Wrong. Its not just about probability, its about abuse. Simple answer for you.
Run Qui-Gon JM and Quin-lan Vos in a squad for a multiplayer game. Add in Mon Mothma, a RBSV, and Kazdan Paratus. Now have 2-3 players using recon. See how long it takes to get an init done.
Also, its about fairness to the initial rolls. In a two player game, if you roll a 2 and your opponent higher, you lose. You don't get the benefit of a reroll, where in multiplayer, you do. It absolutely changed the probability of init.
Look at the initial situation of two MTs if its not clear. In a regular game, you always have the chance that the MT player rolls a 1. In multiplayer with two MTs, you have the chance that both might roll a 1, but quess what, MT works on the reroll. So your chance of winning init (even if its tiny less than 1/400), is completely gone. That is absolutely a different percentage than how the game is normally played.
I understand probability, this has nothing to do with coin flips. Here's what you are missing. Things like reserves (which are generally 1/20 chance) are costed into a mini based on the likelihood of it happening. In a standard game, the only way you can lose your roll, is if the one other die roll ties you (or two in some cases). So you have a slightly lower than 1/20 rate of return for the investment. In multiplayer, you will lose it, if anyone on the table ties. Now, sure, you have another 1/20 chance to get it again on the next roll, but its not the same percentage as a regular game. Its actually a much lower percentage, precisely because the rate of ties is so much higher in a multiplayer game than in a standard skirmish. In MP games, your rate of return for things like reserves is lowered by each additional player at the table, and by each person who also has recon/anticipation. Here is why statistically speaking I am right.
Make yourself a chart. Let's begin with the simplest, 2 players, no recon/anticipation, and one reserve character. 1/20 is your chance of getting the number you need, but your opponent can tie. How many die combos are there in two die rolls? 400 combinations. Now, how many result in a tie, in the 1/20 chance? 1 combination. So the real odds of hitting reserves is about 19/400, not 1/20. Now, you can get it in the reroll again, you have to add in the number of tie options, and then another 19/400, so we are getting to infinitesimal differences now.
Now, let's add in recon. Recon for the opposing player of reserves, specifically. What are our odds of reserves now? Well, our opponent has two chances to tie us, so our odds go down again. Its much more complicated here, but I think you can clearly see that its not the same as the above situation. It will not be 19/400.
Now, extend this to multiplayer, and add in multiple recon/anticipation and reserve numbers. The odds are nowhere near 1/20. For example, if say two players tie with 19s and one has recon who rolls a 6 as his second roll, and a third player rolls a 6 with Ozzel, player two, who would rather not grant reserves, chooses his 6, and forces all players to reroll. Now imagine if 3 players had recon. Player four who rolls reserves, now has the possibility of massive amounts of ties, to prevent his reserves, and almost every player can choose to tie with someone else to force another reroll.
What happens is init takes forever, and MT becomes abusive with two on the same team in a team game, recon and anticipation are overpowered and undercosted on their minis, and the game breaks down. If you like that then fine, but I prefer the odds to run similar to a normal mini game. Hence why I don't play that way.
And by the way, next time you want to give a statistics lesson to someone, make sure you have actually done the math.
I prefer to keep my multiplayer games as close to the general rules as I can, and I have often found that this one has lots of options for abuse.
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