Re: [spoon-discuss] No, I haven't really forgotten...

["Baron von Skippy" <baronvonskippy@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

> > > Someone made a guess in the Number Game a while back -- Orc, maybe? -- 
> > > but
> > > I still can't figure out how to respond. No, really, I'm not sure what 
> > > the
> > > hell a 'distance in five-dimensional space' or whatever that rule asks
> > > for, is.
> > >
> > > Someone's gonna have to explain it to me in terms a five-year-old can
> > > understand.
> > >
> > > ...dave
> > -The distance between two points on a plane is equal to the square root of 
> > the sum of the squares of delta x and delta y. Pythagorean theorem, for 
> > those of you going "what the...?".
> >
> > So, the distance in 5-d space is, through some extrapolation of the 
> > Pythagoream theorem, distance^2 = (delta v)^2 + (delta w)^2 + (delta x)^2 
> > + (delta y)^2 + (delta z)^2, where v, w, x, y, and z are the five numbers, 
> > and delta (letter) is the real number minus the guess.
> >
> > You know, this is a dumb game. The odds of winning are 3.2 million to one. 
> > If you guess right, you should just win B Nomic, given those odds. We need 
> > an equalizer or something.-
>
> The system isn't dumb; if you guess at random, then yes, your odds of 
> winning are one in 20^5. But given five guesses, if you know how to solve 
> systems of equations, you can solve for all five values. If you're *really* 
> lucky, you could do it with as few as 2 guesses... that's unlikely, though.
> Still, it only costs 20 points to make five guesses, and thirty points is 
> the payback; so you make ten points (or more, if you let other people make 
> guesses and use them). That's not too shabby for a few minutes of 
> computation.
-But 10 points in 5 nweeks is. That's not going to get you anywhere. And not 
nearly everyone has the necessary knowledge to solve those equations you 
mentioned. (Give me a few hours, I might find the latent skill within 
myself, or I might find a new well of annoyance...)-

[[BvS]]

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