In other words, luck is not about pure chaos and disorder, but more about the Chaos theory, branch of mathematics focusing on the study of chaos—states of dynamical systems whose apparently random states of disorder and irregularities are often governed by deterministic laws that are highly sensitive to initial conditions.
Chaos and randomness aren’t technically the same thing. Chaos follows rules, often very simple rules; you can predict exactly how a chaotic system will evolve over time if you have perfect knowledge of its initial state. A truly random system cannot be predicted even with perfect knowledge; you can often treat it statistically, like there’s some probability a certain event will happen, but you can’t know for sure until it happens.
I know I am a little late to the game, and most people who are voting at all will have voted already, but I would like to put out the plea for my preferred characters again. I worked out who I would want for each during the first voting round and posted them, but since it is rather hard to find my post in the mass of discussion that went with the initial vote, I’ll repost here; I’ll probably repost on the ‘Ding’ page, too.
I, for one, chose only after reading most of this comments column. I think I was most influenced by J’s talk about the need for a wild card. After seeing what people were saying, and which ideas moved me most, I made a list of characters that I was certain that I wanted on one team or another, whatever happened. Then I made two-slot sections for each of Rusty, Mimic, and Gelatinous Cube, each with a wildcard box to check. If there was no wild card, I would review my choices.
My must-haves were:
Prestige Perkins, Practiced Practitioner of Prestidigitation. I love Presty (character and costume design; the way she just takes things in stride, and the way she is freaked out by other things), and feel that she didn’t get a lot of time last chapter.
Dorilys Happ. For the same reasons that everyone loves her, of course. She just makes things happen, and makes a perfect straight man, she is so annoyed by everything.
Derek the Cleric. I was really impressed seeing Derek in action, and I feel that if he is not actively put to the fore, we wo’n’t be seeing in such extreme condiions for very long.
Drago Stromscale. I have got to have more Drago. His plots are good, his dialogue is entertaining, and the suggestions of Malevolus and Calamitus made me think about the potentials of a villain (he’s listed as ‘other’, but come on; he’s a villain by nature).
So, a ‘P’ and three ‘D’s. Right, who for the slots?
The first person I decided on was Drago. He is a natural for Cube’s team. He is a hard hitter for the defense, and devious enough for ferreting out the infiltrator (especially if that infiltrator is Anti-Madeline; I have a really strong suspicion it’s her). I’m pretty satisfied that he checks the ‘Wildcard’ box, too.
I looked at other people’s ideas for a while, and in the end, I put Madeline down for the other slot; you want someone really incorruptible to keep an eye on Drago, and her evil-sniffing will be further help with the infiltrator. Furthermore, she is another hard-hitter for the defense. I am kind of feeling like this mission does not offer Madeline enough scope (she is my favourite character in the whole comic), but at least it’s better than a nest of ants and corruption if her death memories start causing her trouble. And I have a sort of suspicion that the castle may turn out to be the most interesting part of this level after all.
I knew that Mimic should have Presti, as it just seems like common sense that if you are going to the black market, one of your companions should be a cop (especially a cop with a good history in bluff); more so if you are determined to have her in whatever happens. She’s certainly not a wild card, though, and neither is the other natural choice that everyone has been calling for on this mission, Stabitha. I would love to see her in action in her natural habitat, but the fact is that she’s not terribly unpredictable. Instead, for this team’s wild card, I plunk for Dinkum. He is evidently a member of the Black Market and should be a good guide there. He is able to go invisible for long stretches of time. And he is a gnome, enough in itself to make a wildcard of him. Finally, I find it hard to believe the enemy will be able to predict Mimic choosing him, of all people, so that even if he was a fairly predictable character, he would probably still qualify as a wild card, at least at first.
Rusty’s group came last, and basically ended up with my dumping both of my remaining must-haves on him. I had already been considering both clerics for that mission anyway, on account of what people were saying in the comments (notably Fortis on Derek for the mission). It isn’t that well-thought out, but my priorities are Mimic (most promising mission) and Cube (favourite party member, best place for Drago). People may say that sending two clerics is redundant, but I am not so interested in them as clerics per se, especially as we have not seen a lot of overlap of abilities between Derek and Dorilys, except for healing.
