Birthday Present probabilities

I don't know if anyone has covered this like this before, but there's been too many occurrences lately where people state guesses like facts.

I was questioned earlier about the probabilities for the different colors of minipets. I remember theorizing the chances before for 70/20/7/3 (White/Purple/Gold/Green). But someone today said that it was 75% for a white mini. So I went through the process again more mathematically looking for a trend in the math by looking at the different data tables for the minipets.

For Green/Gold/Purple, it appears to be 1x, 2x, and 3x respectively. It also makes logical sense. Though it technically means you don't have a greater chance to get a Kirin than a Bone Dragon. You just have a greater chance to get a purple than a green because the rarity is offset by relative quantity (1 green, 2 gold, 3 purple).

However, whites don't work the same way. Given the data tables, it would break the formula for it to be 8x. Instead of only looking at white, I just looked for a way to get the 3 other values which then shows what white is. My previous concept shows green at 3%, so I wanted to make it equal ~3.

33 sounded like a good number to use. I wanted to make the fraction be equivalent to 33/33. Following the basic 1x, 2x, 3x idea, it was simple.

1/33
2/33
6/33

That leaves 24/33 for white. Oh, but what is this? 6 times 4 is 24. It perfectly follows 1x/2x/3x/4x.
Or (1x) + (1x*2x) + (1x*2x*3x) + (1x*2x*3x*4x) = 33x
So that works out. Just take 100 divided by 33 and multiply it by the 4 numbers (1, 2, 6, 24) to get the % chance.

03.03% Green
06.06% Gold
18.18% Purple
72.72% White

You don't have a better chance to get a specific purple over a green, but you do have 3 times the chance to get a specific white over the other 3 colors. So you essentially have a 3% chance to get any specific Purple, Gold, or Green, and a 9% chance to get any specific White.

The numbers just look perfectly suited if you look at how they are repeating decimals. I'm pretty damn sure this is all correct, but there's always a chance.

nice all in all. i can see you also posted this on PSC :P

it's probably just random because if it was 72% to get a white and only 3% for a green greens would be worth A LOT more.

Aren't the greens already worth alot? Im guessign the real stats probably isnt far off from what you said...good work OP

Well if you want to go and assume the economy works like a mathematical formula, what you said would mean a green would be worth 24 times more than a white. A Bone Dragon is almost exactly 24 times more than a normal white.

Kind of scary now that I look at that...

Besides, the data tables on wiki show percentages close to mine.

So, let me get this straight...

3.03% for each specific Green and Gold.
6.06% for each specific Purple.
9.09% for each specific White.

Can't say what data you've looked at to get your numbers, but that sounds mathematical enough for me to believe it.

I almost misunderstood you to say that you'd have the same chance in a gift to get a Bone Dragon as you would a Whiptail Devourer, but on a second look, that seemed wrong.

Last I knew, Bone Dragons still fetched between 100k-200k. I don't think I've seen any first-year white sell recently for 4k-8k.

I made a small mistake in my explanation. I meant to say

You don't have a better chance to get a SPECIFIC purple over a green, but you do have 3 times the chance to get a SPECIFIC white over the other 3 colors. So you essentially have a 3% chance to get any specific Purple, Gold, or Green, and a 9% chance to get any White.

neat. i always knew math could be... fun. ish.

anyways the numbers do look too good to be true. which means that they must be true. gj finding this out once and for all (maybe).

This is clearly wrong. All the statistics I've been able to gather point to the conclusion that 1st year presents have a 100% chance of dropping a Whiptail Devourer, thereby completely debuffing your theory.

Indeed, Sods law needs to be included into the equation.

Where the probability of getting an undesirable or worthless mini is high and subsequently the chance of getting that same mini again is further increased.

Statistically, this is what you are looking at:

1/1 chance you will receive a "Fungal wallow", and to put this to proportion, the chances of green = the chance you survive the black hole CERN will eventually make .

I don't know about the exact chances, but I do know it sucks when you get the same pets 2-3 times in a row. This past August I had 3 bdays, opened all the bday gifts and all were same damn pet! I've got about 3 Mini Jade, 3 Joko's and all happened pretty much in a row, which I don't understand. But I know it sucks waiting for Bdays, and end up getting all the same pets.

Nice numbers but it's still random imo
Posted this before but an update for 3rd now.
1st birthday on same account I got 3 Bone Dragons on 3 chars
same 3 chars when they hit 2nd year birthday they all got a Thorn Wolf each
3rd Birthday only have 2 chars hit that so far but have got a Freezie and a Raptor
All the other chars on my account i keep re-rolling so they never get a prezzy.

About randomness. I had 6 characters created at the same time and guess what. 4 of them got charr shaman for birthday and 2 got jade. Looking at probabilities it will be almost impossibile to get such result (probability of receiving 4 the same purples in a row). I think there is a script running which creates a content of a birthday present depending on the date and probably opening time. I think those drop probabilities are highly dependent on several factors and are far from the ones you provided. In other words knowing those factors you can influence a probability of receiving a given item.

