My wife came in to see me watching a PowerPoint presentation with a slide titled "When to consider shooting yourself." 10/10 will watch with boss around next time.
@@thunderspark1536 Should've used the Panic Attack. It fires in a fixed pattern and the decreased accuracy on subsequent shots shouldn't matter (one shot should be enough)
@@Disatierethats just gamblers fallacy tho? The chance of hitting 10 heads in the row is the same as 10 tails, or 3 tails then 7 heads, or any other combination
the way I like to simplify it is that unless one of you has beer, every shot in the loadout has to be fired at *someone*. The more of those are fired at you, regardless of who's firing it, the more likely you take damage.
@@airplanes_aren.t_real Yes, beer and cigarettes will help you live longer. Actually though, beer is phenomenal because it can let you take some of these scenarios and reduce or eliminate the chance for you to take damage. You generally want to save beer, unlike cigarettes which you should almost always smoke immediately to get them out of your loadout (as long as you're not wasting them of course). Take a dead simple "one live one blank" scenario, you and dealer both have two charges, but the dealer has a hacksaw. If you shoot the dealer, there is a 50% chance of doing one hit to dealer, and a 50% chance of it being blank and then dying to dealer since he will always know what the last shell is when it is reached. This is less than optimal, so the better choice is to shoot yourself. The odds change to a 50% chance to take one hit, but still live, and a 50% chance to get a blank, and then do one hit to the dealer. This scenario is covered in the video, and obviously taking a 100% chance to live is better than a 50% chance to die, even if shooting yourself is less than ideal. Beer is so strong because *it let's you "shoot yourself" but every shell is treated as a blank* so if we go back to the "one live one blank" scenario, we still see that shooting ourselves is optimal, but taking damage from it is not. Instead what we do is drink one beer and cycle the shell out. There is a 50% chance it's a blank and we then hit the dealer for one, and a 50% chance the shell is live. If we didn't have beer, we would have shot ourselves and taken one hit. So although beer doesn't change our best scenario (hitting the dealer for one) it has improved our worst scenario (taking one hit). The rules for using beer is virtually identical to shooting yourself (there can only be one live, if you're preventing lethal, if you want to get to the next round, etc.) but there is one stipulation: You should only use beer if the number of beers you have is equivalent or to the number of blanks still in play, otherwise you should shoot yourself.
@@airplanes_aren.t_real With no items, it's always better to have an odd number of shells when you're shooting. So, use a beer when it's an even number. If it's odd and you have two beers, using them both is useful if you don't mind ejecting all the shells and getting more items to garantee a kill on the next round (don't do this if you're possibly at kill range (1 or 2 life) and the dealer has 3 or more)
I wish I was making this up, but I couldn't even if I tried. I live in student family housing with my college, and I was watching this video on my TV. Apparently, someone had peeked through my blinds at the EXACT MOMENT the text "When you should shoot yourself" was on screen. They promptly called campus Public Safety, and I got a knock on my door 20 minutes later from a public safety officer checking if everyone was alright. I then had to explain that, no, I was not planning on shooting myself; I was watching a video discussing strategy in a video game where you play Russian Roulette with a shotgun.
As a stats professor, I love this video! Excellent analysis. If the game didn't involve shooting yourself/the dealer, I'd assign an analysis of Buckshot to my classes. Fun game though!
A shame, but you can always make it into something different to analyze for class, like a card game or something, something still interactive but not about shooting others or yourself
could always try censoring the idea to a deck of 5 cards where one is a point and you choose to either give the card to your opponent or keep it for yourself before looking at it
@@genericfurrygaming374 the game could be giving or taking cards! Black cards don’t give points, red cards give points, it’s like golf so too many points is losing… If you take a black card you’re free to take or give another card from the deck, if you take a red card or give any card to the opponent the opponent goes next. handcuffs and magnifying glass can stay the same (or to continue the obfuscation, magnifying could be “peeking” and handcuffs could be “tying”), hacksaws are just “doublers,” cigarettes are “subtractors” (no negatives values allowed in points though)! It’s always possible to obfuscate stuff like this. Although good luck if someone knows the game and connects the dots haha
You can adjust the context to being a red card/blue card where pulling a red card removes health, putting a sticker on the card is like a handsaw, eating skittles is like smokes, and you can get a peek token or force skip turn token.
