I know this really is an irrelevant topic......but I still think we have a right to know. I am a Statistician by trade, with over 15 years of experience crunching p-values and t-tests. So I decided to run a statistics experiment to test my theory. I would encourage anyone to repeat my experiment and see if you get similar result.
Procedure: I climbed to Rank 5 using a Pally Murloc Deck. I rapidly ascended to this rank, and then, of course, ran into the Void Lord and Cubelocks. Earlier than rank 5, I got a fairly even mix of opponents, but because the Cubelock is dominating right now, I expected to see more of them at the higher ranks. So......I changed one card in my deck. ONE CARD. I swapped out a knife juggler for a Defias Cleaner to get an extra silence tech. I was already running 2 spellbreakers, so this card had no purpose other than to silence a voidlord.
I immediately noticed the ladder was not facing me against cubelocks anymore. Since I couldn't lose stars at that rank, I started a game, and if it wasn't a warlock, I just conceded. It literally took me 17 games to even face a warlock.......and the deck was a ZOO build....NOT Cubelock. It took me 26 concessions to find a cubelock to go against.....because I changed one card to counter that deck,
I repeated that experiment every 3 hours.....just to allow some new players to come on and off.
I used 26 matches as my standard candle. (No pun unintended)
Trial 1 : 3.8% chance of facing cubelock
Trial 2: 4.0% chance of facing cubelock
Trial 3: 4.2% chance of facing cubelock
Average: With deck holding 3 silences, instead of 2.....the chance of facing cubelock was 4.0%
OPPOSITION EXPERIMENT:
I took the Defias Cleaner out, and put my knife juggler back in.
Again standard candle of 26 games at Rank 5:
Trial 1: 73.2 % chance of facing cubelock
Trial 2: 57.6% chance of facing cubelock
Trial 3: 69.2% chance of facing cubelock
Average 66.6% chance of facing cubelock.
Remember, this is a sampling of over 150 games, 75 WITH a 3rd Silence (No Cubelocks), and 75 with only 2 Silences (Many Cubelocks)
By changing ONE card in my deck, the likelihood that I would face the deck it was DESIGNED to beat went down by a factor of 4.5. When I removed that one card, the likelihood I would face that same deck went UP by a factor of 4.
As a further test, I took out a card and added a Ravenholdt Assassin, which has the same stats as a Defias Cleaner, but no silence. I saw ZERO change in the amount of cubelocks I was facing with the card, but did only run one trial.
So right now, Pally, Priest, and Warlock, and hunter are the classes to beat. You would think you would see them on average every four games, with a couple randoms thrown in.
But based on switching out ONE card.....and running hundreds of trials I found my chance of facing a cubelock DROPPED 62% when I put in a tech card to counter it. One Single Card.....the Defias Cleaner.
I implore someone to recreate my experiment. If Blizzard is fudging the latter, we need to know about it.
Can you explain what exactly is your proof? As far as I can see there are some accusations based on very small sample, but no proof. That "statistician by trade" bit seems very suspicious to me.
Blizzard is known to mess with RNG in their games, especially with the new algorithm spotted this year created by Activision (and EA too) to force the players into buying things in their games that will be certainly used in the next years.
In Short, your experience doesn't proof anything. because it is only your experience.
A proper study will include a sample with various hundreds of players, (if not thousands) , doing the same test as you at the same time, an not only you.
Sorry man for your hard work, but i don't buy it :)
'I am a Statistician by trade, with over 15 years of experience crunching p-values and t-tests. So I decided to run a statistics experiment to test my theory.'
I am a Doctor by trade, with over 15 years of experience curing colds and using band aids. So I decided to run a Medicine Experiment to test my theory because yes, I definitely am very much a real doctor
Screenshots? Deck tracker? Sampling error? Z scores, null hypotheses, alpha level, significance test output, etc? 15 years experience lol
Did you by any chance record those statistics using HSDecktracker or a similar software? Seems like you put a lot of effort into this, but it seems odd that you're not really presenting any proof.
'I am a Statistician by trade, with over 15 years of experience crunching p-values and t-tests. So I decided to run a statistics experiment to test my theory.'
