Arena Betting

[P3t3r133]

So my game is going to have an Oblivion style arena in it where you fight progressively stronger opponents. I want the players to be able to bet on themselves but dont know how the odds should be determined. Does anyone know of a system that shows your odds of winning based on EL? My PC's are all at 10 atm.

[Rhynn]

That's mathematically impossible, pretty much. It's also irrelevant: what matters is the bookmakers' opinion on their odds. That's going to change as they fight more.

Start with something like 1:2 odds (that is, you win 0.5 for every 1 bet if you win), and adjust that up or down. If they seem really out of their depth at first, you might even do 2:3 or 2:1 odds for the first fight, then radically drop them as the PCs prove their abilities.

Remember, bookies have to make money no matter who wins, so the odds are set based on that. The total winnings given out for either outcome can't exceed, and shouldn't even come close to, the money taken in from the losing bet. Given that they can't know these numbers accurately beforehand, they're going to set the odds kinda conservatively. 2:1 odds are basically for fooling people into betting on a sure loss because "but I'd win so much money!" (Gambling makes money for the person running the game, off the psychology of gamblers.)

[Emperor Tippy]

So my game is going to have an Oblivion style arena in it where you fight progressively stronger opponents. I want the players to be able to bet on themselves but dont know how the odds should be determined. Does anyone know of a system that shows your odds of winning based on EL? My PC's are all at 10 atm.

A creature facing an equal CR challenge is theoretically supposed to have a 50/50 shot at winning (the same with the party facing a ECL+3/4 challenge).

In reality the odds can vary quite wildly.

The easiest way to do it is to take the total pool of bets (all bets on that match), deduct the houses cut (5-10% is reasonable), and then divide that amount by the number of people who's bets are winners and hand it out.

Don't have fixed odds (for one they are too easy to rig which is why they tend not to be used in real life all that often) as this method lets you tailor the payout to what you want and what the actual challenge is/was. The PC is known to be able to run up walls and shoot things quite well with a bow and he is facing a Barbarian who tends to only wield a great axe in melee range, well who do you think that most of the bets are going to be on?

[Seffbasilisk]

Have fixed odds in their favor if they have magical weapons that are apparent. Betting 6:1 is not fun. If they flourish (I believe gladiators have a whole system of weapons checks that can intimidate, raise morale and wacky things) increase odds in their favor.

Weigh if there's a house champion. Someone they've seen fight, reckon from each perspective whether they'd think he'd win.

[Eurus]

You might let the players make some kind of skill check before the fight to convince more people to bet against them. The more people that bet against them, the better their odds for winning should be, and vice-versa.

[Malphegor]

Maybe base it on the CR? The stronger the enemy the more likely it’ll win a bout. Therefore it pays less.