Maybe you can also work towards getting an extra item for a round if you pull it off enough times to better your own turn economy. Also, perhaps you have a streak for how many times you've successfully pointed the gun at yourself without taking damage, which rewards more bonus money the longer the streak is.
ok, but to be fair; which it more likely, that humans are innately bad at understand statistics or that humans are innately bad at understand statistics and the way we describe statistic problems is also pretty vague?
@@TheRabbitPoet Statistics are extremely simple. You split an event into a number of equally likely possibilities, and then branch out for each subsequent event. Occasionally it's more complicated, but that's it 90% of the time. Humans just like patterns. Randomness doesn't mesh with our brains because we want to think things are happening for a reason. when Jack played, the first half dozen rounds mostly had the first bullet as a blank, and his brain took this as fact most of the way through the video.
you can think of aiming at yourself as giving the dealer another turn where he can only aim at you, and if he hits a live you dont even get a turn its funny how the intuition changes when you rephrase it
same, i tapped on the video, went out, quickly watched a video to get the rules and context, then came back don't know if i'll ever play it but i'm here for the maths
Imagine playing normal Russian Roulette with the twist being you can also choose to shoot your opponent instead of yourself while your opponent picks between you and themself randomly and there’s just a crowd of people going “No, shoot yourself! You’re ruining the game by playing it wrong!”, because that’s basically just Buckshot Roulette sans items
It just occured to me that theres a non zero chance that some idiots out there who actually would play real life russian roulette might have adopted this games ruleset of being able to shoot your opponent.
The concept of items turns this on its head because you generally want to give the dealer a turn as late as possible, so aiming at yourself can be better. Sometimes this even manifests into "you should drink the beer cans until the last 2 shells". It's not just limited to specific scenarios like the dealer having a handsaw but him being down 1 HP on you.
Your videos convinced me to buy the game. Beat the normal game first try, and then got to a million in endless after a good handful of tries. Also runs great on my Steam Deck, so that'll be nice for killing time here and there.
The year is 2024, I'm turning 21 this year, it's 4am and I am sat here on my cracked iPhone 8 watching a man who sounds like Dagoth Ur explain when exactly you should decide to shoot yourself in a video game.
tbh besides it just being an interesting breakdown of probability and game mechanics I kinda love dissecting the hell out of what's supposed to be a dark, haunting experience about someone willing to throw their lives away so frivolously for some cash, to the point where there's slightly more than zero percent chance of losing.
Shooting yourself is not very good for getting more damage on the dealer, sure, but it is a very important tool if you identify a round as one that you need more to survive than to win. I noticed and commented on a couple of these scenarios on your juiced dealer ai video. In general, if there is enough saws+bullets such that it's very likely the round will end the game, you need to focus on different goals like delaying damage you take or, in the worst case, taking a single point of damage instead of a guaranteed 2 points, etc. I did since analysis of the most dangerous rounds where you lost a run to a misplay, namely not changing to a survival strategy when you had more than enough information to see that it was necessary, and the results can be surprising.
I guess a better way to put it is you're giving yourself better odds, yes, but you're also giving the dealer better odds, so you're gaining no advantage over your opponent and just risking shooting yourself. Mabye that could be mitigated if you both had seperate guns that were just loaded with the same configuration, rather than sharing a gun.
I love this bit of stats, and you having that beautiful beat going on in the bg. Feels like you're coaching us in the restroom before we have to go and take on the Dealer.
This video made me realize that sometimes using the magnifying glass doesn't even give an advantage and that the beer is more powerful than I thought. Of course it all depends on the items and how many lives vs blanks are there but in your case of 1 live and 4 blanks you are already shooting on the odd numbers which gives you an advantage, knowing the next shot is a blank and shooting yourself doesn't really make it better since now there is a 50/50 chance for both to shoot the opponent if you are constantly shooting each other, which was already the case but in the dealer's turn instead of yours. But with the ai it is always beneficial since between you shooting and the dealer shooting themselves you get more chances of dealing damage.
It works if we think of every shot as dealing damage equal to its probability too. You wouldn't shoot yourself for .2 damage and then shoot the dealer for .2 damage, you'd just shoot the dealer for .2
When clicking this video, I did not know that Buckshot Roulette is a game. I thought it was some bizarre variant of Russian Roulette. I was really interested xD
fun statistics fact: when asked to pick between three closed doors, and then have a non-winning door opened, and asked to choose whether to stay with your choice or change it, your odds of getting the winning door actually are different from when you first chose even if you keep the same door. Information changes odds. I think this is something people struggle to intuit when it comes to bsr
It's really simple to intuit. Your odds of picking a non winning door is higher because there are more of them. You will most often pick a non winning door, therefore when the other non winning door IS opened, you will know that most of the time, the last unopened door will be the winning one.
this becomes super understandable if you imagine you pick out of 100 doors, and then 98 of them get opened. now what do you think, the door you happened to pick is the right one, or the only other one that the host didn't open?
it's so interesting how even if each move on it's own is perfectly justified, the whole game might not make sense at all it has so much implications in other places and even irl too...
