The RNG in Pathfinder Kingmaker

[MR67]

Since the turn based mode was introduced, I've had more time to look at my rolls in combat and there is definitely something borked with the RNG system. Other people may beg to differ, and I'm not going to argue with them, but this is based on my experiences in this game.

Why is it that:

- Your characters seem to struggle to roll above 10 in most of their attack rolls in combat while the opposite seems to apply to the enemies?
- You seem to roll critical misses in nearly every combat (often consecutively) while enemies hardly seem to do this?
- Enemies almost always make their saving throws. Even when you target their weakest save category, they hardly ever roll below 11 on d20.
- Some enemies (eg various primal monsters) have a permanent blur effect. It's only supposed to be a 20% miss chance, but your characters seem to miss them because of this about 80% of the time.
- Your characters struggle to roll above 10 for skill checks as well, especially when trying to disarm traps. You literally have to ensure you're buffed to the nines when making skill checks of any kind otherwise you will almost always fail them.

This must be the only game where I've played over 1800 hrs and have not yet finished it. I really like a lot of things about this game, but the RNG (and to a lesser extent, the ridiculous stat bloating of enemies) ruins it for me.

Does anyone know if Owlcat has sorted out the RNG issue for Wrath of the Righteous? I'm really tempted to get the game but really don't want to have to put up with the same issues all over again.


I've attached a link to a screenshot where I got FOUR consecutive critical misses in a fight in Candlemere. What are the chances of this happening?

https://i.pinimg.com/originals/6c/d3/69/6cd3699bc3adf0d9098c6f4404c9ed4a.png

[dulany67]

Escrito originalmente por InEffect:

Reality is I'm pretty sure owlcats just hooked the standard unity RNG instead of spending the time developing their own, so it's likely they've no idea if it works "correctly".

Doesn't P:K collect telemetry? If it does than I'm pretty sure rolls are part of that and easily checked. But I may be thinking of another game.

[InEffect]

Don't think it stores dice rolls, although I might be mistaken. One guy who did actually test it and provided methodology(and as such it could be somewhat trusted and verified by others) just wrote his own soft for that. The thread should be still buried somewhere on the forum, although I'm too lazy to search, but it basically came back with the expected distribution over 10k rolls(iirc), so nothing exciting. The hard part about the soft collecting the rolls is to separate the other dice from the d20 pile, so they don't pollute the results afaik. Not a coder myself, so just relaying what other people said.

[MR67]

Escrito originalmente por InEffect:

Reality is I'm pretty sure owlcats just hooked the standard unity RNG instead of spending the time developing their own, so it's likely they've no idea if it works "correctly". No machine-generated numbers will be perfect, though. They always take something as a base for generating the numbers. Usually it's system clock, so some anomalies are inevitable.
Also, our brain is wired to notice patterns everywhere regardless of if they actually exist or no. Add to that that we notice failures a lot more than success and sprinkle confirmation bias and you've got yourself a lot of people who believe something is wrong with RNG.

I've played DnD with one guy who pretty much couldn't roll over 10 the whole campaign(I'm exagerrating a bit, but his rolls over 10 were super-rare). He even rolled like 3 1's in a row once. And no, changing the dice and using a tower didn't help either. Such things happen.

Thanks - I think this will probably be the best answer I can get on my RNG gripes at this point!

[Dixon Sider]

There is no such thing as a random number anyways. No one has ever been able to develop hardware that could implement a random number. It is believed to be impossible. Everything in the universe has some variable that allowed that event to happen. Even quantum mechanics has an exact physical explanation for each discrete electron. Quantum mechanics is nothing more than the summation of an infinite number of those interactions at once, guesstimated into probability functions.

[Frostfeather]

Some characters can become "infected" with low rolls. It's very rare, but I had a Havocker that would consistently roll lower than other characters, hundreds of times in a row.

I started keeping track of hundreds of rolls and all my other party members were averaging right around what they should have been - 10.5. The Havcoker was always around 8. So I did thousands and the numbers stayed the same. And thousands more. And thousands more, for good measure.

It's not a bias. It's not a fluke. There was some actual measurable thing going on, though I suspect it has something to do with a mod. I haven't noticed it on any character for long time now, over a year. And only ever on 2 characters around that time on that pc with that mod setup.

Anyway, it *can* happen, and I've experienced the proof of it. But it's extremely rare. And for all I know, it may have been an issue with an outdated mod version and is not an issue now.

[Uzkin]

Escrito originalmente por Dixon Sider:

There is no such thing as a random number anyways. No one has ever been able to develop hardware that could implement a random number. It is believed to be impossible. Everything in the universe has some variable that allowed that event to happen. Even quantum mechanics has an exact physical explanation for each discrete electron. Quantum mechanics is nothing more than the summation of an infinite number of those interactions at once, guesstimated into probability functions.

