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time*treat

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Feb 20, 2008, 9:24 pm

Hmmm a jp with 1:10 odds ... o.k

1 ticket bought = 1 in 10
2 tickets bought = 2 in 10 (or 1 in 5)
3 tickest bought = 3 in 10
4 tickest bought = 4 in 10 (or 2 in 5) and so on
5 tickest bought = 5 in 10 (or 1 in 2), or 50/50 <-- but writing it that way can be confusing in this context.

it will always be total number of tickets bought / total number of combos

In neo-conned Amerika, bank robs you.
Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms should be the name of a convenience store, not a govnoment agency.
benmas

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Feb 20, 2008, 9:51 pm

the odds discussed here are probability odds, or mathematically speaking..

mathematically speaking this $100 gives a probaiblity of 1:1,757,115

in practice i would call it "covering all bases" ($100 covers 100 bases and leaves the other 175,711,436 uncovered)...
Coin Toss

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Feb 21, 2008, 12:14 am

Quote: Originally posted by benmas on Feb 20, 2008
the odds discussed here are probability odds, or mathematically speaking..

mathematically speaking this $100 gives a probaiblity of 1:1,757,115

in practice i would call it "covering all bases" ($100 covers 100 bases and leaves the other 175,711,436 uncovered)...

Benmas

Both statements above can't be right.

In the former, you are saying that the $100 gives a probability of 1:1,757,115.

Since the odds start at 175,711,536, you are sayng that this $100 has covered 173,954,421 combinations, leaving 1,757,115.

The $100 doesn't do any such thing, it merely covers 100 combinations.

One, and only one combination is drawn as the potential (if anybody has it) winner.

Every doillar played covers one, and only one combination.

If you play $100, you have 100 combinations, all of which have the odds of 175,711,536:1 against them.

No matter how much is spent on any drawing, each one line of numbers is a stand alone entity against the jackpot odds.

Those who run the lotteries love it when players look for consistency in something that's designed not to have any. So many systems, so many theories, so few jackpot winners.

There is one and only one 'proven' system, and that is to book the action. No matter the game, let the players pick their own losers.
justxploring

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Feb 21, 2008, 1:22 am

Let's change the subject for a minute, since this has been debated before, and the 2 sides will never agree. I'm sure everyone has heard of the show Deal or No Deal. It's a stupid show, and I'm surprised it's still on the air, but I've watched it anyway. Now it's the same ol', same ol' and it's totally boring. It's all luck..not even like Wheel of Fortune, since at least you have to know how to spell on that game! LOL Anyway, for those of you who have never seen it, there are 26 beautiful models holding 26 cases and inside each one is a dollar amount from a penny to a million dollars. So the odds are 1 in 26 that the player will choose the case with a the $1M. Yet almost everytime someone takes a big risk, he/she loses, or at least leaves with a very small prize. Some players wisely back out early. Because nobody won, they kept adding more and more $1M cases. So imagine a game where "all" you need to do is eliminate 20 or more cases with lower dollar amounts to get a huge offer, and it's been tested over and over, and nobody can break the magic code. Now look at a Lottery with odds of over 1 in 100M. Why would anyone think that buying 50 or 100 tickets really makes that much of a difference? Each ticket you buy gives you one more chance at winning. Every ticket is a different bet. You could play 5,000 combinations and the person in line in back of you might be the lucky winner and only spend $1. (and get a quick pick)

Side note: The FL Lottery has rolled and rolled and tonight just 1 person won $37 million. I wonder how many of the 18 million people living here said "the jackpot is $37M so I'm going to buy 50 more tickets tonight to cut my odds."
benmas

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Feb 21, 2008, 1:49 am

Quote: Originally posted by justxploring on Feb 21, 2008
Let's change the subject for a minute, since this has been debated before, and the 2 sides will never agree. I'm sure everyone has heard of the show Deal or No Deal. It's a stupid show, and I'm surprised it's still on the air, but I've watched it anyway. Now it's the same ol', same ol' and it's totally boring. It's all luck..not even like Wheel of Fortune, since at least you have to know how to spell on that game! LOL Anyway, for those of you who have never seen it, there are 26 beautiful models holding 26 cases and inside each one is a dollar amount from a penny to a million dollars. So the odds are 1 in 26 that the player will choose the case with a the $1M. Yet almost everytime someone takes a big risk, he/she loses, or at least leaves with a very small prize. Some players wisely back out early. Because nobody won, they kept adding more and more $1M cases. So imagine a game where "all" you need to do is eliminate 20 or more cases with lower dollar amounts to get a huge offer, and it's been tested over and over, and nobody can break the magic code. Now look at a Lottery with odds of over 1 in 100M. Why would anyone think that buying 50 or 100 tickets really makes that much of a difference? Each ticket you buy gives you one more chance at winning. Every ticket is a different bet. You could play 5,000 combinations and the person in line in back of you might be the lucky winner and only spend $1. (and get a quick pick)

