The one that jumps out first is the one that imagines the draw to draw differences by position onto a grid, measuring both the angle (positive or negative) and the line length to connect those points.

I honestly had no idea what was going to be done next... but it was a valuable lesson in using the index/match formula. The angles and line lengths were pre calculated from every pair from 0-0 to 9-9. A lookup table was created, but instead of using Xlookup I went with index/match. Turns out each approach has it's use.

Another one was a literal manual version of machine learning, where I had generated a guess for each draw using follower data, then added weights based on measuring the error from my pick vs. the next draw, feeding the error measurement back into the pick system on a per column basis. That hit 2 weeks in but not again.

These are all for pick 3.

My old power ball sheet (the one lost in the old laptop) had a grid and lines connected for a simple visualization by position, I remember the first attempt tracked all on 1 sheet and was visually a nightmare... so i separated it into 6 sheets, one per position.

The sheets that I made macros in VBA for were replaced with Python scripts. I was never a fan of VBA. Back testing was not a pleasant experience when the picks were complex.

From the old python scripts, there was the "buddy system", where you would generate the pick based on followers and then this script would analyze each follower and display the numbers that most frequently appeared with each position's follower. This one was for the PA match 6... it also did not win.

Then there was the latent follower sheets, and subsequent Python scripts... this looked at delayed followers in 2 ways... 

1. LRS (Latent Repeating Sequences)

2. LOOPRS (Latent Out Of Position Sequences)

LOOPRS was too complex to manage in just Excel, the Python script proved via back testing that it did not operate at a profit.

LRS was the one I used to get a straight hit on the pick 4 ONCE. Was $1 st/$1 box for $5,400. Back testing showed it only worked 10 times in ALL of the game history, I was just lucky when it worked while I was on it... third pick! Gave up playing it after 1 month of losses.

My pick N sheets had a permutation checker, so I could enter a combo and see how many times it hit both straight and boxed.

What were the lessons learned? That numbers really have no value other than it is the symbol painted on the ball. Trying to base everything on the numbers alone was not helping. Hence my shift toward patterns of frequency.

It is sometimes interesting to see where you have been to help steer where you are going.