edumacational - fun with binomial theory

[doyle]

I was posting a comment about this on icafreak's journal and I thought "it's maths! Random pointless maths! Who wouldn't love that!"

So anyway, I was talking about my love of odd pairings.

I'd love to have written all the possible pairings, even if it's only for a ficlet, but even just counting the major characters there are *so many*. (If we're talking Buffy, Willow, Xander, Giles, Dawn, Anya, Tara, Oz, Riley, Spike, Angel, Cordelia, Gunn, Wesley, Fred, Illyria, Lorne, Harmony, Doyle, Faith, Lindsey and Lilah - 22 people equals (22*21)/2 pairings. That's 231 pairings, unless my maths is shoddier than I think. And it would mean writing something like Lorne/Dawn or Giles/Lindsey...)

I'm sure I'm missing a major character. Connor! How could I forget my boy! And Andrew! Okay, add them. And Snyder, for swmbo. That gives us 25 characters. The number of possible pairings goes up to 300 (25*24/2). 300! I've got a long way to go before I've done all of them.

If our 25 characters are bored with twosomes then there's a gigantamous 25*24*23/6 = 2300 possibilities for hot threeway action. Okay, might be just a bit impossible to do them all.

The moral of this is: more randomness in our pairings is what we need. To start with, someone should write Cordelia/Dawn/Riley. Or, as icafreak suggested, Anya/Illyria.

Disclaimer: should be taken as an estimate only. I may well have screwed up the maths, in which case the mathematicians on my friendslist will point and laugh.

Comments

[mosca.livejournal.com]

I did that once, albeit in E.R. fandom and on a smaller scale: 4 characters, every possible pairing thereof. And was going to do more, but started doing the math.

I have this sinking feeling that Darla and Drusilla should be on the list. And if I put on my sad puppy eyes, will you add the Grooselugg? I'll-- I can't believe I'm saying this, but I'll write Lorne/Dawn.

[doyle_sb4.livejournal.com]

*g* Lorne/Dawn: theirloveissogreen.

And yep, Darla and Dru should have been on there. I'm wondering if Warren and Jonathan and Ethan and Joyce should be, too... (admittedly this means Buffy/Joyce and Dawn/Joyce coming into it. Which would be doable, going for really dark darkfic where either Joyce is a vampire, 'came back wrong' in Forever, or was The First.)

[settiai]

And what about Kate? ;-)

[doyle_sb4.livejournal.com]

...you are evil. That instantly adds about another thirty pairings. But it's Kate, so I must. (Kate/Gunn, ooh.)

Somebody's bound to mention Jenny Calendar now

[jennyo.livejournal.com]

Oh, I was going to mention, um, Eve. (Nina, Holtz, Justine, Jasmine)

...but that's just me being evil.

[settiai]

Oh, and you can't forget Kendra. Because Kendra/Buffy? So canon.

[doyle_sb4.livejournal.com]

Also Kendra/Giles!

[settiai]

True, true...

*wonders if anyone has mentioned Knox yet*

[doyle_sb4.livejournal.com]

Knox! And Holden! And Lawson! And Penn!

[jedi-penguin.livejournal.com]

I'd read that! Never thought of it before, but now that I have... Yep. I'd read it.

[doyle_sb4.livejournal.com]

Holtz/Andrew!

It has to be done. As does Holtz/Gunn.

[gwynnega]

Oh god, Holtz/Andrew! Andrew would be so in love with Holtz...

[silly-dan.livejournal.com]

OK. What about Jenny Calendar? 8)

And Johnathan, Larry, Kennedy, Rona, Vi, Amanda, Joyce... um... whosits who ran the Watcher's Council....

[settiai]

Quentin Travers.