Powerball at $2.00 - What jackpot level do you start playing?Previous TopicNext Topic

That's ok.

We have to factor in any number of lottery industry butt-plugs skewing the results as well.

I won't  make a decison based on an arbitrary amount. Spending $2 for a chance at a cash jackpot of $100 million or more becomes stupid shortly beyond the point where the same $2 would make you twice as likely to win a Megamillions jackpot that's half of the PB jackpot. Spending twice as much for the same odds demands a possible reward that's at least twice as big. The bigger 2nd prize means PB offers a very slightly better risk to reward ratio at double the jackpot value, but the ratio becomes even very close to that point.

Even if the PB jackpot would net 3 or 4 times as much I'm likely to go with the 2x better chance of winning a comparatively modest MM jackpot. I'm sure I could make good use of $100 million (cash), but anything over $10 million would guarantee all of my reasonable indulgences, and several unreasonable ones, for the rest of my life. There's a limited upside to taking twice as much risk for the chance to get more than you could easily use. Still, if PB reaches a cash value of more than $200 million I may get a ticket if the MM jackpot is fairly modest. Maybe $200 million + for PB when MM is under $40 million. At a guess I wouldn't expect my annual spending on PB to exceed $20.

$40 million sounds good to me

What's your answer.I guess it is $250 millions since you know your maths.I can't believe that 50% of you guys will start playing at $40 millions.The reason powerball increased the jackpot was because many players were playing the jackpot when it reached $100 millions.

I will make that extra dollar work by waiting until it reaches $100 millions to start playing.I feel that $2 for a $100 millions starting jackpot is a great deal.

The powerball will jump so many times to $100 millions that we might not realize our buying points.

50% playing at the starting jackpot of $40 millions before it goes to $100 millions is not bad.They said that the jackpot will increase by $10 millions multiply by 6 drawings =$60 millions plus $40 millions =$100 millions.  It will reach $100 millions in no time since 42 states will be playing.

Man that thing will jump like fire.$40 millions is a life changing amount with cash value of more than $20 millions plus with a chance of winning $1 million for the same price.No wonder many players will start playing at $40 millions.This new powerball game matrix will create some gambling problem.

It seems to me like a big prize scratch game.

I plan to look at the expectation value, the ratio the ratio of the overall prize to the cost times the odds.

I have already calculated the fixed expectation value for lower prizes.   Because of the $1M second prize, this expectation is still around 0.17 so any increase has to come from the jackpot.

Historically big lotteries have had expectation values close to 1.0 and even on occassion exceeding that.    For Powerball as it has operated up to now, the pretax expectation value approaches unity (a good bet) at around $380M, including adjustments for the Poisson distribution that describes the probable number of winners.   The Poisson distribution actually slightly increases expectation values, since it raises the probability of there just being one winner of a large jackpot.

The new format - with a very crude approximation of sales figures, say 350 million in sales on a single draw - I'd estimate would only approach 1 in the 3/4 billion range.   I doubt it will be there often.    At 350 million in sales, the rollover probability and the single winner probability are equal, about 37%

Overall the best expectation values are likely to be found in MM in the future.

If you look at the new payouts it does'nt pay to play powerplay as much as it use to, playing a $2 tickets get's you about the same and you still can win a Million so why pay another $1 the new payouts suck!   

"At a guess I wouldn't expect my annual spending on PB to exceed $20."

Wow. 

Last of the big-time spenders.

Roger that, Dallas! 

thrifty I tend to play when the jackpots are lower-(yes, it's hard to hit powerball, but my reasoning is that its even tougher when you get all the people who don't normally play, playing the bigger jackpots)

That sounds good, but what if the numbers you now only play on Mega Millions because it is a $1 ticket game roll for Powerball?  But since you didn't buy a Powerball ticket, you didn't win.  I think I will shell out the 2 bucks for my chance at millions.

The number of people buying a ticket for the jackpot has no effect on your chances of winning.  Only the number combinations affect your chances of winning and they are clearly stated on the back of the play slip or on the website.  I play every drawing as the amount of the jackpot is irrelevant until you have a ticket with the matching numbers.  Until that time, it is just a hope and a dream!

Jackpot level means nothing to me, it's the cash value that tells me the real value of a jackpot.  At $2 a play, PowerBall cash value would have to be twice what MegaMillions is ever likely to be before I would play again which might make it jackpot level at more than $800M.  I usually play 20 or so lines when I play and right now I can't see paying $40 for what is being offered by MM for $20.

To anyone wondering how high of an amount the jackpot could reach this is what i sent to MUSL and the response i got:

Hi,

with the new game (after January 14th) what do you expect the new jackpots to be? A lot of people are throwing around crazy numbers but what do your mathematical simulations suggest? You stated that the average would go up to 255 million from 141 million but do you have estimates on how high they would go? Because on a lot of blogs people predict that they'll go as high as a billion which I dont think is possible...feel free to reply with a funny answer haha.