Side note: The FL Lottery has rolled and rolled and tonight just 1 person won $37 million. I wonder how many of the 18 million people living here said "the jackpot is $37M so I'm going to buy 50 more tickets tonight to cut my odds."

and also with Coin TOSS...time to leave the math and the odds aside and play $10 max at a time in my opinion....you need luck with that many combinations in lotto...better be lucky than good..
RJOh

100

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Feb 21, 2008, 2:18 am

Actually with $100 worth of MegaMillions tickets, if you avoid duplications you can cover:

A. 100 of the 175,711,536 combinations that could win the jackpot.

B. 100 of the 3,819,816 combinations that could win second prize of $250,000

C. 500 of the 16,895,340 combinations that could win third prize of $10,000

D. 500 of the 367,290 combinations that could win forth prize of $150

E. 1000 of the 1,275,120 combinations that could win fifth prize of $150

* you don't need to buy every combination, just the winning ones *
KY Floyd

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Feb 21, 2008, 3:15 am

Quote: Originally posted by Coin Toss on Feb 20, 2008
KY Floyd

On page 3 of this thread benmas said:

For MEGA the odds of winning jackpot with $1 are 1 : 175,711,536.

With $100 in one shot it becomes 1:1,757,115.

A lot of people fall for, uh, believe this.

If this were true, every $100 would reduce the odds by another 100th, not reduce the total number of combinations "against you" by 100, by reduce the odds in a manner of

1:175,711,536 to 1:1,757,115

and another 100 from

1:1,757, 115 divided by 100, etc...

UNTIL

Each additional $100 woud actually have the odds in the player's favor!

Picture the lottery as one entity (booking the action) and all the players together as "The Player" or "Players" (which is exactly how it is).

If this $10 reducing the odds by a power of 10 or $100 by a factor of 100 WORKED, there would have to be many more winners.

THERE AREN'T.

If $100 reduced the odds by a 10 factor, or $100 by a 100 factor, what in the world woulld 13 to 30 million dollars played do?

And if somoine with enough money was crazy enough to play every combination to "guarantee" a win (no such thing, read on), despite thejackpot, they could still not recover their $175, 711, 536, because someone out there just nay have played the same numbers!

So let's say someone did put up $175,000,000 for a $270,000,000 jackpot BUT SOMEOONE ELSE ALSO HITS.

That "guaranteed" $270,000,000 is now cut in half, and even before cash option reduction and taxes, that $270,000,000 is now shared with someone else and we have a guaranteed 270 million minus half. So the player who put up $175,000,000 LOSES $40 million by winning.

What benmas said is correct. Your chances of winning are directly proportional to the number of tickets you have, but you clearly don't know what directly proportional means.

"If this were true, every $100 would reduce the odds by another 100th"

You say this every single time the subject comes up, asIpointedoutin the post you responded to. That you stilltrotoutthesamemisunderstanding clearly shows that you don't understanditatall. For the 57th time: as far as I know, nobody has ever said it works that way.

Comparedto buying one ticket, buying 100 tickets makes you100timesas likely to win because you have 100 times as manytickets.Let'sreview. 100 times as many tickets = 100 times as likely to win.

Now suppose you buy another 100 tickets. Pay close attention to this part: nobody says that makes you 100 times more likely to win than you are with only the first 100 tickets.

Buying the second 100 tickets gives you a total of 200 tickets.Watchclosely again, because this part is apparently a stumbling block.200 tickets is 200 times as many as 1 ticket. That makes you 200 times as likely to win as you would be with one ticket. That's 100 plus 100, not 100 times 100. That's what a direct proportion is. Buying n times as many tickets makes you n times as likely to win, no matter what n is.

"If $100 reduced the odds by a 10 factor, or $100 by a 100 factor, what in the world woulld 13 to 30 million dollars played do?"

