Rigged Dice Distribution - An hypothesis.

[Alex]

Hello everyone. I am a lover of Catan, played the game since I was 14 years old, in the Netherlands with my family. I know that on Catan Universe I am just one of the many who have gotten incredibly frustrated by the dice distribution that appears to be so much against reality.

I have played/observed many games, chatted with many players and analyzed many distribution charts. In the end, I formulated a theory as of why is the dice distribution so seemingly unrealistic.

Let me start by quoting a developer:

Originally posted by Catan Universe CM:

The dice RNG does what it is supposed to do. It produces random numbers. We get feedback about changing RNG results (it’s getting worse or better) after every Update but the RNG hasn´t been touched in a veeeery long time.
This shows us, most Catanians do perceive the RNG to be changing when it fact it doesn´t. It has been the same and it works perfectly fine.
For a regular game with -let’s say 50 rolls - chances are quiet high to not even get close to a standard distribution. Or let’s put it in other words… the results might be all over the place. Seemingly favouring certain numbers over others despite them being less probable to get rolled. Now why is that the case? It´s because we do not use loaded dice.
We encourage everyone to do a small experiment at home. Just write down every roll for every player when playing with your friends or family at home sitting around the table. It’s very likely that someone gets lucky during the game and someone will have bad luck. Now would you think the person who is lucky used loaded dice? Or rigged the dice?
Also feel free to use https://www.random.org/dice/?num=2 and write down the 50 dice results. You might be get quite random results ;)

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This folk is a half-lie or a half-baked truth. Or rather, it's misleading information.
Anyone who knows a little about software development and computers in general, should know as a fact that perfect randomness is simply not achievable.
(here an interesting article about it
Stack Overflow [softwareengineering.stackexchange.com] ).
Mr. Developer's comment refers to one of those algorithms that emulate randomness, but it does not address how Catan Universe probably does not use one of those, or uses an adjusted algorithm.

So that was point 1: No true realistic random number generator exists.

And here's point 2: How did they adjust the algorithm?

Please understand that this is speculation, however, I tried to find a logical explanation as to why Catan Universe doesn't make an extra effort to address the dice problem.

The idea is: Catan Universe is a business. Much like any major social network, their business model expects to create a big community of users, who will then purchase items in-app over time, and provide a cash flow, which will then generate revenue.
Hear me out here, it's a business with the sole purpose of making money: they have not developed Catan because they are good samaritans and you like to play Catan with your friends so much.

Once you understand this, you will see how, from a business perspective, it would very natural and pertinent to the stable business plan, the goal of maximizing the total user count: a small community would simply be not profitable.

So how do you maximize the community? By making sure that everyone wins!
Here it's where it becomes delicate.

I have the dreadful suspect that there is some kind of hidden ranking list that records losses vs wins on any given player. For example. If the player loses 4 games and plays a firth game, the algorithm will make sure to favor him in that game, to not make him tired, to not make him wanna give up on the platform, to keep the adrenaline going.

That is how Catan Universe makes sure that nobody leaves (deletes their account)
That is how Catan Universe makes sure that even the worst players win now and then. That is how Catan Universe maintains the platform addictive, just like the slot machines in a casino: they always make you win a little to keep you going.
That is how Catan Universe meet its business requirement to keep a huge community of players.

But if all of this is true, how is a player advantaged vs others in a game? Many variables come into play. Please note that these variables only affect the optimal scenario in which other players don't interfere with the preset handicaps. NOTE: These observations apply only to the base game, although some of them might be present also in the expansions.

