This is how I see it: TT return might be capped to the current status of our collective loot pool.
If MA set the average predicted return to be collectively at 96% and it drop below this those above will probably be
able to get higher per centage individualy than what the collectively target is.
So if those below the set value improve their return, those at the top will drop some.
It is interesting what you are saying.
It depends on the definition of āpoolā. If they determine a pool as a preset amount you can loot, then yes there is no pool in the literal sense.
But they do track our TT return and there is an adjustment of loot afterwards. This adjustment might just happen to multiplied loot, which would make regular loot follow the eff/loot profession curve. Only point is that regular loot without multipliers wonāt give you a good hunting run.
Maybe the biggest question for MA would be to ask the following:
āAre TT return and other expenses tracked and calculated when a loot event happensā
The answer will be yes. Iāve seen multiple indications of this.
It wasnāt that way in 2008 for sure, but they started doing it by 2010.
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Maybe, I am not high enough level, nor have a high eff. gun to check the upper limit.
I do know that on the other side of the spectrum we get compensated.
I can only assume that MA capped it at some point and maybe tweaked it after the lvl13 amp exploit in mining.
I follow the logic that MA must make sure nobody can exploit (either intentionally or by accident) the loot system, since that would cost them money.
Maybe return is capped at 99%. maybe at 101%. And maybe it is not a hard cap, but just an extra fractional multiplier whenever you get a multiplied loot.
In example. If the system would give you a 100x multiplied loot, it multiplies it with a variable based on tracked tt return. If you lost a lot, that multiplier would be higher then 1; if you had good loot it would be smaller then 1.
It would not affect most loot events which are between 0.25x-2x return on costs, but it would effect the few loot events that make or break a hunt.
From what Iāve observed and following MAās changes to the system over the years, it seems that they indeed would program loot this way.
Entropy would mean all information is kept in one form or another. Maybe there is an algorithm that keeps track of all expenses and returns.
This would explain certain things.
Ahh well, I hope that the source code (or at least the calculations) get released in the event EU ever stops being. Iām not a math geek, but I would surely look through this. It is like Entropia is one big riddle. :tiphat:
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Iām not being facetious when I say this. I really do think a probability and statistics course for the serious Entropia player is a must, particularly if you are going to hypothesize how the loot system might work.
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We will lose lots of players if that happened.
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I finished a college statistics class 6 months ago and I must say it wonāt tell that much about Entropia.
Also, the only player who I know has a mathematics degree is Star, and heās not playing that often anymore. I donāt know if he sold most of his uber stuff or when he stopped playing, but it might telling something about loot 2.0
:twocents:
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I bought some of his stuff a couple years ago. Are you a new player?
I took a long break and started over.
So Iām both new or a very old player depending on how you look at things.
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Imagine spending all that time doing all that measuring shit, for MA to look at your ācumulativeā return, and turn up or down your dial for ten minutes. Big smile.
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Gotcha. Welcome back!
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Oh you did a math course a while back? Cool, think about it this way then:
If you were to setup a system, lets just call it a gambling system, would you rather:
[ul]
[li]Not how you would code this, I know, but its easier to read if I say it like this, lets save the programming / optimization for stackoverflow.[/li][li]Im just gonna make up nice round numbers here.[/li][li]Lets just say there are only 3 buckets/kinds of multipliers cuz I dont wanna spend too much time on this.[/li][li]Also, within those buckets we actually have a little variation, its not always 0.5*TT_IN = TT_OUT but maybe 0.6 but with that statistics course, you can prolly come up with tons of ways to add a little bit of fuzziness to those, maybe 0.5+RA_NUMBER/BUCKET_LIMIT, what ever.[/li][/ul]
[SIZE=5]A)[/SIZE] Have a system that rolls a number, say 1 to 200.000.
[TABLE]
[TR]
[TD]Rolled Number[/TD]
[TD]Multiplier[/TD]
[TD]TT_RETURN[/TD]
[TD]Chance[/TD]
[TD]Expected payout[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]1-190.000[/TD]
[TD]0.5[/TD]
[TD]0.5 * TT_IN[/TD]
[TD]95%[/TD]
[TD]47.5%[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]190.001 - 199.999[/TD]
[TD]10[/TD]
[TD]10 * TT_IN[/TD]
[TD]4.9995%[/TD]
[TD]49.995%[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]200.000[/TD]
[TD]2000[/TD]
[TD]2000 * TT_IN[/TD]
[TD]0.0005%[/TD]
[TD]1%[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD][/TD]
[TD][/TD]
[TD][/TD]
[TD]Total Return:[/TD]
[TD]98.495%[/TD]
[/TR]
[/TABLE]
[ul]
[li]Explanation: On a 1500HP mob, that gives you a āglobalā ~ every 20 mobs, and a nice juicy, 10k hof every 200k mobs, which people tell me is a way too low sample size right now :devilish:[/li][li]You get 98.495% Player Return in this system. MA canāt lose, there is no way for you to exploit this. This is why online casinos, Roulette etc. use a system like this, very simple, basic but robust system.[/li][li]You can tweak numbers, add buckets, what ever[/li][li]You can add stuff too, math gets more complicated but add simple variables to add āEfficiency Impactā or you add a constant, root, mod or what ever to TT_IN. Tons of āeasyā ways and the only thing MA needs to check is if their math still works out (rightmost column canāt add up to more than 1), tho lets be fair, this loot formular adjustment is the only time they will actually run a simulation to beta test their shit. hrhr[/li][/ul]
[SIZE=6]B)[/SIZE] OR would you rather have a system that also rolls a number, say 1 to 200.000, but keeps track of where your Player Return is at and adjusts, either your chance to get a multiplier OR the size of the multi. Both of these have sub-options but end up the same. Its just a sliding scale that dynamically changes one or the other variable.