I think this video was very well made, but I think it could be a little easier to explain. If you imagined all the previous bullets, it really emphasizes the importance of shooting. If there are 2 rounds left, it's not actually a 50/50, but rather an 80/20. The reason why shooting yourself is always bad is because if there is an even number of bullets, both players are equally likely to get the live round. So in that circumstance, it is better to always shoot. If there is an odd number of rounds, you get a one round advantage. With that one round advantage, you have 2 options. Target yourself to get an 80% chance of equally likely odds as the opponent, with a 20% chance of failure with the extra round, OR target the opponent with a 20% chance of success, and an 80% chance of equally likely odds. In other words, there is not a single instance where targeting yourself is worthwhile, unless items are involved.
Statistics is a lie, its always 50/50! Either it happens or it doesn't Yes you heard it right, you either win 35 blackjack games and become a billionaire or you don't
This reminds me a lot of the Monty hall problem. Its common for people to disregard previous statistics when a new variable is added and just focus on the "new" statistics. I think this is why people get so focused on the "incorrect" objective of the game. Excellent video, i dont play this game but your explaination of statistics are great!
the music still playing in the background makes me feel like im at this nightclub taking a semimar from someone who learned to game the system before i go play the dealer
Another edge case would be if you need to get to new items quickly. Say you have 2 health, and there are 2 live 2 blanks left, but dealer has 3 health, 2x magnifying glass and 2x inverter. If you shoot the dealer, you lose 100%. If you shoot yourself and hit a blank, you can shoot dealer afterwards and survive to the next items (dealer only gets 1 turn).
Counter-conventional statistical probabilities, mixed with the question of whether or not one should shoot oneself in the face? Truly this is the Monty Hall problem for the modern millennial
I think the real problem is that people overthink these things. Every time the gun is pointed at you is a chance to get shot. So, if you don't wanna get shot, don't point the gun at yourself. It's that simple.
Easier explanation is : If you shoot the dealer 3/5 times you have 3 50/50 chance shots at him while he only has 2/5 50/50 chance shots at you(bar items). So you ALWAYS shoot(and make sure you are on an odd number of shots so you get more tries) Basically bar any unfortunate chain of events you will ALWAYS win that exchange given enough repletions(pray you aren't at 2 life and you miss 2/5 shots at him in a row whit no good items)
so, if i understand this right, there's basically a set number of shots to be made each round and you want as few of those to be targeted at you. makes sense
24:15 it's important to factor in turns. If you keep saw yo could give first turn of next loadout to dealer because he shoots himself with a blank. If you give up a saw you could go first in the next loadout because he shoots you with alive round
This video reminds of Magic the Gathering. A common beginner's mistake is valuing your life total too much. The only life that matters in MtG is the last one in most games, and so your goal isn't "Don't take damage", the goal is to lower your opponent's life to 0 before yours hits 0. It doesn't matter how much you win by, it only matters whether or not you win. I see it reflected in the initial goal analysis of "predict the next shell" or "kill the dealer". Classic beginner mistake in games.
I think that's a bit different but the understanding that life is a ressource *does* help for the scenario where you do shoot yourself actually. But for the more general point I don't think there's that much overlap, except maybe a general aversion to losing control. In mtg people don't like when their opponent makes progress and that comes from a good place, it's good to not want your opponent to approach victory, but a competent opponent in a multiplayer games will always attempt to do things you don't want them to do so it's wise to accept some amount of unavoidable loss as a cost for doing your own powerful things. In buckshot roulette I feel like people just feel more in control when they get to keep their turn so that's the appeal of shooting yourself. But it doesn't contribute to winning at all so I think it's a more fundamental misunderstanding of how the game works
@@Laezar1 i think there's plenty of overlap. Its the same idea in a beginner's mind. "Oh, letting my opponent possibly lose me life is bad, I need to do everything to avoid that." Rather than "I need to do everything to defeat my opponent." A beginner's mindset will very much be defensive, as they aim to lose less, rather than win more. That's exactly what the "clinging to control" is in buckshot roulette, and what a lot of beginner's do in MtG. The shift from losing less to winning more is a big one on MtG, and, I think, clearly demonstrated here in buckshot roulette, but if you still don't see it that way, I understand.