1 - Starting order: you will notice how sometimes the board is arranged horribly in favor of the first player, who in this case will be the advantaged player (AP).
2 - Dice distribution: what everyone is complaining about. The dice will favor the AP only.
2.1 - The AP cannot be kept blocked by the robber. AP will often roll 7 to unblock themselves.
2.2 - Game 90% stars with a 7 in the first round. Usually by the AP, easy way to block others and get a head start.
2.3 - 7 Often strikes players with more than 7 cards that are not the AP.
2.4 - 7 Often gets rolled in succession until the robber gets parked on a spot that will effectively block the players who are not the AP.
2.5 - 7 Often gets rolled after a knight card is played wasting the efforts of buying and using the dev card. This happens to everybody but the AP. (BTW the AP doesn't need a knight card: see point 2.1)
2.4 - Dices often roll numbers on which AP is settled. Often many times in a row, creating an irrecoverable gap.
3 - AI: bots act completely irrationally.
3.1 - on a 7 bots almost never rob the AP. It can happen that the bot robs the player who is winning, but that's just because the current leader happens to play better than the AP.
3.2 - bots tend to avoid trading with players who are not supposed to win.
3.3 - bots trade until the is at 2 points from the win (3 if I am not wrong in C&K) when it's already too late.
3.4 - bots trade easily more than 1-1.
4 - Development cards: development cards tend to advantage the players. You might have noticed more often than not, how you will pull a card that you don't need at all for your tactics.
4.1 - You will invest in dev cards but the very first card you pull from the deck is a victory point card (pulling a victory point card as the very first card is a complete disaster, some of you might understand). The probability of pulling a VP card as the very first card is 1/5. But the probability of that happening often is way lower than that... yet you are left with what you experience.)
4.2 - You will pull a road builder in a game on which it's completely useless.
5 - New player account: if the player is recently signed-up there's a good chance he will win in the first 5 games.


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Conclusion

These were my observations and speculations as on how Catan Universe keeps it's community and sustains its business model by predetermining an advantaged player for any one game. I have observed several methods, one of which is by messing with the RNG.

If you find this helpful please contribute by replying with what you have experienced. Also, if you think that some of my analyses were wrong please let me know.

[USM [CM]]

As part of the Catan Universe team, I do feel it is my duty to answer the here posted hypothesis despite the fact that we already answered a lot to the mentioned topics above.
1. Of course, most of the feasible RNG solutions for games are pseudo RNGs. We used to describe it as such in many many many posts in the past and tried to explain how they work and that it is perfectly normal to use such a pseudo RNG.
Well… that always backfired! Because our users thought that this was the smoking gun! That pseudo RNGs aren´t real RNGs and therefore the RNG is flawed.
Also please keep in mind not every user does have either programming experience nor a deeper understanding of statistics. By describing the inner works with more common terms we do have a bigger chance of more Catanians understanding what is going on.

2. There is a lot of unpack here but I´ll give it a try.
In your hypothesis you are trying to prove, you should be able to find one major flaw. If one player wins up to 3 players are losing and having a bad time. If there was such a thing as an advantaged player, 3 players would just have a bad time and they would be much more likely just to delete the game.
But without speculations, here is what we do:
The board:
The setup of the map is the so-called spiral method you´ll also find in the physical board game as well. Catan Universe had a more random approach in the past but Catanians asked for the spiral method because it produces more similar but more balanced board overall. So we implemented that.
Please look up the board game rules here: https://www.catan.com/service/game-rules. You´ll be able to find the random map method and you´ll be able to find that every base game board will be according to those setups. Please note: The ore for Wool scenario is excluded in this case because due to the “special task” a certain setup is needed.
The 7 /dice in general:
We just recently added a new feature to the game. It´s the “live dice statistics”. Now every player can track every player dice throws throughout the game. Why did we do that? Because Catanians wanted to know who rolled what. Is there any value in knowing that your opponent already rolled the 8 three times. Absolutely not ^^ But player wanted it and we gave it to them. If there was anything fishy with the RNG, why would we lay this info open like that?
Catan Universe doesn´t give any player an advantage when rolling the dice. The pseudo RNG isn´t influenced by anything happening on the board. It is a thing on its own. It works independently from any influence. The only thing that influences the pseudo RNG is the so-called seed. The seed is pre-determined before the game even starts. It’s a combination of different hard values we are in control off and that can´t be changed by any player for example server time and date. But the seed doesn’t involve any value connected to any Catanians profile.

Dev Cards:

The dev card stack is shuffled one time while the game gets initialized. It only includes a certain amount of cards. You can read up on the dev cards here as well: https://www.catan.com/service/game-rules.
After the first shuffle, the stack just sits there. There is no line of code in Catan Universe reorganizing the stack based on any event in the game.