I am still open to other ideas. In particular, I think that a trip to the black market might quickly mean that a healer could be desirable, and it is probably safer putting the Belt of Genre Changing in Dorilys’s hands than in anyone else’s.
In brief for those who don’t want to go through my reasoning, I am voting for Presti and Dinkum to be on Mimic’s team, and am hoping others will do the same.
You haven’t updated our line of reasoning to take account of Rusty’s mission – specifically, you haven’t taken into account that Madeline is no longer available for Cube’s mission, leaving you with a large empty spot right there.
Presti know her illusions, and can infiltrate very well herself… would she not be a natural fit for that now-empty space?
You are right; I did not look that part over before reposting; I will have to re-think who I want to go with Cube and Drago now. I suppose I have plenty of time, though, and might as well see who is going with Mimic before I try a new idea. I still hope that people will vote for Drago when the time comes.
If Presti doesn’t go to the black market, I will probably vote for her in the castle. I want her somewhere, after all. Of course, if that happened, and if Drago got in like I also hope for, it would seem almost a pity that Cube isn’t purple, to keep with the theme. In reality, I don’t expect that Drago has much of a chance, though Dinkum seems to have done much better than I thought he would in this round of the voting, to judge by people’s comments.
As I suggested to someone on the paizo boards, If you want to replace die rolls with a static number, then devil worshipers must always get a 6, while lawful good clerics must always get a 7.
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In other words, luck is not about pure chaos and disorder, but more about the Chaos theory, branch of mathematics focusing on the study of chaos—states of dynamical systems whose apparently random states of disorder and irregularities are often governed by deterministic laws that are highly sensitive to initial conditions.
Yup.
Explains a lot, doesn’t it?
I think I get it now. Even randomness has rules.
Chaos and randomness aren’t technically the same thing. Chaos follows rules, often very simple rules; you can predict exactly how a chaotic system will evolve over time if you have perfect knowledge of its initial state. A truly random system cannot be predicted even with perfect knowledge; you can often treat it statistically, like there’s some probability a certain event will happen, but you can’t know for sure until it happens.
I know I am a little late to the game, and most people who are voting at all will have voted already, but I would like to put out the plea for my preferred characters again. I worked out who I would want for each during the first voting round and posted them, but since it is rather hard to find my post in the mass of discussion that went with the initial vote, I’ll repost here; I’ll probably repost on the ‘Ding’ page, too.
—————————————————————————————————————————————————————
I, for one, chose only after reading most of this comments column. I think I was most influenced by J’s talk about the need for a wild card. After seeing what people were saying, and which ideas moved me most, I made a list of characters that I was certain that I wanted on one team or another, whatever happened. Then I made two-slot sections for each of Rusty, Mimic, and Gelatinous Cube, each with a wildcard box to check. If there was no wild card, I would review my choices.
My must-haves were:
Prestige Perkins, Practiced Practitioner of Prestidigitation. I love Presty (character and costume design; the way she just takes things in stride, and the way she is freaked out by other things), and feel that she didn’t get a lot of time last chapter.
Dorilys Happ. For the same reasons that everyone loves her, of course. She just makes things happen, and makes a perfect straight man, she is so annoyed by everything.
Derek the Cleric. I was really impressed seeing Derek in action, and I feel that if he is not actively put to the fore, we wo’n’t be seeing in such extreme condiions for very long.
Drago Stromscale. I have got to have more Drago. His plots are good, his dialogue is entertaining, and the suggestions of Malevolus and Calamitus made me think about the potentials of a villain (he’s listed as ‘other’, but come on; he’s a villain by nature).
So, a ‘P’ and three ‘D’s. Right, who for the slots?
