• @froodster:

    Argh. What you don’t get is that I am defining a hypothetical. You can’t change my hypothetical on me, make your own. In my hypothetical both players have amassed forces of equal strength. That can happen, no? Granted it might be dumb to pull the trigger in that situation, but remember my players might be equally stupid, not equally brilliant. But even if equally brilliant, if neither player can gain an edge as DEFINED IN MY HYPOTHETICAL, eventually one or the other will have to decide to let the dice decide.

    Between relatively equally matched opponents, luck will make a much bigger difference, because the other differences are not as big as they are between unmatched opponents.

    You can be “relatively equal” can’t you? Or does every single game prove that the winner is the best and the loser is an idiot? Would you say that about the game between Switch and JSP?

    Yes, people can be “equally good.” But how does that eliminate mistakes??? The best player alive will still make mistakes.

    You cannot sit here and say in every game between 2 people no one ever screws up or makes a mistake. It doesnt have to be a big one. Maybe only 2-3 infantry are out of place. But that infanty is the difference between deciding to attack or not. The infantry not being there, the attack has a % outcome, the players decides to attack.

    For instance:

    Player A left 2 infantry “out of place”

    With that 2 infantry, Player B has only 55% chance of success. Without that 2 inf, his success rate is 70% or better.
    Player B attacks. He wins.

    That misplaced inf caused player B to attack. Without it, he (a conservative player) would not have attacked.

    Was that dice? luck?

    No, it was your mistake that caused the attack.

    If 2 players are “equally horrible”, then there are SO MANY mistakes, how can you justify the dice being the factor?

    If 2 players are “the best”, sooner or later one guy will make a mistake. That usually leads to victory.

    Only if these players were “perfect” and NEVER made a mistake would luck be “the” deciding factor. This is your computer example. Except no computer AI like this EXISTS. No AI is good, let alone perfect. If ever that changes, like I said, let me know.

    Of course dice/luck has some influence. But strategies should be designed to compensate for them. If one cannot compensate for “some” bad dice, then their loss is due to that failure to compensate, not the dice. At some point, like i said earlier, bad dice will be unable to be overcome. Such is NOT the situation after G1, and certainly not due to the 2 examples posted above (Egypt and the BB).

    If you can “never ever recover” from that situation, then you either quit to easy, or have a bad strategy.

    And, finally, if a 100 tank vs 100 tank battle occurs, yes I say the loss was strategy. Why did I match you tank for tank. Why didnt I try something more cost effective. Sure the dice “could” have been mine, but a better strategy would have given me a better dice chance. You have to agree on that.


  • @Sankt:

    Huh? I’d think the german player would move his troops while you scramble in w.russia. R1 is your only shot at taking out that German fig.

    So? If you cant take out that fighter, you cant win??  You are suddenly in a huge hole going to be beaten??  Please.

    There are several strategies which dont require a UKR attack R1. And attacking it in the face of a bid risks failure.

    And since the Origins player in question has won a few games, and been in the masters at GCI, he’s probably “pretty good”. You have no idea whether he is good or not.

    Continue to believe its 90% luck. I dont care. But for the new players who come here looking for advice, know that this game is skill based, and you should spend time learning it and learning strategy rather than quitting on G1 after minor setbacks.


  • @squirecam:

    So? If you cant take out that fighter, you cant win??  You are suddenly in a huge hole going to be beaten??  Please.

    There are several strategies which dont require a UKR attack R1. And attacking it in the face of a bid risks failure.

    And since the Origins player in question has won a few games, and been in the masters at GCI, he’s probably “pretty good”. You have no idea whether he is good or not.

    Continue to believe its 90% luck. I dont care. But for the new players who come here looking for advice, know that this game is skill based, and you should spend time learning it and learning strategy rather than quitting on G1 after minor setbacks.

    You’re an arrogant. And I’m not even gonna add “IMHO” to that.

    You are no doubt a better and more experienced player than me, though. But unlike your pro at origins I’d smack you good with 3 inf, 1 art, 3 arm in ukraine at R1. Especially when your counter fails miserably as you said, that means you’ve lost at least 7 units on the counter. And your Egypt strike went sour… There is no coming back from that, you are either too arrogant or too optimistic to believe that.

