God's Imitator

’↓Hanged Man’ himself tended toward high risk, high reward.

At the beginning, many players, out of prudence, would set upper limits on the amount of Wealth Vouchers they carried.

Some brought two to three hundred thousand, some brought five to six hundred thousand, some brought one to two million.

However, after two rounds of the game, many players’ understanding of the game rules had updated.

Because the number of matches in the game was limited, and the total amount of exchangeable Wealth Vouchers had no limit, inflation was bound to occur later on.

The earlier one started carrying the maximum limit of Wealth Vouchers, the earlier they could accumulate wealth.

Of course, the prerequisite was ensuring positive returns.

The current new rule meant either the ’Thief’ took everything or the ’Sage’ took everything. ’↑Wheel of Fortune’ had become one of the earliest batch of players in this game to directly max out leverage.

So the biggest question was which side had a higher probability of taking everything.

...’↓Hanged Man’ quickly made calculations.

”There are 22 boxes in total. According to the ’Number Bomb’ gameplay, there are actually two different strategies.

”The first is more aggressive, guessing the middle number each time. For example, the first time directly guessing number 11, and the second time, based on the range change, guessing 6 or 16.

”This way, even in the worst luck scenario, the range can be reduced to the minimum in about 4 attempts.

”The second is more conservative, guessing from both ends toward the middle. For example, the first time guessing 22, the second time guessing 21, the third time guessing 20...

”Guessing this way, theoretically in the most extreme case, it would take 22 attempts to guess it.

”Of course, there’s also a very small possibility of guessing it directly in one attempt.

”Using these two different strategies depending on the situation, I should be able to control the number of attempts. For example, I can start with a relatively aggressive strategy to narrow the range. If I haven’t guessed it by the third attempt, then on the 4th, 5th, and 6th attempts, I’ll adopt a conservative strategy as much as possible, guessing close to the current range.

”As long as I don’t guess it on the 4th, 5th, or 6th attempts, there won’t be many numbers left for the subsequent 7th and 8th attempts, so it’s almost certain to be guessed.

”Moreover, with so many chances, maybe one of them will just happen to hit it. After all, there are only 22 numbers total. This probability won’t be very low...”

Time was running out. Faced with nearly 11 million in huge Wealth Vouchers, ’↓Hanged Man’ found it hard to just give up so decisively.

After all, according to the game’s matching mechanism, the first 3 hours shouldn’t match repeat players. If he missed this opportunity to win 11 million Wealth Vouchers alone, it might never come again.

Moreover, even if he lost, he would only lose expected returns and wouldn’t incur actual debt, which would greatly reduce the psychological burden.

”I’ve decided. I’ll play according to your rules.”

’↑Wheel of Fortune’ nodded, ”Alright, but before that, I hope we can close off the sound in the room so outside spectators can’t hear.

”Because these spectators might study the strategy you use, optimize and upgrade it, which would reduce my chances of winning when using this ruleset in subsequent matches.

”You don’t want your wins and losses to benefit others either, right?”

Closing off the sound in the room required unanimous agreement from both ’Thief’ and ’Sage,’ and wasn’t mandatory.

In other words, as long as one party disagreed, it definitely wouldn’t be closed.

’↓Hanged Man’ considered for a moment and nodded, ”Alright, I agree to close it.”

Obviously, whether he won or lost, the strategy ’↓Hanged Man’ would adopt next would become a reference for other players, and this wasn’t something he wanted to happen.

If he could win, of course he didn’t want this winning method to be copied by other players; if he lost, he also didn’t want other players to learn from his lesson.

After all, the number of players from the same community in this game was limited and most likely weren’t among the currently spectating audience.

[Spectators can no longer hear the sound from the current room.]

’↑Wheel of Fortune’ raised a hand to indicate, ”Then please begin guessing.”

’↓Hanged Man’ had already considered his strategy and pointed to box number ’12’, ”I choose the same number as myself, number 12 ’Hanged Man.’”

’↑Wheel of Fortune’, ”The special number is smaller than it.”

”Number 6 ’The Lovers.’”

”The special number is larger than it.”

Having guessed to this point, ’↓Hanged Man’ paused and fell into thought again.

He had now guessed twice, using an aggressive strategy to quickly narrow the range. The current range was 6 to 12 (not inclusive).

This included five different numbers: 7, 8, 9, 10, and 11.

But now, the third attempt was very important.

If he continued with the previous strategy and kept guessing the middle number 9, then if he didn’t guess it, he would definitely lose afterwards.

Because in that case, the range would be reduced to ’7, 8’ or ’10, 11,’ and guessing correctly on the 4th, 5th, or 6th attempts would all count as failure.

He had to adopt a conservative strategy now to slowly reduce the numbers and try as much as possible to avoid the 4th, 5th, and 6th attempts.

If he couldn’t avoid them, he’d lose. If he could avoid them, he’d win.

But immediately after, ’↓Hanged Man’ realized a new problem.

This was his third guess. If he guessed the special number correctly, he’d win, but if he guessed wrong, he’d have to avoid the special number in the next three attempts.

If he started ’hugging the edge’ from now on, for example guessing 7 or 11, then if he didn’t guess it, there would be 4 numbers remaining, and to avoid them on the 4th, 5th, and 6th attempts meant he’d have to save the special number for the 7th attempt.

It seemed probability was no longer on his side.

”Where exactly did it go wrong?

”Should I have adopted a conservative strategy earlier? For example, for the second guess, instead of guessing 12, guess a position one-third from the front or back, 3 or 9?

”That way, there would be more numbers reserved for avoiding the 4th, 5th, and 6th attempts, but without knowing what the specific number is, it still seems very easy to step on a mine, right?

”After all, the 4th, 5th, and 6th consecutive attempts cover too large a range of numbers.

”Or should I have adopted a conservative strategy even earlier, for example on the first guess, instead of directly guessing 12, guess a number relatively closer to the edge? For example, directly guessing 21 or 19.

”That way, the range of numbers left for the 4th, 5th, and 6th attempts to avoid would be larger.

”But the problem is, if the range left is too large, even if I avoid the 4th, 5th, and 6th attempts, if I can’t accurately find the special number on the 7th and 8th attempts, I’ll still lose.

”This rule is much more difficult than I imagined... The opponent must have planned this in advance, ensuring that the probability of guessing the special number on the 4th, 5th, or 6th attempt is highest, before making such a rule...”

Time was already running out.

Obviously, just this brief time on the spot wasn’t nearly enough to come up with a comprehensive strategy. ’↓Hanged Man’ only had time to think of a relatively crude strategy, which was to guess middle numbers for the first two attempts to quickly narrow the range, then adopt a conservative strategy for the 3rd, 4th, 5th, and 6th attempts to slowly narrow the range, and try to hit it on the 7th or 8th guess.

But after actually implementing it, he found this strategy didn’t seem particularly good.

Things had come to this point. He could only place his final hope on luck.