Matrix Games Forums

As the topic says, to start with I thought there were no problems with the percentages (assumingly matching the possibilities) of chits drawn, but now I am in a game where USA can merrily do the 2nd gear up by Sept / Oct 1940.

They've already 2 * 5 strong Chits (which are not in the tabletop game, there is only 1 - in '39; and the other is in '41), and 4 * 4 chits, out of the total of 6 of them between the combined '39 and '40 pool.
Pratically the percentages allow the game to be screwed over in cases of extreme luck swings. (And since the chits are of the same pool of the Germany / Soviets pool that could give minor hints to Germany to how many good chits the US got when playing Netplay proper).

I do not think that is too hard to code - and it's pretty much a box by itself which does not affect other codes.

See Players Manual volume 2, pages 189-190.

The use of chits in the board game was solely because of the limitation imposed by having to physically print the chits. That is also the reason the US Entry and the Neutrality Pact markers are drawn from the same pool. For instance, the printed chits all have US flags on them, even those drawn for the Germany-USSR neutrality pact.

MWIF uses probability distributions instead. As a modeling tool, probability distributions are used throughout the game: e.g., for all the die rolls.

So, while the US Entry chits might be skewed in one direction or another, the probability of needing to drawn a chit may be skewed in the opposite direction. The theory is that everything evens out in the end.

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Of course, as someone once said: "In theory, theory and practice are the same; but in practice, they aren't."

An infinite pool of chits has much higher standard deviation, so it is possible to get such results, however the distribution used was modelled millions of times in order to seek the best match to typical average draws from the finite pool.

The shortage of chit counters in the boardgame did indeed allow for a number of intelligence "coups" but it is questionable if that is design intent or simply an unavoidable result of counter limitations.

ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets

Of course, as someone once said: "In theory, theory and practice are the same; but in practice, they aren't."

Love the quote. Never seen it before but how true. Everything works in theory and especially for those who don't have to put it into practice!