    DM Edit.

  • Moderator

    Squire and Sankt, lets make sure we keep this a friendly debate.  :-)


  • @DarthMaximus:

    Squire and Sankt, lets make sure we keep this a friendly debate.   :-)

    Yay, my first moderation. And me out of all people, I’m all sunshine.  :cry:

    If you are condescending me, belittling me or making assumptions about me or bestowing views upon me that I don’t have you WILL hit my trigger-values. Which is why I put pleasantries aside and stated the obvious, he’s an arrogant *****. Leaving the ball dead now, eternal sunshine, happy thoughts…  :-)


  • @Sankt:

    @squirecam:

    So? If you cant take out that fighter, you cant win??  You are suddenly in a huge hole going to be beaten??  Please.

    There are several strategies which dont require a UKR attack R1. And attacking it in the face of a bid risks failure.

    And since the Origins player in question has won a few games, and been in the masters at GCI, he’s probably “pretty good”. You have no idea whether he is good or not.

    Continue to believe its 90% luck. I dont care. But for the new players who come here looking for advice, know that this game is skill based, and you should spend time learning it and learning strategy rather than quitting on G1 after minor setbacks.

    You’re an arrogant. And I’m not even gonna add “IMHO” to that.

    You are no doubt a better and more experienced player than me, though. But unlike your pro at origins I’d smack you good with 3 inf, 1 art, 3 arm in ukraine at R1. Especially when your counter fails miserably as you said, that means you’ve lost at least 7 units on the counter. And your Egypt strike went sour… There is no coming back from that, you are either too arrogant or too optimistic to believe that.

    DM Edit.

    I think I’ve stated my arguments. At no point did I attack you personally or call you any names. I never stated I was better than you or anyone else for that matter, except the “pro” at Origins.

    In fact this debate has even been about “you” playing “you”, in which case relative skill doesnt exist. Apparently, you seem to feel the need to attack me. Its nothing I havent heard before.

    I was never “too arrogant” or “optimistic” about that game. Like I said, instead of quitting, I took it as a challenge. How good could I do given crappy circumstances.

    Also, the opponent in question was an agressive player. As I said earlier, agressive players can take advantage of dice, but if they over extend or have bad luck, they can end up letting there opponent back in it.

    Thats what ended up happening. He pressed his advantage, rather than turtle. I was able to get back in it. And yes, I thought I was a better player than him, not that he was bad.

    But dont say I make assumptions about you, when you make many assumptions about who I have played and how good they are.

    Are you disagreeing with me that attacking UKR with 2 bid units is risky?? If your not, then what I said was true. USSR has strategies to win without getting that air G1.

    If you think its not risky, (and the attack is 50/50) then what is??


  • @squirecam:

    But dont say I make assumptions about you, when you make many assumptions about who I have played and how good they are.

    Are you disagreeing with me that attacking UKR with 2 bid units is risky?? If your not, then what I said was true. USSR has strategies to win without getting that air G1.

    If you think its not risky, (and the attack is 50/50) then what is??

    Don’t make it seem like I’m the one attacking you on a personal level. Your posts did all what I just said, although in a more or less “subtle” manner. I guess that’s ok on a forum, but it’s not good tone. If you said that to anyone face to face you’d be considered rude.

    I totally agree attacking Ukraine is risky, even without a bid. Standalone there is a 90% chance to take the territory so that’s acceptable, the reason it is risky is the value of the units used(and probably lost) and what you lose in the w.russia attack which is considerably weaker without the extra art/arm. I’ve often done the w.russia/belo instead because it feels a lot safer. But if I could get average dice every time I would choose to hit ukraine instead since the payoff of a successful attack is so much higher.


  • OK, Neutral corners…


  • @Sankt:

    @axis_roll:

    You are admittedly relatively new to the game, so have some faith in the veterans of this game.  Dice b*ing is common in this game… and I admit there are times when no matter what you do, the dice will not let you win.

    If this invariability is still too much for you to deal (with your chess background), I would suggest you either play Low Luck games or some other variant that relies more on strategy rather than dice roll…

    Haha, you are wonderfully arrogant! I know I’m relatively new to the game, but winning that doubles tournament has got to count for something? And getting to the bronze final in last year’s singles? (Though I withdrew prior to the match)

    Regretfully I have no chess background and I dislike LowLuck in its current form. Something called MediumLuck or something would be more my thing, but I’m settled with luck being a big part of the game. 90% to be precise!  :-D

    My apologies, I confused you with the originator of this thread Johnny.