I am a Doctor by trade, with over 15 years of experience curing colds and using band aids. So I decided to run a Medicine Experiment to test my theory because yes, I definitely am very much a real doctor
Screenshots? Deck tracker? Sampling error? Z scores, null hypotheses, alpha level, significance test output, etc? 15 years experience lol
I believe him because he simply has no reason or bias to try to slender Blizzard. If anything, it looks like he truly loves hearthstone and only wishes for it to be a fair game. I personally dislike it so much, how judgmental people are in these forums. The sample size and the difference in percentage is DEFINITELY something, at the very least, not normal, and it is simply idiotic, to dismiss it just because of unfounded suspicion.
Thanks, OP, for your hard work, and if I get to rank 5 this season I'll 100% check this out.........
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"As housecarl I am sworn to your service. I will protect you and all you own, with my life." - Lydia of Whiterun
I'm not sure that is actual proof, but it is pretty strong evidence in favor of something suspicious going on.
I would like to see more data, I may try it myself at some point, though I tend to play between rank 15 and 10 most seasons where deck variety is pretty strong.
I could see a plausible case where Blizzard uses some kind of game prediction data to make matches that are not especially one-sided. AKA it could use match data to say that if X cards are a very high incidence of success against another set of cards, then that's too one-sided a match for optimal play experience and it prefers a different match with a less once sided predicted outcome.
Thus if you tech hard against a given deck, you are less likely to see it provided your tech has been proving very effective in other matches over the whole of the game.
It may be possible for a group like VS who analyzes large volumes of data to see if lopsided matches are within a predicted range of commonality based on the play prevalence. That would also be compelling evidence (and more representational).
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Check out my gaming blog: Downy Owlbear Designs and download free P&P games. Or argue with me about games on Qallout, the video debate site.
I'd love some proof to, but just to make a point, let's assume you're right and your idea holds weight.
I have the following questions;
What is your hypothesis? Would it be correct to say that it is: "Hearthstone has a matchmaking system that tries to lower the chance that decks including specific tech-cards matches up against the decks that they are intended to counter."?
If so, what would you say motivates them to arrange such a system? I argue that it would just lower the incentive to craft tech cards if it's not working out. You may say it's because they want the expensive tier 1 decks to be mandatory to craft, but I'd maintain that people would still craft these decks as long as they're posted on Hearthpwn, reddit or twitter or whatever. Wouldn't blizzard make more money on tech cards actually working? That way the meta changes more and people will need to try out more decks. Blizzard has nothing to win on a stale meta as people would only build one or two decks.
My second point is the risk involved from such a move from Blizzard. It's pretty easy to test using a quantitative method as you did. Requires fairly low effort, especially if many are doing it. Even more considering various meta reports and third party stat trackers. If Blizzard would be found out that they're rigging the ladder, that would be HUGE and may just destroy a huge part of the community, especially the competitive scene (which I would say is what keep Hearthstone alive). It seems like a huge risk for a low benefit and I see this being sort of a defeater for any conspiracy theory. It just makes no sense, at least for me. But someone can provide more proof and data about this, on a much larger scale as well, then I'd definitely be willing to trust that data and wonder if there's something weird going on from Blizzards side.
Also, data like that wouldn't necessarily conclude that Blizzard made this intentionally, we'd need more proof for that. It might as well originate from an unintentional glitch in the game, or whatever.
I have a legit question, I don't have too much sense in this whole thing so I just want to get a real answer.
I have understood based on other threads that when a player auto-concedes gazillion times in a row, they will be matched against the entry level players with close to zero collections. Is this just a false statement or true? :O
Like if that claim is true, then it is 100% fact that some kind of rigging is done. After that it is just a question of how much. So please, I'd like to hear some opinions on my question, thanks :)
I always tech my decks depending on what I face if I have the slot for. I remember clearly back at Un'goro, I climbed legend playing Aggro Druid with double hungry crab and I pretty much made it to legend very easely because I faced massive amount of Murloc Paladins.
Not so long ago I was facing a lot less mages than usual, I took out Flare of my hunter deck, but didn't face more secret deck after that.
I also stop running silence with my Priest and face the same usual amount of warlocks, if not less.
Just upload your screenshots and deck tracker data man, if you're really into math you should know how to justify a proof.
EDIT: Math doesn't usually need "evidence" (in this case screenshots, deck tracker data, etc) because it concludes stuff based on statements that are known to be true. But this is stat, which within the mathematical domain is sort of an oddball. You can't just type stuff like "I got this data by playing 75 games with 2 tech cards and 75 games with 3 tech cards". Upload your evidence to eliminate all doubt.
