Jimmy and Noodles already answered sufficiently your question Sircus, but may I add the following.
As Jimmy mentioned, loot seems to be random. More precisely, we can't atm contradict the hypothesis that loot is random and therefore we do assume that it behaves randomly.
If we assume that loot behaves randomly, then gambling strategies can be applied. Your question was if it makes sense to use amps after several losses.
We have two situations here. A random system doesn't have memory and therefore today's returns are not related to future ones. That's like when using a fair coin, the probability for a head is always 50% independently from previous tosses. However, there is also another point of view.
Instead of evaluating single events you can combine them, like what's the probability to toss a tail after 3 heads in a row. Although, tosses are independent from each other, this probability is quite higher than 50%. Let me explain.
The probability for 3 heads in a row is .5^3 = .125
The probability for 4 heads in a row is .5^4 = .0625
The probability to get a tail in the 4th toss is still 50% but to get at least one tail in 4 tosses has a probability of 1-.0625 = .9375 and that’s about 94%. Hence, the more heads you observe the more improbable this series will become and hence the more probable a tail will become in the
whole series but not as
single event.
Now let's come back to your question and assume that you had 3 bad runs. Let’s define a run to consist of 1000 drops and we’re mining enmatter. We must now identify the relevant probabilities. The return rate is only an expected mean loot relative to expenses and it’s not the probability we're looking for.
We know from the loot model that till loot class 4 expected return rate is about 80%. In 1000 drops, assuming a find rate of 27%, we should have 270 finds. 1000 drops will cost (without decay) 500 PED and a return rate of 80% would imply to get 400 PED back. Loot above loot class 4 has an expected mean of 91 PED but a large range ranging from 40 to 200 PED. So if one is able to get loot from loot class 5 or above then his return rate will be quite close or over 95%. Now the probability of loot above class 4 is only .42% and hence overall all runs you can expect only about 38.5 PEC from it. However, seen from single runs there will be quite some runs with profit. In 270 finds you can expect 1.14 finds to have loot from this class. But what’s when you get none or 2 or 3? From the simulation that we did, we know that in runs of 1k drops at least 40% will have over 100% return rate and that’s the probability we’re looking for.
So let’s define a good run as a run with return rate above 100%. It’s probability is 40%, like the probability of a head when tossing a coin. Now let’s assume that we had 3 bad runs in a row.
The probability for 3 bad runs is .6^3 = 21.6%. So it’s not uncommon to have 3 bad runs in a row. The probability to get 4 bad runs in a row is 13% and hence the probability to observe at least one good run out of 4 runs is now 87%. That’s why persons do believe that they will have more luck after some bad runs. However, don’t forget that we’ve already observed 3 bad ones. The probability to have exactly 3 bad runs and then a good one is .6^3 +.4 = 8.6% and this is lower as 4 bad runs in a row. Hence, although the probability to observe at least one good run out of 4 is high, its realization after 3 bad ones is still quite low.
Very confusing I would say. But let’s repeat, to observe BBBB (means 4 bad runs) has a probability of 13%, to observe BBBG has only 8.6%, that’s an implication of memoryless. However to get at least one G out of 4 runs, which could be GBBB, BGBB, BBGB, BBBG, GGBB, GBGB, and so forth .. has a probability of 87%. That’s the reason why some do use gambling strategies.
One consist in influencing output like when using amps. In roulette games you can use a
doubling strategy. However, such strategies do only work if you have the possibility to double infinitely often, and that’s the reason why banks did introduce table stakes. With amps we have a similar situation, amps are limited.
So all in all, I wouldn’t recommend any betting strategy using amps after bad runs, but if you’re lucky it will for sure make your day
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