  • @Sankt:

    @squirecam:

    But dont say I make assumptions about you, when you make many assumptions about who I have played and how good they are.

    Are you disagreeing with me that attacking UKR with 2 bid units is risky?? If your not, then what I said was true. USSR has strategies to win without getting that air G1.

    If you think its not risky, (and the attack is 50/50) then what is??

    But if I could get average dice every time I would choose to hit ukraine instead since the payoff of a successful attack is so much higher.

    Which is why it works much better in LL. But maybe now you see what I have been saying. A person might make an attack like ukraine, with only a 55% chance of success, but when it goes bad, complain they got diced.  Sure, averages say they “should” win, but nothing ever always goes as planned. I would rather argue that in this situation, the decision to attack was more responsible for the loss than the bad dice was.


  • @DarthMaximus:

    Like poker, A&A is a skill game.

    Luck has very little to do with who wins long term.

    I concur

    I think alot of this game has to do with managing risks.  
    Yes, Ukr on R1 does not have the best odds. Â

    There’s a good prize when you win (kill German ftr, sometimes even take the land ($ and force Germany to retake).  Personally, I think the prize if worth the risk. Â

    If the risk doesn’t pay and I lose ukraine, is the game ‘over’?  Doubtful.

    Why?  You could say because it’s so early in the game.
    I would say it’s because (unless I am extremely desperate), I don’t hang the outcome of a game on one battle.

    I manage my risks…


  • @axis_roll:

    @Sankt:

    @axis_roll:

    You are admittedly relatively new to the game, so have some faith in the veterans of this game.  Dice b*ing is common in this game… and I admit there are times when no matter what you do, the dice will not let you win.

    If this invariability is still too much for you to deal (with your chess background), I would suggest you either play Low Luck games or some other variant that relies more on strategy rather than dice roll…

    Haha, you are wonderfully arrogant! I know I’m relatively new to the game, but winning that doubles tournament has got to count for something? And getting to the bronze final in last year’s singles? (Though I withdrew prior to the match)

    Regretfully I have no chess background and I dislike LowLuck in its current form. Something called MediumLuck or something would be more my thing, but I’m settled with luck being a big part of the game. 90% to be precise!  :-D

    My apologies, I confused you with the originator of this thread Johnny.

    It’s just something to get used to. The game still requires much strategy, but I believe the strategy based around superior forces, their hit and the luck.

  • 2007 AAR League

    @squirecam:

    A person might make an attack like ukraine, with only a 55% chance of success, but when it goes bad, complain they got diced.  Sure, averages say they “should” win, but nothing ever always goes as planned. I would rather argue that in this situation, the decision to attack was more responsible for the loss than the bad dice was.

    I agree completely.

    A player’s individual prospect of winning is determined by three factors:
    a - their skill/experience
    b - inherent game balance (eg. whether the Allies have an advantage or not based on the setup of the game)
    c - luck

    P (prospect of victory) = a * b * c (or a + b + c)

    Now suppose we rate each of these factors on a scale of 10, and we have players 1 and 2.

    Player 1 has scores a1, b1 and c1. Player 2 a2 etc.

    And let’s even say that skill, when you have it, is more important than luck, because a skilled player minimizes the role of luck, so we will square the effect of skill

    So P = a^2 * b * c

    Players 1 and 2 are about equal in skill, one is a 7 and one is a 7.5. We will assume that the second factor, game balance, has been neutralized by the bid - we’ll give both players 5 on that. But Player 1 is lucky today - she gets some good dice early on and as a good player is able to hold that advantage. So player 1 gets an 8 for luck today, while player 2 gets a 4 - just a little worse than average.

    P1 = 7^2 * 5 * 8 = 1,960
    P2 = 7.5^2 * 5 * 4 = 1,125

    Without the luck factor, P1 is 245 and P2 is 281 - much closer. Now you see what a big difference luck makes between closely matched opponents.

