Powerball/MM Strategy

Reply #7

tg636 — Fri, 24 Mar 2006 19:30:12 GMT

Quote: Originally posted by sirbrad on March 22, 2006 Quote: Originally posted by dvdiva on March 22, 2006 If you are playing to hit the Powerball number the odds are 1:42. Those odds are to hit the powerball and no white balls. Still the odds are a little higher than roulette.

The PA site claims the odds of hitting just the powerball are 1 in 68.96, not 1 in 42. Although 1 in 42 makes sense, I think it would take more than 42 draws to pick any said ball if you kept returning the missed bal... [ More ]

Reply #6

spy153 — Thu, 23 Mar 2006 11:46:37 GMT

Reply #5

dvdiva — Thu, 23 Mar 2006 04:04:40 GMT

No, there are 42 balls and only 42 possible combinations. It's not like they are going to draw a .96 ball or lil' stumpy .

Perhaps the PA lottery has a new way of getting rollovers - having powerballs that aren't covered by quickpicks or play slips. Just imagine the joy when the number 43 Powerball is drawn. But if they are going to have a loser ball that guarantees a rollover than why stop with numbers.

They could use letters, that way YOULOSE could be a possible combination for pick 7... [ More ]

Reply #4

sirbrad — Wed, 22 Mar 2006 22:39:50 GMT

The PA site claims the odds of hitting just the powerball are 1 in 68.96, not 1 in 42. Although 1 in 42 makes sense, I think it would take more than 42 draws to pick any said ball if you kept returning the missed balls back to the chamber, hence the higher number.

Reply #3

Just6ntlc — Wed, 22 Mar 2006 18:24:53 GMT

In my MM and PB strategy, I don't buy too many tickets. Instead of wasting too much money and lose, our family buys $1 or $2.

Reply #2

dvdiva — Wed, 22 Mar 2006 14:38:03 GMT

If you are playing to hit the Powerball number the odds are 1:42. Those odds are to hit the powerball and no white balls. Still the odds are a little higher than roulette.

Reply #1

sirbrad — Wed, 22 Mar 2006 09:42:22 GMT

Yea I discussed this as well in the other thread. I would rather buy all the same powerball then playing every single powerball. If you play every powerball, the only problem with that is that if you do not hit on your ONE line, you now have 41 useless lines that are only good for 5 of 5 for a top prize, but not a jackpot.

If you buy 50 tickets with the same powerball, and you just happen to see that powerball drawn, your chances of a jackpot win have just increased drastically. It is going

Powerball/MM Strategy

Bingo Long — Wed, 22 Mar 2006 08:23:41 GMT

I've seen this discussed here before: if you're buying 50+ tickets for Mega Millions or Powerball, why not just buy ever possible megaball/powerball number?

As a caveat, I never look for patterns in old numbers drawn, and assume that numbers are chosen randomly. I know that this isn't exactly true, but I've decided it's not worth hours and hours of my time to do analysis that might give me an infintesimal advantage.

I live just outside Boston. I can play mega millions at my corner sto... [ More ]