As I see it, the booze is the most powerful item in the game for four reasons: first, it's essentially shooting at yourself without the danger of taking a hit meaning any time it's better to shoot yourself you can instead avoid taking damage as the obvious repercussion. Second, it's a wonderful way to deny the dealer the chance to take a turn with the potential for you to deal guaranteed damage should the last round or two rounds, should you have handcuffs, have at least one live left. Third, if you can't kill the dealer in the current round, you have the potential to eject a live round, especially if it's the last round in situations where you can make the dealer waste items. It's always super useful to get the dealer to use the saw when you know it's guaranteed to be a blank. The other situation is you eject a blank and get to take a shot. Fourth, if the dealer made it so they are shooting the odd rounds, you can take back the odd rounds advantage.
The way this video is presented makes me feel like I'm sitting in a dive bar, shady restaurant, or bus stop, and this is being explained to me by a guy who has personally participated in this game, and who does so once every few years when he's short on cash. An old card shark who gambles for much higher stakes.
This is so interesting. I'm a mathematician but I only considered taking the basic probability into account, not all probability scenarios at once. Very compelling
When you've played this enough, you know that the optimal position is when the dealer has no items that would help him know what's next, and then gets a gun with 4 blanks, 1 live. He will shoot himself 3-4 times in a row, and the odds he damages himself are pretty high.
I suspect what I've seen called results-oriented thinking plays a part as well. In a luck-dependent game, you can get rewarded for bad decisions, or punished for good ones. Just because something turns out badly doesn't mean your strategy was wrong. If we're playing a game and you bet against me rolling exactly double sixes on two dice, then I roll a 12, that does not mean you made a mistake! You took a 35/36 chance and I rolled the 1/36, it was just bad luck. Likewise, if you shoot the dealer with a blank and got shot in return, it's easy to feel like you should have shot yourself because in this case you would have won. But the outcome and the odds are disconnected.
Wow. This video was humbling. I was just drunkenly insulting the logic of this video until about the 28 minute mark, where I started to realise that, fuck, you actually know what you're talking about
Only time I shoot myself has been on 1-2 rounds where the Dealer has a handsaw and threatening lethal or the same danger but a 1-1. Rather take 1 damage and make it to potentially better items than instantly die lol
Unbelievable. I’ve barely seen any gameplay of this game and I only just heard about it from this channel being in my recommended. But I keep watching these vailed Comp Sci lessons. Good job I guess?
I want to know how this stands up today with the new items in the steam release. The new items that directly impact the shells are the phone and the polarity device.
all of what you described was already intuitively clear to me, even without calculations now i just wonder why i still can't pass my probability and statistics course
I didn't want to think about the math involved with this and I also didn't like how unintuitive it was, so I coded up something to run simulations using the always shoot at the dealer and the "play the odds" strategy. The always shoot at the dealer method wins about 4% more compared to playing the odds.
at the beginning i could not conceive that the objective was different to the first one but when you said the second one it became clear, i couldnt even fathom how i could have been misunderstanding the goal
oh this is why i recognized your channel name! i assume i got this recommended because i watched exactly one video of this game and youtube’s algorithm isn’t great, but this was a good suggestion
Another example that I think helps your point: imagine an absurd scenario in which you have 100 rounds and only one of them is live. You and the dealer have the same number of turns. If you always try to shoot the dealer and he always tries to shoot you, you have a 50% chance to win. But if you always shoot at yourself any time that the chances of it being a blank is >50% (which is the way new players tend to play), then you would end up shooting yourself 98 times in a row, only even considering shooting the dealer when you get down to one live and one blank. Your chances of winning are now
I find it profoundly funny that the game based on russian roulette, with mechanics centered around playing a game of russian roulette, actively rewards you for avoiding playing russian roulette
I love getting a statistics lecture from a funny youtuber, I’ve genuinely considered taking stats in uni again as a full bachelor (I had a semester of it because of programming) because I just find it that interesting. Hope you get the 1 billi jackbot bby glhf
What if the dealer kept track of the bullets left, and rolled a virtual die that has odds that correlate to the unspent shells? Could make for an interesting dealer ai mod