    But now let’s say that Player 1 is less skilled, only a 3 on the Frood scale  :-D
    P1 = 3^2 * 5 * 8 = 360

    You can see that with skill being given twice the weight of any other factor, luck diminishes in its significance as skill differential increases. The fact that P1 has amazing luck does not save him from the fact that he wouldn’t know the front end of an artillery piece from the back.

    Alternatively, if skill is still close and luck is closer:
    P1 = 7^2 * 5 * 6 = 1470
    P2 = 7.5^2 * 5 * 5.5 = 1547

    In that case P2, with slightly worse luck, still comes out ahead because of slightly better skill.

    I think you got me wrong - I am not saying the dice are at fault. Skill is more important, and is more constant than luck. But when there is no real skill difference, each player making the same amount of mistakes and exploiting the other’s mistakes with equal skill, luck becomes more of a consideration than between opponents where there is no real contest.

    It’s like the expression “Good Luck” - “Thanks, I’ll need it”. I think I would need some amount of luck to beat Switch, assuming we’re in the same league. I would not need luck to beat my 4 year old niece - thus, luck is less important. And if Switch is out of my league, then again luck won’t help me, because he’ll kill me no matter what.


  • @froodster:

    @squirecam:

    A person might make an attack like ukraine, with only a 55% chance of success, but when it goes bad, complain they got diced.  Sure, averages say they “should” win, but nothing ever always goes as planned. I would rather argue that in this situation, the decision to attack was more responsible for the loss than the bad dice was.

    I agree completely.

    I think you got me wrong - I am not saying the dice are at fault. Skill is more important, and is more constant than luck. But when there is no real skill difference, each player making the same amount of mistakes and exploiting the other’s mistakes with equal skill, luck becomes more of a consideration than between opponents where there is no real contest.

    If everything were exactly equal, then luck makes “the” difference. I just think that really doesnt happen much.


  • @ShadowHAwk:

    Really in the end luck can be the deciding factor if you win or lose.
    There will always be key battles that can go horribly wrong and are hard to recover from, and against a equaly skilled player can cost you the game, even against a weaker player can cost you the game.

    Doing Pearl and doing 0 damage and taking 3 hits, you can even lost that battle without doing any damage at all.
    If germany or russia get incredible luck ( happened 2 me more then once ) that can almost deside the game.
    Russia attacks both fail to hit anything and germany hitting 90% of the shots, will put you in serious risk with russia.
    Same with germany failing to down a single UK ship first turn is also verry verry unhealty.
    Or the altime favorite attacking a country with AA guy and the gun killing 5 out of 6 planes.

    Those things can deside the game pretty soon if the opponent can capitalize on those things. Especialy with big stacks luck can become a big factor losing your russia or EEU stack without doing significant damage to the other side will lose you the game without you having anything to do with it.

    You’ve described some very extreme outcomes… these do not happen very often (but they can!)  I agree with earlier posts that although there are major set-backs, these battle outcomes CAN (and have been) overcome and one can still win regardless of those battles.

    Generally, most of the battles in the game (and think about it from a total number of battles in an entire game perspective) come out within reasonable expectations.

    With smaller numbers, you will have the potential for results to be many standard deviations from the norm.  However, I do not think this variability (or luck or whatever you want to call it) amounts to estimates as high as 90% of the game.

    It is these slightly off exact results which make the game so challenging, IMHO.  React to them in the right manner and you’ll become a great A&A player…manage those risks!

    I think for giggles, I will start some polls on other A&A MBs to see what percentage of ‘luck’ players think exists in A&A.

    My prediction: 50-60%

    Anyone care to help me word the poll question (perhaps we should start one here), with the answer from 0-100% in increments of 10%.

  • Moderator

    I’m also not saying luck doesn’t play a role, but I’m looking at the games played over the long term.
    Anyone (and we all probably have had one of these) can have a complete screw job battle and lose a game based on it, no matter what your skill compared to your opponent.  However, over the long term the screw job battles fall into their statistical place and the more skilled will rise to the top, whether that is because they have seen it before, or rolls even out later, or whatever.

    I think our League will be a good test and example.  I’m willing to guess that the the end of the year winner (hopefully me  :-)  )  will probably end up at like 10-2 or 10-3 (+/-), with a win % between 75-85%.
    And I don’t think this person would have been lucky to get there.  Sure maybe 2-3 games, but all 12-13 games, no.

