Provable randomness

[Magua]

So your plan is not true randomness but rather loosely guided randomness since you have lyncher's picking lynchees. Correct?

So I was wrong when I said provable randomness. (But still a broken setup.)

So your code is only trying to find the odds the assassin gets lynched? Or does your code have anything that factors assassin's chance of making the right suicide bomb once he has been lynched?

The assassin gets a shot after he is lynched, which is 1/(number of remaining players) successful. So the 58% chance of assassin lynch by D5 does not mean 58% town win. But it does mean that the assassin wasted a "shot" by not leading a lynch before being lynched, which is why the town win% goes up as the assassin waits longer.

[PokerFace]

Ahh ok then i think i understand what you did. True randomness is roughly 45%-33% town sided. Your guided randomness is obviously better than that. But I'm not about to say your idea is greater than 50% until I do the math myself. I should have time to do the math tomorrow evening or Saturday.

[Magua]

The math gets stupidly complex. That's why I wrote the Monte Carlo simulation.

[DeathRowKitty]

Wouldn't it be better to have the person being lynched choose the lynch for the next day in AitP? Then the assassin only has a 1/#players chance of ever getting to choose a lynch (if they choose the day 1 lynch)

[Magua]

I believe that would be an improvement -- either the assassin picks the first lynch, or they never get to choose a lynch.

[DeathRowKitty]

Okay, so in an n player game of assassin (1 king, 1 assassin, n-2 guards), if
1. A player is chosen at random to decide randomly on the day 1 lynch
2. The lynchee each day decides the next day's lynch at random
3. Town never lynches the king nor the day 1 lyncher

assassin win rate if I did the math right is H(n-1)/(n-1), where H(n) is the nth harmonic number. This can be approximated very well by (ln(n-1) + .577)/(n-1) for values of n that are for some reason too large for you to want to calculate H(n-1) (only useful for theoretical purposes really...). For 9 player AiTP, town has just over a 66% win rate.

[TheButtonmen]

If that's the issue then I think the real problem is that the game setup is not balanced well. If your setup gives town an advantage by being random then your setup sucks and you need to re-balance it before running it again. Don't ban randomness.

PokerFace are you claiming that any setup with a town sided EV in unbalanced? If so once again I'm going to have to say you're objectively wrong. Go design a 50% EV setup, run it twenty times and see what happens.

[TheButtonmen]

The issue isn't that randomness is a breaking strategy, it's that proveable randomness let's players generate information that isn't at all compromised by their alignment. It's the same issue that we have with the red text of truth and other trust tells. It's not on their level as being able to break the game but the issue is that it's a more winning strategy then actually playing the game. What exactly do you think we gain by allowing it?

[PokerFace]

If that's the issue then I think the real problem is that the game setup is not balanced well. If your setup gives town an advantage by being random then your setup sucks and you need to re-balance it before running it again. Don't ban randomness.

PokerFace are you claiming that any setup with a town sided EV in unbalanced? If so once again I'm going to have to say you're objectively wrong. Go design a 50% EV setup, run it twenty times and see what happens.

No that's not what I'm claiming

I'm claiming any setup where randomness > scumhunting is an unbalanced or broken setup

[TheButtonmen]

So that is what you're claiming?

Town EV's > 50% it is (at least based off data culled from opens / newbies) to dice it then it is to play, MS has for at least the period of several years where I was active preformed worse then random in those areas. Quite literally randomness > scumhunting, it may not be glamourous but that's how it was. Proveable randomness wasn't removed on a lark, it was removed because if it is a legal play and players are playing by rule #1 (play to win) then you can have some truly truly dumb outcomes.

[PokerFace]

The issue isn't that randomness is a breaking strategy, it's that proveable randomness let's players generate information that isn't at all compromised by their alignment. It's the same issue that we have with the red text of truth and other trust tells. It's not on their level as being able to break the game but the issue is that it's a more winning strategy then actually playing the game. What exactly do you think we gain by allowing it?

Yay I never understood that red text of truth stuff. People can choose to lie and start using the text to lie, right? The only reason they don't is because they value how good they are as town more than how good they are at being scum. Any buddy that does that is an idiot. You should value your desire to win equally. You should want to win as town and win as scum equally. So if you aren't lying with red text next time you are scum, then you aren't playing to your win condition to the best of your ability. Which means you suck as a mafia player.

Back on the provable randomness topic I don't think it always let's you generate info regardless of your alignment. If the math ends up in your favor and you follow the plan, then you are the alignment that plan benefits. If the plan actually benefits scum and you are scum and you trick the town into thinking the plan benefits town, then well done!

[PokerFace]

Okay, so in an n player game of assassin (1 king, 1 assassin, n-2 guards), if
1. A player is chosen at random to decide randomly on the day 1 lynch
2. The lynchee each day decides the next day's lynch at random
3. Town never lynches the king nor the day 1 lyncher

assassin win rate if I did the math right is H(n-1)/(n-1), where H(n) is the nth harmonic number. This can be approximated very well by (ln(n-1) + .577)/(n-1) for values of n that are for some reason too large for you to want to calculate H(n-1) (only useful for theoretical purposes really...). For 9 player AiTP, town has just over a 66% win rate.

what you just described was CITP

Contagion in the Palace

And it is very town sided when the mod locks the thread and correctly reveals roles when players are lynched. If they late reveal or no reveal and leave the thread unlocked you get this

[TheButtonmen]

The issue isn't that randomness is a breaking strategy, it's that proveable randomness let's players generate information that isn't at all compromised by their alignment. It's the same issue that we have with the red text of truth and other trust tells. It's not on their level as being able to break the game but the issue is that it's a more winning strategy then actually playing the game. What exactly do you think we gain by allowing it?

