of importance of luck is relative depending on other factors, the only other one I can actually think of being “skillful play” - maybe that’s better than an abstract attribute of general “skill”.

Luck is a significant, probably game-deciding factor when two players play equally skillfully. When one player plays like a total moron and the other plays like the Kasparov of A&A, then luck will not be a significant factor in the outcome of the game, unless of course the difference in luck between the two players is as vast as the difference in skillful play.

However, luck tends to average out over the game, and skillful play will compensate for and minimize the effect of luck. There is an infinite range of degrees of skill, but you can only be so lucky or unlucky. So on the whole, I would say that skillful play is by far the more important factor. But when there is no meaningful difference in skillfulness, then luck becomes a factor.

Maybe think of this analogy: compare the significance of the presidential vote in Florida, and in the rest of the country. Generally,
the vote in the rest of the country is much more important than the vote in florida. But you need both factors to determine who won the election. If the rest of the country has resulted in a tie, then suddenly the Florida result becomes much more important.

That’s the concept I have failed miserably to communicate: that the importance of one factor will vary depending on the closeness of other factors. When other factors cancel each other out, the factors that are not equalled out will determine the outcome.

Finally, I’ll just say this: in any event, percentage is the wrong unit with which to measure the significance of a factor. Instead, I think you have to use descriptions like “success will vary directly in proportion to the degree of luck, and in a squared proportion to the degree of skillfulness of play.”

21.5%