AI:

The AI isn’t perfect but it doesn’t care about any Catanians overall stats nor does it have any “knowledge” about it. The AI that comes in after one player drops, isn´t the smartest one we offer in Catan Universe. So it will make mistakes by design. Those “mistakes” are solely based on not being super aggressive towards players in general and being more inclined to trade. If we had put in the strongest AI as a substitute, it might give players a challenge that is too big to overcome.

General statement:

Catan is a luck-based game where the portion of luck you need to win can be reduced by understanding how the game works … your skill. But skill alone won´t shield you from having bad luck from time to time.
But we can see that over the last years the same top players not only do well in international championships but also do well in-game events here in Catan Universe.
Our goal was to create a platform where you can play the game as true as possible to the board game. CATAN is such a great game, we do not need dirty tricks to get people hooked. We do not need voodoo magic to let people have a great time. The design of the board game is what makes this game special

[Alex]

Follow the discussion on the
Official Forum[forum.catanuniverse.com]

[The Machine]

What a croc of crap!

First, I'll start by letting you know I've played tabletop CATAN, seafarers, and cities and knights since 2014. I greatly enjoyed the strategic aspect of the game. I played it A LOT with different people and noticed I won about 9/10 games, maybe more. I think I made better use of my cards than my opponents. Because of this, I stopped finding players to play against. They weren't interested in playing with me because I won too often.

I found Catan Universe earlier this year and of course was excited to play online against other players to see how good I really was! Well, after so many months, I've finally realized the terrible truth stated in the original post by Alex.

When I first started, I won almost every game. Even if I wasn't winning, I was very close behind or realized any mistakes I made that cost me the game. It struck me odd, but it seemed my numbers were always rolled a lot and when I needed them. Every time I bought a develop card, I usually got just what I needed. All of the things mentioned above. Of course, you don't really think about these things as much when you're winning. I did notice it though. I just thought as the devs would like you to believe "I was having good luck".

Well, I noticed the COMPLETE opposite started happening when I hit around 1100 ELO, or Diamond rank. Mind you, I was not playing against better players. I was not losing to Grandmasters. In fact, I noticed almost all of the games were won by gold or silver ranked players while higher ranked players suffered. The only games I did win were against grandmasters.

I have now played too many games to be fooled by his bullcrap claiming it's actually random. Random is not 95% of development cards I've bought for the past week (many games since I hit 1100 ELO) being VPs instead of something useful. You can keep claiming "bad luck" all you want. Casinos should not be able to throw out card counters then. They are simply having "good luck".

EDIT- I should also mention the link to the discussion in the forums is coincidentally deleted or no longer available.

[Sthenelos]

in my humble experience... where ever i manage to place a settlement those hex numbers are miraculously became rare to roll. And on top, when I manage eventually to gather the required materials to build or upgrade to city then a 7 roll is 100% guaranteed ... maybe 2 in a row.... I won only once the last week.

I dont know if it is rigged or not.. but its not fun for sure!

[mgluteus]

I have also noticed that the AI starts getting many more hits on his supply requirements when my point value gets above 6/7

[fearenough]

i think i know what happens the rng freaks as a couple of numbers over a few game gets missed from % it should so it catches it up in a game that then makes anougher couple of numbers miss out it and catch 21 u always have 2 lucky numbers oh and iota have made a true random generator

[76561199065778513]

At first I loved playing Catan on this app. But as I got better the computer definitely played against me. I had won three games in a row, which I shouldn't have based on the tiles I had to choose...then suddenly, when I had an 8 and a 6, the 3 and the 10 came up three times more often, they were the numbers of my opponents. The next time 7 came up four times in a row, completely wiping me out. The dice are definitely rigged. I have lost my desire to play and I am telling everyone I know to forget the online version of the game.

[Scrubbing Bubbles]

I just played a game in which, after 46 dice rolls, a 9 did not roll once!

I've noticed over the last few weeks of playing that the dice distribution almost always has left or right-leaning skew. Now, I understand that after thousands of games, the distribution would look normal, but that's a principle of any sort of random sampling. I'm curious to know what percentage of games have distributions that would not be considered normal. My guess is that it's a lot more than "random" suggests. I understand than in a random number generator, any unique result is just as likely as another, but something is off here.