The probability of receiving a given item is significantly higher if:
-you had obtained the same item already on the other character created at the same time and you opened the present at the same hour.

I think there is more to it then that. But the weirest thing i've seen with them, friend got a 2nd and 3rd year, two diffrenet characters, once was a Mini Gwen and the other was a Mini Mad King, both opened right after another, same account and all. Now if that isn't pure luck i have no idea what is. So try and factor that into those theorys as well.

I have yet to have a first birthday on any character. But a friend who plays a lot said he got the gold presents on all his characters. He believes the more you play online the better the mini-pet. Since it's by account it's possible the people who get greens have very busy GW accounts.

Just curious, but do the people who got the better gifts play online a lot? And those who just got the whites not so much? It could be gifts are given out by how busy accounts are.

Now, figure the odds on receiving Temple Guardians as your only 1st b-day gift across 6 characters...finally broke the curse with a Windrider...all made up for by the Black Beast of AAAaaaaarrrgggh I received last Tuesday. The nice thing about probability is that it is what will "probably" happen...not definitely happen, otherwise it would be definitibility which just sounds wrong and is too hard to say...Sod's Law: If you are required to collect 5 gallons of shit, you will be given 2 2-gallon buckets.

It's completely random, with higher chances to get common miniatures.

I wish there where an NPC taking 3 miniatures (dedicated or not) of the same rarity to give another one of the same rarity or 9 ones to give one of the next rarity level.

That way all those repeated miniatures that we can't even sell because everyone have them could have an use.

Of course it is random...

Of course... That's the entire point of the topic. Probability is meant to depict the chances. The 3-4 'useful' data tables on the 2 wikis even reflect my theory in terms of probability.

There may be reasonable reasons behind why one could get multiples of the very same mini, but that wouldn't change the probability.

But I didn't give any factors. The factors are unknown. The probability itself is what contains the factors. But it is most definitely virtually impossible to know these factors to manipulate your chances. Even if you could, that would only change 'your' probabilities, not the static probability.

http://guildwars.wikia.com/wiki/Drop...rthday_Present

Look familiar? Only the first 2 years have an acceptable amount of sum data to actually be useful.

The data on the wikis is by no means accurate.
And the numbers in the actual ingame probability table for generating presents don't have to follow any rule. And from years of experience trading minis since release I have a strong feeling that a specific gold one is more common than the green.

The numbers can be for example:

____________ __________white___purp____gold____green___
chance for specific one :| 9.50% | 5.00% | 3.50% | 2.00%
chance for any of color: |76.00% |15.00% |7.00% | 2.00% | =100.00%

or

chance for specific one :| 9.00% | 6.00% | 3.50% | 3.00%
chance for any of color: |72.00% |18.00% |7.00% | 3.00% | =100.00%

they're fairly even and look nice and there's no way to prove they're wrong or true.

you, sir, make me want to punch babies.
nobody said it wasn't random. the thread is about the probability of getting a specific color mini from whatever function randomly generates it.
i don't think you know what the words "random" and "probability" mean.
enjoy your high school arithmetic.
what i said applies to you as well.

They usually do. Normally every idiot conspiracy theorist comes out of the woodwork to impart their keen insights when it comes to mini chance distribution threads. Maybe they're all playing warhammer.

Three third birthday presents. Three Cloudtouched simians, 1 in pre-searing.

Add that to yer sample group

I made additional test: I was opening two birthday presents at the same time with my friend. We both got two siege turtles each. That should be quite improbable according to the probabilities but actually we expected to get similar minis (just we did not know which mini we will get). Pity that there were no 3 of us to make a bit better sample. Half an hour later I open one more present but this time it was a jade.

Regarding Mad King Thorn and Mini Gwen. I think the script for presents attributes a given white to the presents open at the same time obtained at the same date however it just attributes a random green. So for greens there can be one more randomization included. So if you happen to open presents just obtained at the same time (so obtaining and opening time should be similar) I would that with high probability you will get two exactly the same whites/purples or in the case of greens two random ones (can be the same of course). I have no theory on the gold ones. Never got any so far nor seem anyone getting one. Actually pattern I posted below contradicts my theory. But It is just a start.

I think if we gather the data including not only the numbers but also times when a given present was obtained and opened we may get a nice estimation for future and better view on the rules behind presents.

The problem I see here that we are encountering something which is not "independent" probability. This kind of probability would mean that regardless what you do you get a random result. Here I think it is not the case. The real factors are indeed unknown but there are some. The weirdest pattern I saw so far was:

jade
kirin
kirin
jade
jade
jade
kirin

All chars were created at same time and presents open within 10 minutes. Still I do not know what to think about it.

The result of a "sticky" random numbers generator: if it rolls an N it's more likely to roll N again the next roll than it should be. It doesn't throw the probability distribution of rolls over large series of rolls, because all outcomes are equally likely to "stick", but gives these odd winning/losing streaks.
Not an unusual problem with random number generators, but apparently often hard to pin down the cause of or fix. Or so I've been told.

It's been pretty obvious since the start that the random number generator of GW is slightly sticky; sometimes it works against you sometimes it works for you, and in the long run it evens out.