Nope: Quantum Mechanics (QM) is a theory about how to calculate probability amplitudes for measurement outcomes -- this is valid for a single electron as well as for a collection of particles such as the water molecule. From the point of view of the theory, these produce "true" probabilities; the outcome of a quantum measurement is "truly" random (it follows the QM probability distribution). There has never been valid evidence contradicting this. It IS possible to construct working deterministic hidden-variable theories (such as Bohmian Mechanics) but, to this day, their predictions do not differ from the standard Copenhagen interpretation which states that the QM probabilities are "true" probabilities.

Of course, many people have philosophical issues with "true randomness". Einstein himself, famously and allegedly said, "God does not play dice", in reference to QM. To which Niels Bohr replied, "Einstein, stop telling God what to do".

Thank god he is not using a d20 system, at least.

[Dixon Sider]

Escrito originalmente por Uzkin:

Escrito originalmente por Dixon Sider:

There is no such thing as a random number anyways. No one has ever been able to develop hardware that could implement a random number. It is believed to be impossible. Everything in the universe has some variable that allowed that event to happen. Even quantum mechanics has an exact physical explanation for each discrete electron. Quantum mechanics is nothing more than the summation of an infinite number of those interactions at once, guesstimated into probability functions.

Nope: Quantum Mechanics (QM) is a theory about how to calculate probability amplitudes for measurement outcomes -- this is valid for a single electron as well as for a collection of particles such as the water molecule. From the point of view of the theory, these produce "true" probabilities; the outcome of a quantum measurement is "truly" random (it follows the QM probability distribution). There has never been valid evidence contradicting this. It IS possible to construct working deterministic hidden-variable theories (such as Bohmian Mechanics) but, to this day, their predictions do not differ from the standard Copenhagen interpretation which states that the QM probabilities are "true" probabilities.

Of course, many people have philosophical issues with "true randomness". Einstein himself, famously and allegedly said, "God does not play dice", in reference to QM. To which Niels Bohr replied, "Einstein, stop telling God what to do".

Thank god he is not using a d20 system, at least.

It is not truly random. It is the result of a pseudo infinite number of interactions with other forms of energy (motion of particles, or charge from electrons). So many interactions that it is impossible to comprehend how to comprehend the number. The result is exact every time based on the environment. Quantum mechanics just uses probability to calculate an infinite number of forces.

The result can never be different than the one and only possible solution that the environment forces.

The reason quantum mechanics is valid for a single electron is because that single electrons future (next moment in time) is the result of a pseudo infinite number of interactions all happening at once. Every time you fart, every electron all over the galaxy that will be forever changed because of your fart.

[Uzkin]

Escrito originalmente por Dixon Sider:

It is not truly random. It is the result of a pseudo infinite number of interactions with other forms of energy (motion of particles, or charge from electrons). So many interactions that it is impossible to comprehend how to comprehend the number. The result is exact every time based on the environment. Quantum mechanics just uses probability to calculate an infinite number of forces.

The result can never be different than the one and only possible solution that the environment forces.

The reason quantum mechanics is valid for a single electron is because that single electrons future (next moment in time) is the result of a pseudo infinite number of interactions all happening at once. Every time you fart, every electron all over the galaxy that will be forever changed because of your fart.

No, that's not what quantum mechanics is about. You are confusing what you expect or hope it to be with what it actually is. As I said, the concept of "true randomness" can be unsettling; it apparently was so even to Einstein. But no one has been able to invalidate it to date when it comes to QM. You are essentially claiming that you have some deeper understanding of what the reality really is, going beyond the contemporary physics. That is a road leading to crackpottery, almost always.

Alternative, realistic local deterministic models of nature a la "the apparent randomness is just the result of near-infinite amount of interactions which creates an illusion of true randomness", have been largely invalidated by experiment. This can be done e.g. by using the so-called Bell's theorem, by testing the Bell inequalities. In such tests, quantum mechanics (with true randomness, as described by the probability distributions) has been shown to be valid whereas these alternative deterministic models (such as the one you are thinking of) have failed.

[Dixon Sider]

Escrito originalmente por Uzkin:

Escrito originalmente por Dixon Sider:

It is not truly random. It is the result of a pseudo infinite number of interactions with other forms of energy (motion of particles, or charge from electrons). So many interactions that it is impossible to comprehend how to comprehend the number. The result is exact every time based on the environment. Quantum mechanics just uses probability to calculate an infinite number of forces.

The result can never be different than the one and only possible solution that the environment forces.

The reason quantum mechanics is valid for a single electron is because that single electrons future (next moment in time) is the result of a pseudo infinite number of interactions all happening at once. Every time you fart, every electron all over the galaxy that will be forever changed because of your fart.

No, that's not what quantum mechanics is about. You are confusing what you expect or hope it to be with what it actually is. As I said, the concept of "true randomness" can be unsettling; it apparently was so even to Einstein. But no one has been able to invalidate it to date when it comes to QM. You are essentially claiming that you have some deeper understanding of what the reality really is, going beyond the contemporary physics. That is a road leading to crackpottery, almost always.