    I’m also not saying this person is the hands down best, but I would be saying this person is more skilled then someone 4-8 or 6-6.  The skill gap can still be small, but it exists.

    Now someone with 9 wins, alright, they probably have the same skills as the 10 or 11 win player.  But if they played a best of 7 ,9, 11, etc series I’d guess that the more skilled player would eventually not only win more, but start to win a lot more.

    I also don’t think all 32 players had a shot at winning the tourney regardless of luck.  I think certainly by the top 4 any lucky players would have been weeded out.  Eventally bad tactics or overly relying on dice catch up with you.

    This is all because, I think there are a couple different learning curves in the game, there is:
    noob to bad
    bad to avg
    avg to good
    good to great

    I think it only takes about 2-4 games to go from noob all the way to average player (assuming you have some sort of A&A experience, ie you played Classic).

    I think it takes another 8-10 games to approach the good level.  On both sides you get more comfortable with the KGF and you’ve probably seen some games that are KJF too.

    The difficult one is going from a good player to a great player, and that one doesn’t get a number.  Maybe you get there maybe you don’t.

    One of the cool things is I think we have a lot of very good players here, so we do a lot of beating each other up but I think through the growing tourneys and the League that a few players (starting out with maybe 4-5 players) with start to pull away a bit.  And it is up to each other player to continue to learn and play to try and join the “elite” group or pull a few of them down and pass them as you play more and more games.

    I guess this post is the long way of just saying over time I think the more skilled will win more.  :-)

  • 2007 AAR League

    I agree with Darth
    I see I missed the signing for the league play while I was away.

    The Skilled player will win more.

    There will always be the dice factor.

    I have a lot of pride and I try to be the best and try to every game.
    But I realized after loosing a few games because of the dice factor that it doesn’t mean I am less of a good player and the opponent understands that as well when the other side gets some bad dice or a bad break.

    A lot of “bad” dice occurs all the time but probably on smaller scales so nobody says much as they probably won the territory they were attacking anyway just with 1-3 less infantry then expected.


  • @DarthMaximus:

    I think it only takes about 2-4 games to go from noob all the way to average player (assuming you have some sort of A&A experience, ie you played Classic).

    I think it takes another 8-10 games to approach the good level.  On both sides you get more comfortable with the KGF and you’ve probably seen some games that are KJF too.

    The difficult one is going from a good player to a great player, and that one doesn’t get a number.  Maybe you get there maybe you don’t.

    This is exactly what I’ve been saying all along, we just draw different conclusions. Someone falling into the “great player” category will win 90% of his games against the “noob” based on skill. In that respect it’s fair to say it’s 90% skill and 10% luck. I introduced the difficult term “equally skilled opponents”. That means between two “great players” luck will be the deciding factor by as much as 90%.

    I also think that the leap from “noob” to “average” is a lot bigger than the step from “good” to “great”. Therefore a game between a good player and a great player will also be mainly decided by luck.

    I don’t know what kind of players will enter your league, but I guess you will have players from all categories thus making a win percentage of 90% possible. But after just one season those “noobs” will be average players at minimum and unless you introduce new players next season no one will be able to get a 90% win percentage. Maybe 70% since some people never learn.  :-P

    I’d also like to state for the record that I was exaggerating when I made my “10 skill, 90% luck” statement. Although I was aiming to kick some of you guys off your high horses I didn’t mean to get you that upset.

  • 2007 AAR League

    I know from experience the “snowball effect” sucks.

    when you go in with a large superior force against an opponent’s large but smaller force and on Round 1 (you get bad luck and don’t get as many hits as expected vs good luck for him and more then expected hits on his side) this round of battle most likely just changed the fate of that battle depending on how many troops and hits involved.


  • that’s where skill comes in, like the poker analogy (and the song says)

    you got to know when to hold 'em, know when to fold 'em

    in other words, pull back and regroup don’t suicide your remaining forces in jsut to get slaughtered.

    if you attack ukraine for that tasty fig and get 0-2 and he nails you guess what?  it is probably a good idea to retreat baack to caucasus and possibly even change your placement and next rounds buy/strategy

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