Comments on: The Remainder Game — a method for constant-time (pseudo-)random selection http://kanga.nu/~claw/blog/2008/08/13/game-tangent/the-remainder-game-a-method-for-constant-time-pseudo-random-selection/ Wed, 25 Apr 2012 06:58:32 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.2 By: J C Lawrence http://kanga.nu/~claw/blog/2008/08/13/game-tangent/the-remainder-game-a-method-for-constant-time-pseudo-random-selection/comment-page-1/#comment-213 J C Lawrence Tue, 17 Mar 2009 00:46:11 +0000 http://kanga.nu/~claw/blog/?p=198#comment-213 <p>That does make it more difficult for humans to pick a start player in a 11+ player party game. I guess we could count toes for adding 5-sums to the finger count (it being difficult to stick out subsets of toes), but I really don't want the people I play with taking their socks off to verify that aspect!</p> That does make it more difficult for humans to pick a start player in a 11+ player party game. I guess we could count toes for adding 5-sums to the finger count (it being difficult to stick out subsets of toes), but I really don’t want the people I play with taking their socks off to verify that aspect!

]]> By: calpurnio http://kanga.nu/~claw/blog/2008/08/13/game-tangent/the-remainder-game-a-method-for-constant-time-pseudo-random-selection/comment-page-1/#comment-212 calpurnio Mon, 16 Mar 2009 10:06:12 +0000 http://kanga.nu/~claw/blog/?p=198#comment-212 <p>Now that I think about it, it is not even necessary to ask players to limit their finger count. It is sufficient to tell each player that whatever number of fingers he/she sticks out, it will be considered modulo #_players -1. As a nice side effect, the system is now robust to alien races with more then 10 fingers ;)</p> Now that I think about it, it is not even necessary to ask players to limit their finger count. It is sufficient to tell each player that whatever number of fingers he/she sticks out, it will be considered modulo #_players -1. As a nice side effect, the system is now robust to alien races with more then 10 fingers ;)

]]> By: J C Lawrence http://kanga.nu/~claw/blog/2008/08/13/game-tangent/the-remainder-game-a-method-for-constant-time-pseudo-random-selection/comment-page-1/#comment-211 J C Lawrence Sun, 15 Mar 2009 22:42:14 +0000 http://kanga.nu/~claw/blog/?p=198#comment-211 <p>You are quite correct. I wrote sloppily and have (now) corrected the original text. In practice this does not seem to be a problem (here) as players natively tend to limit their finger count to the player count without prompting.</p> You are quite correct. I wrote sloppily and have (now) corrected the original text. In practice this does not seem to be a problem (here) as players natively tend to limit their finger count to the player count without prompting.

]]> By: calpurnio http://kanga.nu/~claw/blog/2008/08/13/game-tangent/the-remainder-game-a-method-for-constant-time-pseudo-random-selection/comment-page-1/#comment-210 calpurnio Sun, 15 Mar 2009 20:18:07 +0000 http://kanga.nu/~claw/blog/?p=198#comment-210 <p><cite> Ideally the number of fingers shown by each player should be in the range of zero-#_players </cite></p> <p>I wasn't sure about this, so I tried all the possibilities myself with 2, 3 and 4 players. What I found out is that for the mechanism to be fair, the number of fingers shown by each player should be in the range of zero-#_players <strong>-1</strong>.</p> <p>Best</p> <p>Marco</p> Ideally the number of fingers shown by each player should be in the range of zero-#_players

I wasn’t sure about this, so I tried all the possibilities myself with 2, 3 and 4 players. What I found out is that for the mechanism to be fair, the number of fingers shown by each player should be in the range of zero-#_players -1.

Best

Marco

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