In the game I mentioned at the top, there's a 0.47% chance of a 9 never rolling in 46 attempts. But that's not the only game I've played where a 9 (or 5) never rolls. Again, I understand that any result is possible in RNG and there is a chance that one could experience several games like that, but that would not be considered normal. I guess the point that players are making, is that there are far too many games that should be considered outliers.

So what might be happening is that such games in which these crazy dice results that would be considered outliers happen often enough, they appear normal to the AI. Then once they appear normal to the RNG, they are likely to occur more frequently. But again, when considered among the thousands of games people play each day, it's going to appear as if there's a normal distribution.

[PikeStance]

Without reading all of the comments, I can share my experience of playing concerning the actions of the AI and the dice. I have noticed that the AI would play the robber on my resource hex in the very next roll is that number. This happens like 90% of the time. In fact, I noticed when it doesn't happen.

I also liked how the AI would rob you and then offer the very same resource in trade.

I believe it was mentioned above, but the 7 rarely rolls on the AI especially if all three of them are well over 7. In my case, it is super rare that it does roll a 7, but if at least two of the AI have over 7, then it won't roll a 7.

I also noticed a bit of meta gaming on the part of the AI. They rarely trade with me and they are more than happy to give each other whatever they need.

What is really annoying is how they hold on to cards well above 7 building up a huge cache of cards. They will then place 5 roads, a settlement and a city.

On last thing. If they 7 rolls to a large extent, i can count on one hand the number of times I have lost. The AI has no fear of "7" and ignores it. It also cannot play if the "7" rolls frequently and consistently.

Quick point from the OP. He complained about receiving a VP card on the first go. I actually receive two in a row. I won't complain though; that is 2 points off of 6 resource cards in two turns as opposed to 6 (with the three thefts) over 4 turns. Moreover, the ore and crop could be used for a city instead and the wool for a settlement. I am not sure it is the kiss of death as suggested.

[eneri81]

I was searching in the forum, because I had some games (with S or S+C&K extensions) where the AI constantly put the robber on my hexes, even when I had least points and least cards.
I also had some games where the AI put the robber always to the same hex, independent if the AI/player at these hexes had many points/cards. Sometimes it was mine, sometimes the another AI who was in focus of these attacks.
I'll have a look on the "first player is more likely to win"-theory, by deactivating the "randoms player starts".
Shame, I was starting to like playing here, but with these "unfair" AIs it's just annoying. I have no problem loosing a game, but not getting a chance at all, because the AI constantly blocking my hexes and robbing literally my last card (while other players have more points and more cards) is very discouraging - and therefore I'm very glad, that I did not yet spend money on the game an certainly won't do so.

[PikeStance]

I forgot to add one more thing. I love how when you are 2nd or 3rd in the order, the first possible placement are three fantastic numbers with three sources. If I am 3rd, then there is two of them. However, when I am 1st or second, such arraignments doesn't exist. Random isn't very random.

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Personally there are times when I would take from the lest if I "Know" they have a specific resource I want. I don't think the AI thinks this way.

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Yet another. I love how i can almost instantaneously agree to a trade and it doesn't trade and in another instant, i can go make a cup of coffee and 30 minutes later, make a trade. Sometimes, when I hover over the green arrow, it says "exit."

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Oh the emotion thing they do looks retarded. I wish i could turn it off.

[justchillinout]

Wow, I'm glad (not glad) that I'm not the only one that has these same experiences. I agree with every one of the previous comments, except those represented by the development team. I appreciate that Alex put in so much effort to compile their findings. It's a shame that the development team or someone in the leadership ranks, has taken it upon themselves to talk down to the people that have purchased their product and thus are supporting their salaries. The developers are correct in stating that unhappy customers leave. I'll be sure to leave soon, and ensure that NOBODY supports your product going forward. Horrible arrogance will get you unemployed.

[Kawfeehaus]

All I know is that I just sat through a 4 player game where the 6 was rolled 3 times. The game before the 12 was rolled 8 times.

[fearenough]

the dice have been crap for many years even when free open beta. maybe now after more than 2 years to get game to continue till some one wins without glitching jamming booting they will work on dice maybe off the open sourced first truly random number generator by Iota if devs care ??? lol

[fearenough]

catan vr has a really good rng for anyone with vr