My group of former Roll20 players think FG's dice hate them.

[Ulric]

I convinced my 5e group to switch to FG and play Starfinder. They like the Starfinder system, but are convinced that the dice rolls are bugged. One player in particular always seems to roll bad and the other players are starting to believe it's possible that something is not right. I not sure what to do about this situation.

[Mytherus]

Not sure what to say here except to provide something to ponder....I've had games where all but 1 pr 2 players roll horribly. I ve had games where 15 nat 20s were rolled.

Its not fg. I can say with 100% certainty but only 99%. **** happens. Bad roll streaks happen. It is what it is.

[Granamere]

So this has been talked about before. I just read something a couple of days ago about someone making a addon that would keep the dice stats. I will see if I can find the thread. Here is another one to read.

https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forums/showthread.php?44440-Players-are-complaining-about-low-rolls-(they-think-it-s-a-FG-problem)/page5&highlight=dice

[Nylanfs]

Confirmation bias, all RPG's players dice hate them... :)

Edit: Also tell them to change the color of their dice. :)

[Granamere]

Found it. Do you use discord?

https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forums/showthread.php?55918-Fantasy-Grounds-to-Discord-(Grognard-Bot)&highlight=dice+stats

[Neovirtus]

That extension is still in development I think, but there are others that read the chat log at the end of a session. Either way, the side are physically simulated (rather than using a random number generator). The odds of an issue are pretty slim I think.

[Granamere]

I agree. I play with a bunch of computer people. I am surprised one guy has not wanted to reach out to FG dev group to see which way the numbers are created. LOL Then again he might have done that and not told me. :) All that to say my players are more of the show me the proof. I bet like the original posters are.

Lavoiejh do you have any links to where they could get an extension that would work for them?

[LordEntrails]

Send them the chatlog.html file and have them run whatever distribution analysis they wish. Just make sure they understand probability and they will find that everything rolls like it should. Then have them research confirmation bias, it will explain why they think they are being persecuted :)

[GunnarGreybeard]

Edit: Also tell them to change the color of their dice. :)

I do this as a GM when I feel the dice aren't sufficiently 'rolling my way' . . :bandit:

[Nylanfs]

Doug or John has a post somewhere that details how the dice are generated. It involves a physics engine, the motion and direction your mouse has. It's pretty elaborate and probably as close to random as the real world dice are.

[Nylanfs]

Found one of the posts I was thinking of.

https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forums/showthread.php?37768-Campaign-Game-Statistics

[similarly]

I was running a game on Roll20, and we all noticed one guy rolled more 1s than the rest of us put together, but I remember when I played AD&D 2nd ed on an actual tabletop, and we'd have bags of dice, and whenever we thought a particular die was being "unlucky", we'd switch it for another. A lot of old gamers had their "favorite" dice. In physical dice, there can be a certain amount of truth in every die is different, and in virtual dice it can be true depending on how they're coded, but overall, a lot of "unlucky" dice is just superstition and luck. I also play X-Com, and the RNG (random number generator) for that game is notorious.

[Willot]

Seems to me if you feel you are getting bad rolls and the dice rolls are based partley on the physics of the die roll. Maybe drag the die into the chat from the top rather than the botton.Change the physics of the roll.

[kevininrussia]

In FGU, the dice look like they are shot out of a canon in a pachinko machine. And still players roll the same number multiple times in a row when clicking or double clicking a roll. I tell them to drag and flick with the mouse, then the dice really hit ludicrous speed ;-)

[Willot]

Be interesting if you turned the mouse upside down and rolled and see what happens

[BaneTBC]

Any time they feel the digital dice are “rigged”, I recommend they switch to manual rolls, so when those suck too they can try to break something when they throw them. I also recommend they don’t aim at their monitors.

[Nylanfs]

It's also fun getting the d20 to spin on it's end also. :)

[Weissrolf]

Well, I still wonder what FG bases its seed on when dice are rolled by button clicking/double-clicking instead of mouse-movement? There is a reason why something like random.org exists.

[bmos]

Well, I still wonder what FG bases its seed on when dice are rolled by button clicking/double-clicking instead of mouse-movement? There is a reason why something like random.org exists.While past statistical analysis has shown pretty consistent randomness, I'm not sure if they were drag or click rolling.

I just did a few test rolls and it seems like the starting position/direction does change even without drag-rolling.

[Neovirtus]

Granamere, the one I was able to find was the Battlestats extension (here (https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forums/showthread.php?54938-5e-Combat-stats)). It doesn't track average dice rolls, but will tell you how many crit fails and crit successes each character had, along with other combat stats like damage done, enemies killed, etc.

I feel like I remember there beign other options but can't find them currently. There's always just parsing the chat log yourself and analyzing in excel.

[ddavison]

We have humored a few people and ran stats on their chatlog results just for fun. It has never shown any sort of statistical bias. But it is still fun to tell your players that they need to perform the correct rituals between game sessions. I'm pretty sure those rituals are hanging out on the official FG discord channel or liking a post they see about FG on Facebook. :D

[Granamere]

We have humored a few people and ran stats on their chatlog results just for fun. It has never shown any sort of statistical bias. But it is still fun to tell your players that they need to perform the correct rituals between game sessions. I'm pretty sure those rituals are hanging out on the official FG discord channel or liking a post they see about FG on Facebook. :D

Man I have been telling mine they have to leave a pizza out for the dice gods or better yet have it delivered to the DEV's with your FG id. :)

[hawkwind]

when players complain about bad dice rolls in my games i always recommend changing the colour of the dice...it usually works

[Dax Doomslayer]

when players complain about bad dice rolls in my games i always recommend changing the colour of the dice...it usually works

Lol - I'm always changing the dice color when they start rolling bad. In my mind it becomes using a different set of dice. That said, I wish there was a function within FG which would generate statistics like this easily to show to my players after each adventure as they like to trash talk about the other's rolls and such.