Yay I never understood that red text of truth stuff. People can choose to lie and start using the text to lie, right? The only reason they don't is because they value how good they are as town more than how good they are at being scum. Any buddy that does that is an idiot. You should value your desire to win equally. You should want to win as town and win as scum equally. So if you aren't lying with red text next time you are scum, then you aren't playing to your win condition to the best of your ability. Which means you suck as a mafia player.

Back on the provable randomness topic I don't think it always let's you generate info regardless of your alignment. If the math ends up in your favor and you follow the plan, then you are the alignment that plan benefits. If the plan actually benefits scum and you are scum and you trick the town into thinking the plan benefits town, then well done!

Post one of each day a dice tag ranging from 1 to X where X is the number of living players will be rolled, each player will vote for the chosen player, this will continue until the game ends.

This plan benefits town, any player who deviates from it is either scum or breaking rule #1.

What a fun game of mafia.

[PokerFace]

So that is what you're claiming?

Town EV's > 50% it is (at least based off data culled from opens / newbies) to dice it then it is to play, MS has for at least the period of several years where I was active preformed worse then random in those areas. Quite literally randomness > scumhunting, it may not be glamourous but that's how it was. Proveable randomness wasn't removed on a lark, it was removed because if it is a legal play and players are playing by rule #1 (play to win) then you can have some truly truly dumb outcomes.

Things were that bad or are still that bad? If they are still that bad then we may want to improve the newbie setup and or run some better opens

How did things get that bad that we were better at being random then we were at scumhunting?

[TheButtonmen]

Because in a random voting outcome you remove most of the scumteams power, you removed the informed portion of the minority and render the fact that the majority is uninformed irrelevant. This can't be solved its an inherent part of the game, randomness weakens scums and strengthens town.

[PokerFace]

The issue isn't that randomness is a breaking strategy, it's that proveable randomness let's players generate information that isn't at all compromised by their alignment. It's the same issue that we have with the red text of truth and other trust tells. It's not on their level as being able to break the game but the issue is that it's a more winning strategy then actually playing the game. What exactly do you think we gain by allowing it?

Yay I never understood that red text of truth stuff. People can choose to lie and start using the text to lie, right? The only reason they don't is because they value how good they are as town more than how good they are at being scum. Any buddy that does that is an idiot. You should value your desire to win equally. You should want to win as town and win as scum equally. So if you aren't lying with red text next time you are scum, then you aren't playing to your win condition to the best of your ability. Which means you suck as a mafia player.

Back on the provable randomness topic I don't think it always let's you generate info regardless of your alignment. If the math ends up in your favor and you follow the plan, then you are the alignment that plan benefits. If the plan actually benefits scum and you are scum and you trick the town into thinking the plan benefits town, then well done!

Post one of each day a dice tag ranging from 1 to X where X is the number of living players will be rolled, each player will vote for the chosen player, this will continue until the game ends.

This plan benefits town, any player who deviates from it is either scum or breaking rule #1.

What a fun game of mafia.

Does provable randomness always mean that plan? I didn't read this entire thread. I was under the impression provable randomness was using the dice

once at game start

. Not every day using it

If provable randomness is always that then we likely need to ban that

If provable randomness is not necessary that or it does not give town greater than 50% win, then it does not need to be banned everywhere

[TheButtonmen]

Provable randomness can reduce mafia to a simple mathematical question of which side can absorb lynches proportionally better.

It is incredibly dumb, I don't understand why people are defending it.

[PokerFace]

to refine what I said earlier: I claimed any setup where randomness > 50 > scumhunting was an unbalanced or broken setup

Math puzzle's are fun, the first time. After that first time, they aren't fun any more. And if you are scum, it doesn't sound like it was ever fun. I think that's why we got rid of all those follow the cop setups in the first place

Provable randomness can reduce mafia to a simple mathematical question of which side can absorb lynches proportionally better.

It is incredibly dumb, I don't understand why people are defending it.

you can chalk it up to naivety. I didn't think provable randomness was as strong as you say it is. Has it actually been done in a game and yielded the exact results you are outlining?

[TheButtonmen]

It was banned no?

Why exactly do we want to bring it back?

[TheButtonmen]

I didn't think provable randomness was as strong as you say it is

You can check for yourself, math out some opens that have been run dozens of time and compare the expected EV to the actual outcomes we've gotten.

[PokerFace]

It was banned no?

Why exactly do we want to bring it back?

I didn't think this thread was about "bring it back!" I thought it was about "why was it banned?"

[TheButtonmen]

It was banned no?

Why exactly do we want to bring it back?

I didn't think this thread was about "bring it back!" I thought it was about "why was it banned?"

I've provided one of the reasons it was banned, can you provide a reason why it should be unbanned?

[PokerFace]

I'm not trying to provide reasons for it to be unbanned. I'm trying to figure out why it was banned since I didn't think it was strong enough to be banned. I can provide a link to some math I did a long time ago where I ruled random lynching was pro-scum in RITP. As the kingdom is town in AITP and the kingdom is scum in RITP (they are somewhat polar opposite) it makes sense random lynching would still favor the kingdom and thus now favor them with their now opposite alignment. But if your theory of which side can absorb lynches better was true then you would expect random lynching to still favor the town in RITP. And it doesn't

http://forum.mafiascum.net/viewtopic.php?f=94&t=59621

[Soft-spoken]

Anyone arguing that random voting has any merit as a strength is delusional

Town consistently out-performs expected value in every setup ever played. expected value is the damn definition of your odds to win if all actions are random.

I would actually consider any attempt at leaving the game up to random chance to be lack of demonstrable intent to win a game.

[Magua]

Town consistently out-performs expected value in every setup ever played. expected value is the damn definition of your odds to win if all actions are random.

If only this were actually true.