I know this really is an irrelevant topic......but I still think we have a right to know. I am a Statistician by trade, with over 15 years of experience crunching p-values and t-tests. So I decided to run a statistics experiment to test my theory. I would encourage anyone to repeat my experiment and see if you get similar result.
Procedure: I climbed to Rank 5 using a Pally Murloc Deck. I rapidly ascended to this rank, and then, of course, ran into the Void Lord and Cubelocks. Earlier than rank 5, I got a fairly even mix of opponents, but because the Cubelock is dominating right now, I expected to see more of them at the higher ranks. So......I changed one card in my deck. ONE CARD. I swapped out a knife juggler for a Defias Cleaner to get an extra silence tech. I was already running 2 spellbreakers, so this card had no purpose other than to silence a voidlord.
I immediately noticed the ladder was not facing me against cubelocks anymore. Since I couldn't lose stars at that rank, I started a game, and if it wasn't a warlock, I just conceded. It literally took me 17 games to even face a warlock.......and the deck was a ZOO build....NOT Cubelock. It took me 26 concessions to find a cubelock to go against.....because I changed one card to counter that deck,
I repeated that experiment every 3 hours.....just to allow some new players to come on and off.
I used 26 matches as my standard candle. (No pun unintended)
Trial 1 : 3.8% chance of facing cubelock
Trial 2: 4.0% chance of facing cubelock
Trial 3: 4.2% chance of facing cubelock
Average: With deck holding 3 silences, instead of 2.....the chance of facing cubelock was 4.0%
OPPOSITION EXPERIMENT:
I took the Defias Cleaner out, and put my knife juggler back in.
Again standard candle of 26 games at Rank 5:
Trial 1: 73.2 % chance of facing cubelock
Trial 2: 57.6% chance of facing cubelock
Trial 3: 69.2% chance of facing cubelock
Average 66.6% chance of facing cubelock.
Remember, this is a sampling of over 150 games, 75 WITH a 3rd Silence (No Cubelocks), and 75 with only 2 Silences (Many Cubelocks)
By changing ONE card in my deck, the likelihood that I would face the deck it was DESIGNED to beat went down by a factor of 4.5. When I removed that one card, the likelihood I would face that same deck went UP by a factor of 4.
As a further test, I took out a card and added a Ravenholdt Assassin, which has the same stats as a Defias Cleaner, but no silence. I saw ZERO change in the amount of cubelocks I was facing with the card, but did only run one trial.
So right now, Pally, Priest, and Warlock, and hunter are the classes to beat. You would think you would see them on average every four games, with a couple randoms thrown in.
But based on switching out ONE card.....and running hundreds of trials I found my chance of facing a cubelock DROPPED 62% when I put in a tech card to counter it. One Single Card.....the Defias Cleaner.
I implore someone to recreate my experiment. If Blizzard is fudging the latter, we need to know about it.
"Paranoid Player"
Wow, that's a nice job, actually. AND it'll be amazing if you will give us some proofs like deck tracker screenshots or something. Thanks
Can you explain what exactly is your proof? As far as I can see there are some accusations based on very small sample, but no proof. That "statistician by trade" bit seems very suspicious to me.
Blizzard is known to mess with RNG in their games, especially with the new algorithm spotted this year created by Activision (and EA too) to force the players into buying things in their games that will be certainly used in the next years.
https://www.pcgamesn.com/ea-matchmaking-microtransactions-eomm-engagement-patent
https://www.pcgamesn.com/activision-microtransaction-matchmaking-patent
Double post.
Now this make me wonder...
What if my deck contain hungry crab,eater of secret,spellbreaker,defias cleaner,skulking geist,dirty rat,mindbreaker ie. pretty much all tech card
Would I get matched against something really funky??
And this is called, confirmation bias
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation_bias
In Short, your experience doesn't proof anything. because it is only your experience.
A proper study will include a sample with various hundreds of players, (if not thousands) , doing the same test as you at the same time, an not only you.
Sorry man for your hard work, but i don't buy it :)
'I am a Statistician by trade, with over 15 years of experience crunching p-values and t-tests. So I decided to run a statistics experiment to test my theory.'
I am a Doctor by trade, with over 15 years of experience curing colds and using band aids. So I decided to run a Medicine Experiment to test my theory because yes, I definitely am very much a real doctor
Screenshots? Deck tracker? Sampling error? Z scores, null hypotheses, alpha level, significance test output, etc? 15 years experience lol
The title says you have proof. Can you please provide the proof?
