Ouch, I knew they were going to mess with the matrices with the addition of Florida, but I didn't think they'd go that nuts with making the odds of winning the jackpot that much worse. That's over a 33% increase which is no way reflective of how many additional players they'll be getting in Florida.

It's kind of messed up that Mega Millions will have better odds when these changes go into effect (if MM doesn't change theirs) and still will have a much larger total population to work with even with Florida joining Powerball. Though it'll still be bringing in much larger jackpots, that's for sure.

Sounds to me like a mining truck or "road-pan" overflowing with it.

Lotteries becoming more like banks and government ..... take everything ..... toss out a crumb or two.

I get why they can technically say they are only adding one more ball to the drum, but they are adding 4 more balls to the drum for the white balls.  I don't care that they reduce the red balls.  Like guesser said, those balls hardly ever come out anyway.  It's the four other balls in the white ball drum I am hating.  That vented, I am excited to hear about the change with the 5x for the second tier prize.  Makes buying the powerplay option a little more tempting to me.  Okay, very tempting.  I also like that they up'd the jackpot size increase percentages.  And the minimum jackpot to 20 million is a great idea., considering the economy.

On a positive note,       We'll get some Brand New Play-slips, wi th new ink,  rather than those faded old playslips I've been seeing lately.

      I wonder if they'l get all new Ball Sets ...or add brand new balls to the slightly used balls?

      Also,  I wonder if the Jan. 3rd drawing will be in Fla.?     

 I guess after the Dec. 31st drawing,  I'll be ripping down some wall charts,  and getting a new start.

        I hope the stores get the right stuff to be in time for the first draw.   

I'm just bummed I have to erase all of my drawing history in January.

I agree. I am not impressed. Whoopie they took away three red balls. Is that suppose to make most players happy and make them not see that they added 4 white balls? It will make getting 5 out of 5 even more hard to get, and the other prizes as well. I have a hard enough time with 55 numbers.

Now would be the time to start writing and asking whether they intend to add 4 new balls to the 55 old balls or add 59 new balls.  This would determine whether we keep working old records making allowances for the change or start fresh record keeping as we would for a new game. 

Anyone who gets a solid answer please post it or supply it to Todd as news.  Don't be surprised to get an ambiguous reply, like they don't understand the question, LOL. 

BobP

New ball sets.

How many ball sets will there be in total, and how will they be selected?  Will there be pre- and/or post-draws, and if so, is there any chance that those results would be posted or available in some way?

It doesn't really matter to me. It just means bigger jackpots and the jackpot will grow faster. Powerball is a game of fate even with its current odds.

All as before.  Four white; four red; two sets of draw machines (four machines).  The same pre- and post-test draws.  Likely new machines along with the ball sets.   Just look for the little red ball.

Well, I hope Floridians are happy that they ruined their in-state game for this!

I bet they will be even happier when they realize that getting a powerball jackpot win will probably come once a year to Florida.

I am not going to go out of my way to play Powerball unless they have a 10x powerplay promotion at the same time they are rolling the jackpot down to the second prize level.....then maybe I'll bother.

I can only describe the new odds a depressing.

However, at $500,000,000 I'll probably buy a ticket but not below that!

Oh and BTW if you check out the new MegaMillions page you will see that some states average about one MM JP per year.  I bet with PB some states don't get a JP for years and It will be even longer with the new odds.

There are 12 MM states, all close to the same population.  There are 31 PB jurisdictions of wildly different popualtion sizes.  What you see is exactly what you should statistically be expected.  You can't complain about an orderly universe.  Both games should get about 12-15 jackpot hits per year.