I already told you that in the previous post. All of theplayers collectively buying 30 million tickets (by which I always meancombinations, with no duplicates) makes the overall chances of a winner30 million times as likely as if only a single ticket was sold. That's30 million in 175.711536 million. It's a ratio, which means that we candivide both sides by the same number without changing what it means,just like 2/4 and 1/2 are the same amount. Dividing both sides by30 million gives us (roughly) 1 in 5.857. 30 million combinationsrepresents just over 1/6th of all possible combinations, so thechances of a winner are just better than 1 in 6.
KY Floyd

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Feb 21, 2008, 3:22 am

Quote: Originally posted by pacattack05 on Feb 20, 2008
If there are 175,711,536 possible combinations, buying 100 combinations improve your odd of having the winning combination to 175,711,536/100=1:1,757,115.

See folks, this is what I mean about misleading. The above shows that buying 100 tix, your odds come down from 1:175,711,536 to 1:1,175,712.

Now, again I say, in mathematical terminology this might be true, however it's misleading.

Does anyone really believe that if you buy a hundred tickets, that you've eliminated a hundred seventy four million possibilities?

C'mon folks....

There's absolutely nothing misleading about it. The problem is that some people don't understand what the numbers mean.

I have no idea if anybody believes that buying 100 ticketseliminates more than 100 combinations from the losing side, butnobody has ever said that's how it works. I'll say it again, since somepeople have such a hard time understanding: Nobody has ever said that buying 100 tickets eliminates more than 100 combinations. That's simply an incorrect interpretation by those who don't understand ratios.

As far as you thinking I agreed with Coin Toss about any of this,I agree that it doesn't work the way he describesit. He's been wrong about that from square one. Since he's wrong, thoseof us who understand how it works are in complete agreement with himthat it doesn't work that way. Don't confuse that with agreeing thathe's right.
guesser

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Feb 21, 2008, 3:23 am

7, count 'em 7 pages of this. Wow.
justxploring

Wandering Aimlessly
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Feb 21, 2008, 3:26 am

Quote: Originally posted by guesser on Feb 21, 2008
7, count 'em 7 pages of this. Wow.

So change your settings. I only see 4 pages.
benmas

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Feb 21, 2008, 3:58 am

Quote: Originally posted by guesser on Feb 21, 2008
7, count 'em 7 pages of this. Wow.

YEah WOW...I'm right and KYFloyd is right but Coin Toss brings up the issue of some average folk not understanding probability concepts..it is the interpretation of probability that is so confusing to some...the numbers can be misleading (example: why is the probability of matching red powerball only 1:79 and not 1:42)..but Coin Toss and justexlporing and RJOh are right in ILLUSTRATING the fact that it is so freaking hard to make any serious improvement in chances when it comes to MEGA...so the bottom line is you can't dent the odds seriosly enough....you NEED LUCK To WIN $ on this game..even if one plays $176 million there is no guarantee he will increase on his investment becasue of the risk of sharing with others...so I suggest let's move on this topic by agreeing that everyone here made a valid point in their own way but the reality remains the same...LUCKY STRIKE needed
JWBlue

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Feb 21, 2008, 11:48 am

How can anyone debate whether there is a better chance of winning with 100 tickets instead of 1 ticket no matter how little the difference is?
pacattack05

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Feb 21, 2008, 12:08 pm

Quote: Originally posted by JWBlue on Feb 21, 2008
How can anyone debate whether there is a better chance of winning with 100 tickets instead of 1 ticket no matter how little the difference is?

Well, apparently to people here, if you buy 100 tickets for a lottery that has the odds of say 200,000,000 to one, by some magical wand, the odds are dramatically decreased by 199,000,000

According to them, it's a big difference, when actuality you've only eliminated 100 possiblities, and the remaining 199,999,900 remaining possiblities magically get reduced down to about 2 million.hmmm...maybe if I buy a thousand tickets, the remaining possibilities would magically go down to a hundred.

Wait a minute, at that rate...If I buy 10,000 tickets, I'm guaranteed to win the JP.....yeah that's the ticket....

This is so silly.
RJOh

100

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Feb 21, 2008, 1:24 pm

Quote: Originally posted by JWBlue on Feb 21, 2008
How can anyone debate whether there is a better chance of winning with 100 tickets instead of 1 ticket no matter how little the difference is?

Who ever said this was a debate? What we have is a bunch of people posting their opinions. And you know what they say about opinions,.......everybody has one.

* you don't need to buy every combination, just the winning ones *
time*treat

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Feb 21, 2008, 1:53 pm

Quote: Originally posted by JWBlue on Feb 21, 2008
How can anyone debate whether there is a better chance of winning with 100 tickets instead of 1 ticket no matter how little the difference is?

Because there are people who can't understand the difference between absolute numbers and ratios of numbers.... even after being provided with examples.

In neo-conned Amerika, bank robs you.
Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms should be the name of a convenience store, not a govnoment agency.

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