Low Luck

[saturnracer]

{besides an accurate description of my dating life in my earlier years},  what in  the world is  “low luck”?  I can’t seem to find a description in any thread

Thanks

[MrMalachiCrunch]

Low luck is a way to reduce the role of the dice in a game.  You add up the attack values and defense values, so say you get 8 offense (2 tanks and 2 infantry say) and 5 defense (1 tank+1 Infantry).  Every multiple of 6 gives an automatic hit and the remainder is then rolled to determine if a hit occurs.  In this case the offense gets 1 automatic hit and 8-6=2 and a roll of 2 or less for a second hit.  The defense gets a roll of 5 or less to determine a hit.  13 versus 13 means both offense and defense get 2 hits and both get to roll on a ‘1’ to determine if a third hit occurs.  It means if you attack with 6 infantry you do not roll a dice, you get exactly 1 hit as you have 6 offense.

[saturnracer]

ah, simple enough

so how do you normally play?

On one hand, i like it……but lets face it, in war, Luck happens, at least in the short run, so weather,  a missed landing due to instrumentation, etc, also occurs (ie see the movie Midway)  so leaving Luck in the equation has its advantages.

[saturnracer]

follow up on low luck question
Lets say i attack with 6 tanks, = 18 attack, and defender has 6 tanks
so you both elminate 3 units on round 1
So on round two, the battle still rages, right?  so you both have 3 tanks=9 points, so you both take one unit off, and roll for the 3 remaining, right?

so in that case, a) the game goes quicker and b) Big battles are settled more in low luck and small battles are settled by dice, right?

@MrMalachiCrunch:

Low luck is a way to reduce the role of the dice in a game.  You add up the attack values and defense values, so say you get 8 offense (2 tanks and 2 infantry say) and 5 defense (1 tank+1 Infantry).  Every multiple of 6 gives an automatic hit and the remainder is then rolled to determine if a hit occurs.  In this case the offense gets 1 automatic hit and 8-6=2 and a roll of 2 or less for a second hit.  The defense gets a roll of 5 or less to determine a hit.  13 versus 13 means both offense and defense get 2 hits and both get to roll on a ‘1’ to determine if a third hit occurs.  It means if you attack with 6 infantry you do not roll a dice, you get exactly 1 hit as you have 6 offense.

[jiman79]

Seems like you understand it

low luck 6 tanks vs 6 tanks would go like this:

round 1:
Att 3 hits - Def 3 hits

Round 2: 3 tanks vs 3 tanks

Attacker rolls 1 dice if 3 or below: 2 hits otherwise 1 hit
Defender rolls 1 dice if 3 or below: 2 hits otherwise 1 hit

Round 3 then depends on the outcome of round 2, but the attacker of course has the advantage of retreat if the dice roll was bad.

I usually play standard rules - low luck forces me to think too much - thereby making the game take much longer time  :-D

Another thing that is different in low luck is that you never score many hits in one roll - it is always the average +/-1 this means that it is fairly easy to bring air units without risking them being shot down. This changes especially the eastern Europe land swapping.

[GCar]

Low luck was perfectly described. The idea is that in normal dice games, many times a huge fight (around 70-100 IPC on each side, sometimes more) happens and the luck potential of those fights is huge in comparison to the normal smaller fights. For exemple if both sides average hit number would be 10 hits, variance makes it quite likely to make it different then that, but even a small difference on turn 1 of attack (like 12 hits against 6 lets say) keeps affecting the following turn of attacks (more units left = more probable hits), therefore increasing the final effect (for exemple a 6 units variance early could end as a 12 units difference in the end, making for around 30-50 IPC depending of the planes in the fight (and if battleships are involved it can get ugly !). In a smaller fight, a lucky roll is unlikely to win you more then 10 direct IPC (usually quite less)  and maybe a couple more of circonstancial IPC due to the fact that a territory is not traded.

[MrMalachiCrunch]

While I agree that with large battles in terms of IPC size the swing away from a statically likely outcome can be great, I would mention that this deviation in terms percentages tends to shrink as the ‘sample size’ increases.

If you roll two dice, the odds of rolling a combined 7 is greatest and is 1 in 6.  The odds of rolling snake eyes is 1 in 36, but it happens.  Its not that unlikely the total will be different by up to 50% of the expected value.  However, roll 100 dice and I am pretty sure it will be within 10% of the expected values.

We have all seen a lone defending infantry hit twice and win/survive the battle in battles where it is 1 bomber +2 Infantry versus 1 Infantry.  If you just HAVE to win that battle as the attacker or else have an enemy tank rush take your capital then you better go 3 infantry and a bomber just in case you miss twice and the defender hits twice, yeah only about a 4% chance but enough of those in critical situations……

It’s a very efficient way to flatten out the curve but I think never having to worry about taking 3 hits on round 1 of combat against 3 Infantry flattens it out a bit too much for me.  On the other hand, I nearly pushed the map off my dining room table last week when I took 7 hits from 9 infantry on Round 1 of combat last week!

