In my first experiment, I tested to see if a player playing Fluxx entirely at random had a significant chance of beating an average opponent. So I conducted a test matrix of 200 two-player games of Fluxx (edition 2.1 for the curious), and found that the random player still won 14% of the games.
Well, that article got a lot of attention, both from BGG regulars and from Rabbits. But many people asked "Yeah, but that’s totally at random. Nobody plays totally at random. You should let the random player spot obvious winning or losing plays."
So I did just that. The new study was another 200 games, this time with the "random player" acting a little less random, opting for guaranteed winning plays and avoiding guaranteed losing plays. This time, the "basic player" won 29% of the games, more than double what the Random Player won in the last study.
As a side note, both studies also measured First Player Advantage. The first study measured FPA to be 4%; the second study measured 6%. I hypothesize that FPA increases in magnitude as players’ comparable skill levels reach parity.
Amusing Internet Videos:
Nicholas Brothers
Let Me In
Movies I’ve Seen
Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (1978) ~ Beatlemania via BeeGees, Frampton, Aerosmith
Shrek the Third (2007) ~ See the other two first
Barbarella (1968) ~ Surreal stupid softcore worth missing
What I’m Reading:
"Dark Tide" by Stephen Puleo
"Flags of Our Fathers" by James Bradley
The Ryanarium 