[Karnas]

Dice are VTT-agnostic. You need to appease the Dice Gods by copious sacrifices of pizza, for it pleases them. Then MAYBE the dice would be good to you.

[BaneTBC]

I have one player who has changed his dice so often based on how poorly he feels he has rolled that he thinks he is running outta colors to change too! (and it's a running joke in the group that he's going to fail every roll that is rogue related [picking locks, detecting traps, stealth, sleight of hand, et al]).

[bmos]

I have one player who has changed his dice so often based on how poorly he feels he has rolled that he thinks he is running outta colors to change too! (and it's a running joke in the group that he's going to fail every roll that is rogue related [picking locks, detecting traps, stealth, sleight of hand, et al]).You should get him the dice color changed extension ;)

I did a chart in excel to compare my players' rolls (Niv has only played ~4 sessions so she has only rolled 1 once, Jian was around for about 8 sessions so also less rolls to base the percent off of).
38192

[BaneTBC]

Oh, I have it....but players don't want answers to their bias complaints, they want commiseration! "The digital dice hate me!" I know, right? "The game is so rigged!" Yep, the game has it in for you! Have you thought of trying manual rolls with your own dice then? That way when decide to rage over the dice you can throw them and break things in your own room! "Oh, that's a great idea, thanks!"

[bmos]

Oh, I have it....but players don't want answers to their bias complaints, they want commiseration! "The digital dice hate me!" I know, right? "The game is so rigged!" Yep, the game has it in for you! Have you thought of trying manual rolls with your own dice then? That way when decide to rage over the dice you can throw them and break things in your own room! "Oh, that's a great idea, thanks!"Yeah, my players didn't seem all that interested in the chart either hehe

[EllivasKram]

That’s why the gods invented halflings and associated feats. As a DM I reward inspired role play and inventive descriptions of their characters actions with inspiration. If it’s an important roll they can burn an inspiration on rolling twice.

With bountiful luck many a time a 1 has been turned into a 20 with the halfling declaring his Praying for a favourable result and/or shouting ‘Hit him Johnny’.

[Granamere]

So tell them for each pizza they sent you their player can have advantage for a night! :)

[Drebb]

My group can relate, the other night the DM dropped 5 crits on us during one battle, our Fighter has a 22ac and the DM consitantly rolls 23. Where as all 4 of us players might roll a 20 if we added all our dice together. I think it's fair to point out that we take notice of the bad rolls and don't remember the good ones. The same concept as a person is more likely to write a negative review of a restaurant when they have bad one bad visit but doesn't bother writing one up for the 10 good experiences.

[deer_buster]

Edit: Also tell them to change the color of their dice. :)

This is the workaround for dice hating you. You have to keep changing the color of the dice until you find the right combination for your specific circumstances in the universe.

[osarusan]

This is the workaround for dice hating you. You have to keep changing the color of the dice until you find the right combination for your specific circumstances in the universe.

I came here to mention changing the dice color. I'm glad someone else said it before me.

We always change dice colors when things start rolling badly. Also, never use the same color as another player.

[EllivasKram]

I just take the ‘Etch-a-Sketch’ approach. Shake the laptop/screen and then Onwards they roll a lot better. Sometime tilting the screen means that pesky 20 doesn’t just roll away at the last second.

[Darce]

I have a large cigar box full of dice. When playing live games I swap out bad performing dice. There have been some sessions that I don't find a d20 that wants to roll in my favor. What are the odds?

[vegaserik]

It does seem to get bad at times. In my Pathfinder 2 campaign Sunday I rolled under a six 7 straight attacks/saves ... :( The problem is we don't really remember the times we hit 7 straight rolls so much. For me Unity is worse for it, but I'm also on lower leveled pc's so who knows lol

[deer_buster]

You guys didn't know that the ruleset devs are all GMs and we put in code that favors the GM and not the players...












</kidding>

[deer_buster]

Also, performed a very unscientific test of 600 d20 on both GM and Player, and the results were within 60 of each other (exactly, oddly enough), or about 0.1 difference per d20. Also, looking at the number of 20s rolled, the GM actually rolled 2 less 20s (32), than the Player (34), but the average was 5.3-5.6%, respectively....so about what you would expect.

[Darce]

Ultimately, I wonder if even our live manual rolls are random. This is why a precision tool like a computer can't be random enough. If we were skilled enough, we could produce the exact kinetic forces and angles on a die to get the exact number we want every time. I believe it is because of all the variables we fail to control it and this is what makes rolling dice random. So if the algorithm emulates our failures and the correct number variables of force and deflection it can reproduce the dice randomness.

[Granamere]

Ultimately, I wonder if even our live manual rolls are random. This is why a precision tool like a computer can't be random enough. If we were skilled enough, we could produce the exact kinetic forces and angles on a die to get the exact number we want every time. I believe it is because of all the variables we fail to control it and this is what makes rolling dice random. So if the algorithm emulates our failures and the correct number variables of force and deflection it can reproduce the dice randomness.

This is why they made dice towers. :)