[Mr.Biggg]

@GCar:

Low luck was perfectly described. The idea is that in normal dice games, many times a huge fight (around 70-100 IPC on each side, sometimes more) happens and the luck potential of those fights is huge in comparison to the normal smaller fights. For exemple if both sides average hit number would be 10 hits, variance makes it quite likely to make it different then that, but even a small difference on turn 1 of attack (like 12 hits against 6 lets say) keeps affecting the following turn of attacks (more units left = more probable hits), therefore increasing the final effect (for exemple a 6 units variance early could end as a 12 units difference in the end, making for around 30-50 IPC depending of the planes in the fight (and if battleships are involved it can get ugly !). In a smaller fight, a lucky roll is unlikely to win you more then 10 direct IPC (usually quite less)  and maybe a couple more of circonstancial IPC due to the fact that a territory is not traded.

Oddly enough, the odds work in exactly the opposite way you are describing. The larger the battle is, the more closely it will follow low luck. Variations in hit results will follow the central limit theorem (an interesting google if you have the time). It’s small battles that will be most effected, and actually somewhat break the system.

Think about 2 tanks vs. 1 tank

2 Tank hits:
Low luck 1 hit 100% of the time
With Luck 0 hits 25%, 1 hits 50%, 2 hits, 25%, Thus the expected value is 0*.25+1*.5+2*.25= 1 hit. BUT, you can’t really hit twice against 1 tank, so the actual expected value is .75. So low luck gives an unintended boost in hits.

[ragnarok628]

agree.  the bigger the battle, the less LL will matter.  the smaller battles are where you really have to worry about getting diced.

either way, they’re completely different games.  LL is mostly deterministic, and you can plan out your moves accordingly, knowing exactly what battles are coming 2, 3, 4 turns in advance.  normal is completely stochiastic, there’s no way to be sure what things will look like next round even.

[GCar]

@Mr.Biggg:

@GCar:

Low luck was perfectly described. The idea is that in normal dice games, many times a huge fight (around 70-100 IPC on each side, sometimes more) happens and the luck potential of those fights is huge in comparison to the normal smaller fights. For exemple if both sides average hit number would be 10 hits, variance makes it quite likely to make it different then that, but even a small difference on turn 1 of attack (like 12 hits against 6 lets say) keeps affecting the following turn of attacks (more units left = more probable hits), therefore increasing the final effect (for exemple a 6 units variance early could end as a 12 units difference in the end, making for around 30-50 IPC depending of the planes in the fight (and if battleships are involved it can get ugly !). In a smaller fight, a lucky roll is unlikely to win you more then 10 direct IPC (usually quite less)  and maybe a couple more of circonstancial IPC due to the fact that a territory is not traded.

Oddly enough, the odds work in exactly the opposite way you are describing. The larger the battle is, the more closely it will follow low luck. Variations in hit results will follow the central limit theorem (an interesting google if you have the time). It’s small battles that will be most effected, and actually somewhat break the system.

Think about 2 tanks vs. 1 tank

2 Tank hits:
Low luck 1 hit 100% of the time
With Luck 0 hits 25%, 1 hits 50%, 2 hits, 25%, Thus the expected value is 0*.25+1*.5+2*.25= 1 hit. BUT, you can’t really hit twice against 1 tank, so the actual expected value is .75. So low luck gives an unintended boost in hits.

What I mean is that in a huge fight that is let’s say 75 % winning (we talk about 30+ units on each side) will be quite close to 100 % winning in low luck. And since those huge fights are usually game breakers, the person which planned is game better as better chance to win because of those big fights.

[Guest]

I have see many cases in them Low BP effects badly on Heart and also become the reason of heart attack,so Low Blood Pressure is also dangerous for Heart as the High Blood Pressure.
What you thinks about That?

[northstorm]

Yes I agree with u OP that it does somewhat take the war out of the wargame. To me LL makes the game feel more like chess and less like war. Also in some funny and twisted way the game also (in my opinion)in some cases becomes high luck because those small important battles suddenly has a greater importance, and a failed bombing run suddenly becomes more important cause of lowluck.

All in all I think LL changes the game in a way that in my opinion makes for a less interesting and a less warlike game.

[newpaintbrush]

You won’t see Germany breaking West Russia on G1 in any Low Luck game in which Russia doesn’t completely suck balls.

It’s a real threat in a dice game even with a good Russia, though.

[northstorm]

In real war losing a battle is always a possibility.