War2 and Math

[mik0r_]

anyone here study math/physics/engineering? I realize after getting an engineering degree that Warcraft is full of differential equations, calculus and physics. specifically rates of change and exponential growth. curious if anyone else thinks the same? sorry for nerd talk

[tk[as]]

No but sounds interesting

[jordan4385]

yea you can for example use addition for the resources you get from your peons.

[KaNuKs~]

You can count your raxes to know how many raxes you have.

[jordan4385]

You can count your raxes to know how many raxes you have.

Now i know why you have attained your legendary status.

[mik0r_]

Lol. Ill take that as a NO. That really surprises me. After studying math, it turns out that the underlying principles of  War2 are governed by math. It may seem obvious, but some of the ideas that you take for granted are concepts you don't see until Calculus 2 and Diff Eq. Anyway, I guess nobody else had this experience. Keep counting your raxes. haha

[mousEtopher]

Lol. Ill take that as a NO. That really surprises me. After studying math, it turns out that the underlying principles of  War2 are governed by math. It may seem obvious, but some of the ideas that you take for granted are concepts you don't see until Calculus 2 and Diff Eq. Anyway, I guess nobody else had this experience. Keep counting your raxes. haha

i think probably the whole world can be expressed in math? and one just doesn't realize it until one has the vocabulary to understand that language

[Certified MENSA Genius Brain (smart)]

Actually, this is really old school but there was a Heat player named Gokun that was a mathematician/engineer.  And he allegedly was checking the efficiency of his strategies mathematically.  He had some absolutely ruthless cookbook powers.

[~ToRa~]

You can count your raxes to know how many raxes you have.

lol

[mik0r_]

I think I said that wrong. The surprising part is that the people here never discovered how truly good they are at mathematics naturally. My theory is that the people that are good at this would be instinctively good at upper level math, and thus should have successful careers in those fields.

[Shotgun]

You're right but as you say most people won't see it

[Tolean]

War2 is pure math i You can see it. Jist think about it: 7 peons p stop, 9p stop, 17 hold, 20 hold , dual, cn tush, 1 rax, 2 rax..... Etc. All this ar epute math. Around 1250 lumber when you start chopng and put mill. Just think of it as math, time/result/ economy/made dmg vs losses bla bla bla bla bla

Pure math

[Certified MENSA Genius Brain (smart)]

yep.  if not interfered with each peon has a rate of gathering resources and specific types of resources, and you could theoretically plot that stuff... all the build times are right there in the map editor too.  But even though the math is still everywhere, there are too many inputs and adjustments a player usually needs to make for things to remain pure or calculable.  But the general ideas are still there.  and most war2 players probably would suck ass at higher math actually, but have nevertheless figured out most of the best efficiencies through trial and error and copying other people.  I mean the 1 rax a few grunts and pop in a catapult is a pretty stable strategy, not too many variables and thats why it's repeatable and why people were able to develop it and tweak the right times to put peons onto wood and so on, and make it into a very effective cookbook

[mik0r_]

Sepi if by arithmetic sum you mean like converging and diverging series, then yes. Imagine it more like this, the two hall makes you stronger later in the game. This is because the choices that you make early on affect the trajectory of productivity. in effect not changing the rate at which you gather resources so much as changing the rate of change or dx/dt. the slope of the tangent line.. the rate at which expend energy on expansion is a trade off to micro capacity, but it can make you "huge" for this reason and others. the point is that these are the concepts necessary to understand math and physics. I would be surprised if the top players all got there by trial and error, and that a select few mapped out these strategies for them in the past. innovative players intuitively understand these concepts I think.

[Paper_Boy]

How would you devise such a representation or system? Djinkhan posted a couple graphs on war2 back in the day. He believed combinatorics graph theory and analyzing probablities could help analyze war2. He did however make a couple Awesome war2 Puzzles that are worth checking out.

Warcraft 2 - dkpuzzle solved - YouTube


 Only seems useful if their was a practical application, like AI or analyzing your replays and show you step by step probabilities as your game play diverges from the optimal move. A combination of deep rationality, fuzzy logic and deduction to find the preferred solution analyzing replay and running simulations would be useful. It’s tricky because a lot of what you do is dependent upon what your opponent does. Effective inferences rely upon making proper reads, scarcity allocation of time, formations and resources and knowing which calculated risks and exposure are acceptable at which stage. Ideally, it would move beyond pattern recognition and create novel abstractions from previously untapped connections & differentiate between strategy and tactics while communicating when and why certain adaptations are necessary. Show us an example of how it would work in the most basic sense! Google's Deep Mind is working on Beating SC2, I think war2 would be far more challenging , would Shotty or Swift represent humanity vs the Rise of the Machines?