It would make sure someone is less likely to hit big quickly in a row or loose too much. Keep in mind the above example tho. I tried making a nice and simple table for this like above but it got confusing and I dont wanna spend forever formatting something for a forum. A piece of paper / white board would be so much easier. But one can convince one self fairly easily that this is the āloot poolā-theory, right?
Like I said I didnt manage to write this down cleanly for a forum, but if you didnt HAVE to take that statistics course, but wanted to or maybe had fun, then this is a nice little exercise, at least it was for me. Trying to write this down and figure out the expected payout with some nice round numbers? Actually a little tricky, at least for me.
[HR][/HR]
Now, the first one is so basic, that there simply is no exploit. Raising your bet at any point? No problem, since payout out assumes infinite rolls, what ever you raise just gets eaten by that infinity, mathematically speaking. E.g. Betting on all the allowed roulette fields, yields what 97% player return? Same with betting Black/Red - doubling your bet thingy, if I remember right.
Not the second one tho, that is more akin to black jack + basic strategy + counting cards. There, you cleverly raise the bets when your deck is āhotā, thus beating the house. That is also why that canāt be illegal but they will ask you to leave and never come back. The reason that works is because they didnt used to have infinite decks so you could count cards and raise the bets when you were likely to win. For a computer program tho, infinite decks are no problem, just pick another random number. Another can of worms I know, lets not open that random can right now tho. Practically, you would figure out a way to know when you are ādue a correctionā as people have called it here, then go to leviathans and get yourself some TT profit. And since we are on a computer, there are plenty of very unsophisticated ways to figure out if you are due a correction, and dang, our crafter friends clicking the EP4s woulda figured that out, at least I believe that.
Now, I donāt know Swedish law or if PE even falls under that or maybe EU law but either way, it could be that MA tries to follow gambling laws in some country just to be safe. Eventho they say they arenāt a casino. But take German/EU law for example. There are laws for online casinos which say (I forgot the number and, was that in malta? cuz thats where all those casinos are at, for us in the EU?) 92% must be returned to the player. That is a theoretical number tho. That assumes infinite ārollsā to figure out the players loss. Lotto for example has 50% (no math needed, they just give back 50% in the āloot poolā, rest is for the govmt/ads or what ever), for fun, you can calculate the return to player for blackjack with basic strategy. It is actually fun, cuz not super trivial, also actually look up how card counting works, surprisingly, the complicated thing isnt the counting but the math behind raising your bet without it being obvious to the casino. Anyway, you CAN have a āminimumā without a loot pool or tracking your current player return. You can also follow the law this way and most importantly, you/the player cant tell the difference UNLESS they try to beat the house and fail. Which leads to my point, if you were MA, why would you do a system with only down sides for you in which you could actually be beat? After all, counting cards doesnt work with an infinite amount of decks, which MA has, cuz its all digital.
I kinda wanted to go for the extra credit and give you a quick python script to simulate system 1 that gives you a nice chart after X rolls. But its time to go to work. I just think we humans are too prone to seeing patterns where there potentially is another explanation, so I posted this. Tho I think its like the 24th of this kinda post on this forum but w/e.
cheers
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Great thread, i have linked it to many peoples already when we were talking about loot.
Also my numbers after 750k cycle is about matches to the expected return from the last table.
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I already made that script 
You can find it here: https://github.com/opentropia/pytropia/blob/master/loot-sim.py
The actual multipliers and probabilities in the script are based on actual data, around 200K of individually tracked kills.
The script also has a model for ābonus shrapā and to scale the loot based on looter/eff.
I still wouldnāt call it accurate since 2000x multis are very rare (like 1 in 200000) so to get accurate models millions of (individual) kills needs to be tracked.
Itās still pretty fun to run it and experiment. You can easily see the ākickbacksā you get from pure randomness :laugh:
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Great work and great conversation.. I might have to test whether my loot return changes when I am not hunting and drinking :). My guess is that I am not taking the game nearly as serious when drinking as I do when not drinking. All joking aside, I enjoyed the read
Great info OP and love the Data you collected but you forgot some very important Looter stats.
- If wearing my favorite pajamaās (shown to increase multiās by 13.33%)
2 The secret hidden Stamina multi (once over 120 stamina you really get the swirls) :woot:
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Amazing post! Thanks!!!
Not saying itās true but would be smart of MA to give close to 100 returns for the first 10-15 levels. Hard to test but that would help get people hooked on the game at the startā¦ ?
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āGreat post! I know you actually tested and recorded data, but heres a random made up idea which goes against that data, which I didnt test whatsoever, that I still feel the need to post in response.ā
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posts like this are why you are the peopleās champ
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People would just cycle new avatars to exploit this.
Would they though? A noob even at 100% TT isnāt going to generate anything substantial. Muleing is pretty easy to detect unless you want to put a whole lot of effort into disguising it, and still wouldnāt be worth the risk in breaking TOS and giving MA a reason to suspend a withdrawal.
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