Odds of the Serious Injury Table

So I was curious about the actual numbers and ran some quick probabilities for the serious injury table. Below are my findings which some of you might find interesting.

Some quick counting (there are 36 possible rolls):

Dead(5): 11,12,13,14,15
Permanently Worse(6.5): 22,24(half),26,31,32,34,35,
Temporary Bad(5): 23,25,35,36,61 (ignoring rolls of 1[which are very bad] for 23&25)
Good(5.5): 24(half),56,62,63,64,66
Special (3): 16,21 (dependent on if average roll is good or bad), 65(dependent on melee skills of hero)

So out of 36 options, 11.5(32%) are permanently bad (5[14%] of which are death), and 5.5(15%) are permanently good. Including the temporary bad rolls, 16.5(46%) are bad results. Ignoring death, 11.5(32%) are bad, which is significantly more than the good rolls, so this makes the multiple injury rolls bad on average(they were considered special above). It'd be too much math to get the exact numbers for the effects of the multiple injury rolls, but I'd increase chances of bad rolls maybe 8% and good rolls 3%.

From a percentage standpoint, odds are you're going to be worse off for rolling a serious injury. I didn't consider how bad or how good the improvements are yet. Lets take a look at the good results and their chances:
frenzy .5(1%) - great improvement, extremely rare
fear 1(3%) - great improvement
hatred 1(3%) - usually against a single model, not too useful.
ignore fear 2(6%) - decent utility
+1 exp 1(3%) - minimal gain

Now bad results:
-1M 1(3%) - very bad
stupidity .5(1%) - extremely bad, also extremely rare
-1T 1(3%) - very bad
-1BS 1(3%) - very bad to minimal
old wound 1(3%) - very bad in longer campaign, minimal otherwise
-1WS 1(3%) - bad to minimal
-1I 1(3%) - very bad(dwarves) to minimal (skaven)

In summary, there's a ~4% chance to get a really good improvement, and a ~10% chance to get something really bad (not including death which is 14%). Feel free to comment/question/analyze as you see fit.

Edit: Formatting issues

That's a useful breakdown, Identity. I had always wondered about the percentages, because (on average) I tend to roll 'Dead' about 50% of the time. After our last game (well, the one before it, actually) THREE of my heroes died. Terrible.
Weirdly, despite its rarity, I've seen 'Stupidity' come up quite a bit. I've never seen anybody roll 'Frenzy' after rolling the 'Madness' result. Strange. Actually, my Warrior Priest, in a campaign a long time ago, was taken out of action after he failed his stupidity roll and walked off the edge of a ruined building. What did I roll for his injury? You guessed it - Dead as a Doorpost. What are the odds?
Well, actually, now we know - about 14%!

You might be interested in this article on DakkaDakka:
http://www.dakkadakka.com/wiki/en/That%27s_How_I_Roll_-_A_Scientific_Analysis_of_Dice

It's a scientific analysis of dice and why you always roll the wrong numbers (hopefully - I can't check as DakkaDakka is blocked at work).

Eliazar wrote:

You might be interested in this article on DakkaDakka:
http://www.dakkadakka.com/wiki/en/That%27s_How_I_Roll_-_A_Scientific_Analysis_of_Dice

It's a scientific analysis of dice and why you always roll the wrong numbers (hopefully - I can't check as DakkaDakka is blocked at work).

Wow, that was an extremely good read. Thanks for posting. I find it hard to believe the GW dice are off by so much (the other dice being 2% off sounds more reasonable), but the guy sounds like he knows what he's doing.

For the most part the Serious Injury Table has been pretty good to me. I have rolled madness and frenzy, and I've rolled Fearsome more than once. Oh, I'm also undefeated in the pit, and we're talking Dregs vs. Pitfighters. However, my most recent rolls were quite tragic. My Necromancer died and my Vampire lost an eye, an arm, and 3 games, due to a skaven sling!

Despite these experiences I plan to buy some casino dice as recommended in the Dakka article.

I was looking for casino dice, too, but as the recommended manufacturer does not ship outside the US, I could not yet located some.
However, I got 5 casino dice with a poker set (don't know if they are top quality, though) and I can only recommend them - not only are they apparently better crafted, they also feel awesome when throwing. I don't know why, but I could sit in a corner and throw them all day

On a side note, it's unbelievable how they kill our fighters (in a way) just to get more dice out of the plastic! Evil!

Man, that article is scary! I've got to find some casino-dice! (Now that you mention it, my gaming group has rolled stupidity loads, and, I think, frenzy once. The most memorable time was when my friend's noble walked out in front of the massed missile weapons of a 10+ game Rieklander warband, ouch!)

It just feels quite over the top to buy casino dice... intresting reading though!

Talking about bad luck in Mordheim:
My Skaven Assassin happed to be practically eaten by the Random Happenings Spawn that popped up in perfect charge range. Following with a Serious Injury Roll I ended up in the pits, got my ass severely kicked and ended up rolling Madness. Guess what? My Assassin was of course effected with Stupidity, leaving him drooling far to often in coming games!

Identity wrote:

So I was curious about the actual numbers and ran some quick probabilities for the serious injury table. Below are my findings which some of you might find interesting.

Some quick counting (there are 36 possible rolls):

Dead(5): 11,12,13,14,15
Permanently Worse(6.5): 22,24(half),26,31,32,34,35,
Temporary Bad(5): 23,25,35,36,61 (ignoring rolls of 1[which are very bad] for 23&25)
Good(5.5): 24(half),56,62,63,64,66
Special (3): 16,21 (dependent on if average roll is good or bad), 65(dependent on melee skills of hero)

So out of 36 options, 11.5(32%) are permanently bad (5[14%] of which are death), and 5.5(15%) are permanently good. Including the temporary bad rolls, 16.5(46%) are bad results. Ignoring death, 11.5(32%) are bad, which is significantly more than the good rolls, so this makes the multiple injury rolls bad on average(they were considered special above). It'd be too much math to get the exact numbers for the effects of the multiple injury rolls, but I'd increase chances of bad rolls maybe 8% and good rolls 3%.

From a percentage standpoint, odds are you're going to be worse off for rolling a serious injury. I didn't consider how bad or how good the improvements are yet. Lets take a look at the good results and their chances:
frenzy .5(1%) - great improvement, extremely rare
fear 1(3%) - great improvement
hatred 1(3%) - usually against a single model, not too useful.
ignore fear 2(6%) - decent utility
+1 exp 1(3%) - minimal gain

Now bad results:
-1M 1(3%) - very bad
stupidity .5(1%) - extremely bad, also extremely rare
-1T 1(3%) - very bad
-1BS 1(3%) - very bad to minimal
old wound 1(3%) - very bad in longer campaign, minimal otherwise
-1WS 1(3%) - bad to minimal
-1I 1(3%) - very bad(dwarves) to minimal (skaven)

In summary, there's a ~4% chance to get a really good improvement, and a ~10% chance to get something really bad (not including death which is 14%). Feel free to comment/question/analyze as you see fit.

Edit: Formatting issues

:lol!:I recognise this...
(Narutoheim post)
If you want to see my alternative seriousinjury chart, modified for my wip maybe project, check the narutoheim post in fantasy wargames shout-it-out, I think it's nice.

Thanks for the article Eliazar!

Admin Tom wrote:

Thanks for the article Eliazar!

De nada!