Is pick order really random? The longer I play the more I'm finding it questionable. With 4 last picks in my last 5 games and probably somewhere around 75% of my games being 4th-5th pick, I must admit I'm really getting frustrated getting stuck supporting and watching people that just aren't very good take the carry roles and proceed to do terrible.
So is it random or is there some formula I'm not seeing.
Well, not to get into the whole "nothing is truly random" spiel, it is random.
Also, you can carry as support, this isn't season 2, supports can do stuff.
The formula, which you don't see, tries to make it random.
Random is a concept that means it can't be predicted and that everyone has an equal chance being in any of the five positions, but it's kind of difficult to make a system that is truly not dependent on any factors. The best we can do when it comes to electronic/virtual randomness is impose an algorithm or formula that mimics the effect of randomness as best as it can.
If this kind of stuff really gets you going, then realize that in 2015 we've come up with some pretty mind blowing algorithms that simulate randomness almost indecipherably, but this is Riot we're talking about. Not to intentionally pick on them, because I know they get a lot of fuss, but at this point when you start to realize that maybe they just grabbed any algorithm, said "good enough," and slapped it in their game... it's probably true. I've had issues with their "random" generators. When you own all of the champions but ARAM selects Mordekaiser for you 9 games in a row before selecting Mundo, and then Mordekaiser a handful more times, and then two more Mundos... while definitely 100% possible in terms of randomness.. probably safe to bet their random algorithm could use some work. I've started typing it as A"R"AM to my friends.
I also get selected to be in the same position for several games in a row, but when the chance is 1/5, it's more believable that it would happen "randomly."
I'm going to be anal for a sec and say 75% percent is impossible in a sample size of 5 games.
Main Point: 5 games is not a big enough sample size. If you were in a different spot each game, then it would actually not be random. in 5 games with only 5 positions it is entirely possible to end up 4th or 5th (40% of the options, almost half) most of the time. That does not mean the system is not random, just that you got a kind of shitty sample of all possible options.
Also don't think about it to hard or you'll probably end up falling into the trap of confirmation bias and thinking your always 4th or 5th because you will subconsciously exclude most games you weren't. Ask my server how often they play against bullshit comps in ARAM, they'll tell you every game. In reality if that were true most of them wouldn't have an almost 1:1 win/loss ratio, but they never seem to remember when we steamroll the enemy team or win a difficult game, only when we get steamrolled or lose a difficult game.
TL:DR It is random, play more than five games.
