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Bad Idea #53: 2, 4, 8, 16?, 32??
12 years ago
Bad Ideas explained: http://www.furaffinity.net/journal/321008/ Includes index.
That's 2^n, though it will soon be (2^n) - 1, unless there are... participants... waiting.
Imagine a narrow vertical channel such that a ball dropped down it would fall rather straight down even if it hit the sides. Now imagine that the channel is in a transparent material so you can see the object dropping. Let's make it more interesting. After a while the channel widens and there's a barrier in the middle, forming two channels, one left and one right of the original. The object can only go down one of those channels, but there's no guarantee which - it's rather a thing of chance. Each of those channels could be split again and then two would become four, and further splits would turn four into eight.
And at the end of each of the final channels are the targets. You guessed it, the dropped object is either heavy enough to do some real damage to some bound balls, or trips something that will. Let's say there are 8 final channels and 8 participants. At the moment of the drop no decision has been made yet other than one of those eight guys will be in pain quite soon. At the first decision point, let's say the object happens to go to the left. This will spare the four guys on the right, but the four on the left are still in danger. At the next decision point the object goes to the left again. Now the two rightmost of the that four are spared, but the pair farthest left is still in danger. At the last decision point the object finally falls to the right and the leftmost is spared, but (if you number the guys 1 to 8 starting from the left) No. 2 is doomed.
This could be played a few ways:
* It's like a horse race. Once a fellow has been in one race, he's done for some time and won't be at risk again for a while - if ever.
* There's no escape. Once in, always in, the suspense is when the final ballbusting will come, and delays are when new participants need to be found.
* There is chance at getting away intact, but it's not a great one. Say, two final channels means having to be at risk twice, four means four times.
Anyone wanna play a game?
That's 2^n, though it will soon be (2^n) - 1, unless there are... participants... waiting.
Imagine a narrow vertical channel such that a ball dropped down it would fall rather straight down even if it hit the sides. Now imagine that the channel is in a transparent material so you can see the object dropping. Let's make it more interesting. After a while the channel widens and there's a barrier in the middle, forming two channels, one left and one right of the original. The object can only go down one of those channels, but there's no guarantee which - it's rather a thing of chance. Each of those channels could be split again and then two would become four, and further splits would turn four into eight.
And at the end of each of the final channels are the targets. You guessed it, the dropped object is either heavy enough to do some real damage to some bound balls, or trips something that will. Let's say there are 8 final channels and 8 participants. At the moment of the drop no decision has been made yet other than one of those eight guys will be in pain quite soon. At the first decision point, let's say the object happens to go to the left. This will spare the four guys on the right, but the four on the left are still in danger. At the next decision point the object goes to the left again. Now the two rightmost of the that four are spared, but the pair farthest left is still in danger. At the last decision point the object finally falls to the right and the leftmost is spared, but (if you number the guys 1 to 8 starting from the left) No. 2 is doomed.
This could be played a few ways:
* It's like a horse race. Once a fellow has been in one race, he's done for some time and won't be at risk again for a while - if ever.
* There's no escape. Once in, always in, the suspense is when the final ballbusting will come, and delays are when new participants need to be found.
* There is chance at getting away intact, but it's not a great one. Say, two final channels means having to be at risk twice, four means four times.
Anyone wanna play a game?
Zephyrlot
~zephyrlot
I do just love these journals from you! The creativity and thought you put into them is really refreshing, especially for a "one-trick-pony" fetish like CBT/BallBusting. Keep it up man!
Zoroaster666
~zoroaster666
It's like Pachinko!