Alternative, realistic local deterministic models of nature a la "the apparent randomness is just the result of near-infinite amount of interactions which creates an illusion of true randomness", have been largely invalidated by experiment. This can be done e.g. by using the so-called Bell's theorem, by testing the Bell inequalities. In such tests, quantum mechanics (with true randomness, as described by the probability distributions) has been shown to be valid whereas these alternative deterministic models (such as the one you are thinking of) have failed.

No one has invalidated it the same as no one has proven things can be random. It will not be proven in our lifetime. F=Ma is still not proven either. Nothing is random, F=Ma determines everything.

I have done both experiments that prove the theories false. You want to know what always happens in every experiment? Exactly what is supposed to happen. Every time.

[Uzkin]

Escrito originalmente por Dixon Sider:

No one has invalidated it the same as no one has proven things can be random. It will not be proven in our lifetime. F=Ma is still not proven either. Nothing is random, F=Ma determines everything.

I have done both experiments that prove the theories false. You want to know what always happens in every experiment? Exactly what is supposed to happen. Every time.

You may entertain whatever crackpot ideas you want, I don't really care. Bell tests HAVE invalidated a very large class of classical (non-random) models of nature.

I just want to make clear that when you claim that "even in quantum mechanics there are no true random numbers", that is NOT something that quantum mechanics says -- instead, it is something that you cooked up in your head.

[Dixon Sider]

Escrito originalmente por Uzkin:

Escrito originalmente por Dixon Sider:

No one has invalidated it the same as no one has proven things can be random. It will not be proven in our lifetime. F=Ma is still not proven either. Nothing is random, F=Ma determines everything.

I have done both experiments that prove the theories false. You want to know what always happens in every experiment? Exactly what is supposed to happen. Every time.

You may entertain whatever crackpot ideas you want, I don't really care. Bell tests HAVE invalidated a very large class of classical (non-random) models of nature.

I just want to make clear that when you claim that "even in quantum mechanics there are no true random numbers", that is NOT something that quantum mechanics says -- instead, it is something that you cooked up in your head.

There are experiments that "prove" quantum mechanics false just like there are experiments that "prove" our understanding of classic physics false. It is our understanding that is false, not the concept. Random is impossible.

The human nature of "I don't understand, it must be random" sounds like a more crackpot theory to me than anything else.

[Mörkö]

"Your characters seem to struggle to roll above 10 in most of their attack rolls"
Holy hell this has been annoying me as well. Like constantly 1,2, 5,6, 3, 2 ... etc. barely above 10. I thought the thing gets bugged sometimes. Though how did you manage to play it for 1800 hours without finishing lol?

[Uzkin]

Escrito originalmente por Dixon Sider:

There are experiments that "prove" quantum mechanics false just like there are experiments that "prove" our understanding of classic physics false. It is our understanding that is false, not the concept. Random is impossible.

The human nature of "I don't understand, it must be random" sounds like a more crackpot theory to me than anything else.

You are welcome to believe in anything you want, I don't care. But contemporary physics certainly does not claim that "random is impossible". Quite the contrary: assuming that the measurement outcomes are truly random (and follow the QM probability distribution) is a valid interpretation of QM: to this date there's no good empirical evidence contradicting this interpretation.

But I guess you're one of the many ppl suffering from the "physics is wrong, I am right" illusory superiority.

[Dixon Sider]

Escrito originalmente por Uzkin:

Escrito originalmente por Dixon Sider:

There are experiments that "prove" quantum mechanics false just like there are experiments that "prove" our understanding of classic physics false. It is our understanding that is false, not the concept. Random is impossible.

The human nature of "I don't understand, it must be random" sounds like a more crackpot theory to me than anything else.

You are welcome to believe in anything you want, I don't care. But contemporary physics certainly does not claim that "random is impossible". Quite the contrary: assuming that the measurement outcomes are truly random (and follow the QM probability distribution) is a valid interpretation of QM: to this date there's no good empirical evidence contradicting this interpretation.

But I guess you're one of the many ppl suffering from the "physics is wrong, I am right" illusory superiority.

My argument is literally that physics is right lol... Yes I am one of those people that believes in physics. F=Ma can not and will not ever be disobeyed. Something being truly random means it is allowed to disobey physics. Therefore nothing can be random. Only pseudo random. If you have infinite computers with infinite amount of time and infinite amount of power, then there would be no need for quantum mechanics.

[MR67]

Escrito originalmente por Morkoth:

"Your characters seem to struggle to roll above 10 in most of their attack rolls"
Holy hell this has been annoying me as well. Like constantly 1,2, 5,6, 3, 2 ... etc. barely above 10. I thought the thing gets bugged sometimes. Though how did you manage to play it for 1800 hours without finishing lol?

I tend to play CRPGs Ironman-style, so no save scumming or reloading. If my party is wiped out, then I start a new game. It generally results in me taking very long to finish some of these games. Sadly Kingmaker has lots of these bullsh*t moments where it's all too easy to bump into something which wipes the floor with you, so I've ended up restarting a lot because of this. Also I tend to restart if I feel my character build is not working out or when the RNG really starts annoying me.....!