
Chutes and Ladders: Basics on Markov Chain (for parents) - ColinWright
http://www.r-bloggers.com/basics-on-markov-chain-for-parents
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alpb
Pardon me but is that really for parents or am I just a dumb? I am an
undergraduate student but I'd expect a more human friendly explanation on this
topic.

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ufo
Basically, for each turn you calculate the probability that the pawn is on a
given square. You can then calculating the probabilities for the next turn by
applying all possible moves to all possible positions, while weighting for the
chance of the position and the chance of the move.

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cmicali
For parents that were mathematics majors

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mturmon
They come up with an expected number of rolls-to-complete of 32. This
surprisingly large number is why that game tends to drag on forever.

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Someone
It is not that surprising. If you leave out all the snakes and all the
ladders, the rolls-to-complete is 100/3.5, or about 28.5. So, it seems the
average loss due to snakes is larger than the average gain due to ladders.

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mturmon
Yes, I realized this simple explanation only after doing the Markov chain
analysis myself a couple years ago.

But for some reason, looking at the game, you don't think it will take so
long.