"As housecarl I am sworn to your service. I will protect you and all you own, with my life." - Lydia of Whiterun
That's why I am asking other players to do the same.
You Cracked Their Rigging Code , Well Done ;)
PSYQLOPZ MAGOO
I'm not sure that is actual proof, but it is pretty strong evidence in favor of something suspicious going on.
I would like to see more data, I may try it myself at some point, though I tend to play between rank 15 and 10 most seasons where deck variety is pretty strong.
I could see a plausible case where Blizzard uses some kind of game prediction data to make matches that are not especially one-sided. AKA it could use match data to say that if X cards are a very high incidence of success against another set of cards, then that's too one-sided a match for optimal play experience and it prefers a different match with a less once sided predicted outcome.
Thus if you tech hard against a given deck, you are less likely to see it provided your tech has been proving very effective in other matches over the whole of the game.
It may be possible for a group like VS who analyzes large volumes of data to see if lopsided matches are within a predicted range of commonality based on the play prevalence. That would also be compelling evidence (and more representational).
Check out my gaming blog: Downy Owlbear Designs and download free P&P games.
Or argue with me about games on Qallout, the video debate site.
I'd love some proof to, but just to make a point, let's assume you're right and your idea holds weight.
I have the following questions;
What is your hypothesis? Would it be correct to say that it is: "Hearthstone has a matchmaking system that tries to lower the chance that decks including specific tech-cards matches up against the decks that they are intended to counter."?
If so, what would you say motivates them to arrange such a system? I argue that it would just lower the incentive to craft tech cards if it's not working out. You may say it's because they want the expensive tier 1 decks to be mandatory to craft, but I'd maintain that people would still craft these decks as long as they're posted on Hearthpwn, reddit or twitter or whatever. Wouldn't blizzard make more money on tech cards actually working? That way the meta changes more and people will need to try out more decks. Blizzard has nothing to win on a stale meta as people would only build one or two decks.
My second point is the risk involved from such a move from Blizzard. It's pretty easy to test using a quantitative method as you did. Requires fairly low effort, especially if many are doing it. Even more considering various meta reports and third party stat trackers. If Blizzard would be found out that they're rigging the ladder, that would be HUGE and may just destroy a huge part of the community, especially the competitive scene (which I would say is what keep Hearthstone alive). It seems like a huge risk for a low benefit and I see this being sort of a defeater for any conspiracy theory. It just makes no sense, at least for me. But someone can provide more proof and data about this, on a much larger scale as well, then I'd definitely be willing to trust that data and wonder if there's something weird going on from Blizzards side.
Also, data like that wouldn't necessarily conclude that Blizzard made this intentionally, we'd need more proof for that. It might as well originate from an unintentional glitch in the game, or whatever.
some people saying this for years but they get their thread locked because it's "tinfoil speak". you can't convince people who refuse to believe
thanks for the effort..
the title says it all. it's a mathemathical proof, not pictures proof.. so yeah..
I have a legit question, I don't have too much sense in this whole thing so I just want to get a real answer.
I have understood based on other threads that when a player auto-concedes gazillion times in a row, they will be matched against the entry level players with close to zero collections. Is this just a false statement or true? :O
Like if that claim is true, then it is 100% fact that some kind of rigging is done. After that it is just a question of how much. So please, I'd like to hear some opinions on my question, thanks :)
I always tech my decks depending on what I face if I have the slot for. I remember clearly back at Un'goro, I climbed legend playing Aggro Druid with double hungry crab and I pretty much made it to legend very easely because I faced massive amount of Murloc Paladins.
Not so long ago I was facing a lot less mages than usual, I took out Flare of my hunter deck, but didn't face more secret deck after that.
I also stop running silence with my Priest and face the same usual amount of warlocks, if not less.
So you're probably just very unlucky.
Just upload your screenshots and deck tracker data man, if you're really into math you should know how to justify a proof.
EDIT: Math doesn't usually need "evidence" (in this case screenshots, deck tracker data, etc) because it concludes stuff based on statements that are known to be true. But this is stat, which within the mathematical domain is sort of an oddball. You can't just type stuff like "I got this data by playing 75 games with 2 tech cards and 75 games with 3 tech cards". Upload your evidence to eliminate all doubt.
yeah the ladder match up is not random