The first person I decided on was Drago. He is a natural for Cube’s team. He is a hard hitter for the defense, and devious enough for ferreting out the infiltrator (especially if that infiltrator is Anti-Madeline; I have a really strong suspicion it’s her). I’m pretty satisfied that he checks the ‘Wildcard’ box, too.
I looked at other people’s ideas for a while, and in the end, I put Madeline down for the other slot; you want someone really incorruptible to keep an eye on Drago, and her evil-sniffing will be further help with the infiltrator. Furthermore, she is another hard-hitter for the defense. I am kind of feeling like this mission does not offer Madeline enough scope (she is my favourite character in the whole comic), but at least it’s better than a nest of ants and corruption if her death memories start causing her trouble. And I have a sort of suspicion that the castle may turn out to be the most interesting part of this level after all.
I knew that Mimic should have Presti, as it just seems like common sense that if you are going to the black market, one of your companions should be a cop (especially a cop with a good history in bluff); more so if you are determined to have her in whatever happens. She’s certainly not a wild card, though, and neither is the other natural choice that everyone has been calling for on this mission, Stabitha. I would love to see her in action in her natural habitat, but the fact is that she’s not terribly unpredictable. Instead, for this team’s wild card, I plunk for Dinkum. He is evidently a member of the Black Market and should be a good guide there. He is able to go invisible for long stretches of time. And he is a gnome, enough in itself to make a wildcard of him. Finally, I find it hard to believe the enemy will be able to predict Mimic choosing him, of all people, so that even if he was a fairly predictable character, he would probably still qualify as a wild card, at least at first.
Rusty’s group came last, and basically ended up with my dumping both of my remaining must-haves on him. I had already been considering both clerics for that mission anyway, on account of what people were saying in the comments (notably Fortis on Derek for the mission). It isn’t that well-thought out, but my priorities are Mimic (most promising mission) and Cube (favourite party member, best place for Drago). People may say that sending two clerics is redundant, but I am not so interested in them as clerics per se, especially as we have not seen a lot of overlap of abilities between Derek and Dorilys, except for healing.
I am still open to other ideas. In particular, I think that a trip to the black market might quickly mean that a healer could be desirable, and it is probably safer putting the Belt of Genre Changing in Dorilys’s hands than in anyone else’s.
In brief for those who don’t want to go through my reasoning, I am voting for Presti and Dinkum to be on Mimic’s team, and am hoping others will do the same.
You haven’t updated our line of reasoning to take account of Rusty’s mission – specifically, you haven’t taken into account that Madeline is no longer available for Cube’s mission, leaving you with a large empty spot right there.
Presti know her illusions, and can infiltrate very well herself… would she not be a natural fit for that now-empty space?
You are right; I did not look that part over before reposting; I will have to re-think who I want to go with Cube and Drago now. I suppose I have plenty of time, though, and might as well see who is going with Mimic before I try a new idea. I still hope that people will vote for Drago when the time comes.
If Presti doesn’t go to the black market, I will probably vote for her in the castle. I want her somewhere, after all. Of course, if that happened, and if Drago got in like I also hope for, it would seem almost a pity that Cube isn’t purple, to keep with the theme. In reality, I don’t expect that Drago has much of a chance, though Dinkum seems to have done much better than I thought he would in this round of the voting, to judge by people’s comments.
There’s a good sight gag if one of the castle staff pours purple dye into Cube from above.
Chaos is a matter of perspective. What looks like anarchy and pandemonium to you, could be someone else’s plan going off without a hitch.
A 1 which translates to “critical success” in good tabletop games.
(This joke may be a bit too convoluted and obscure)
Well, she’s in a D&D universe and was, in origin, an actual D&D character.
As I suggested to someone on the paizo boards, If you want to replace die rolls with a static number, then devil worshipers must always get a 6, while lawful good clerics must always get a 7.
Heck yessss! Go yellowstone~
Uppie downie
Actually… no, they don’t. Greater deities are always considered to roll 20 on all their dice rolls in d&d 3.5… But I understand the sentiment.