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RJOh

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mid-Ohio
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Feb 6, 2017, 11:25 pm

Quote: Originally posted by BobP on Feb 6, 2017
Whether you buy one ticket or one hundred tickets, chances of winning are below zero. However, like many things this is the purchase of a dream, an intangible shinny object you can carry untarnished until the next draw.

BobP

"Whether you buy one ticket or one hundred tickets, chances of winning are below zero."

If that's true, how many tickets do you have to buy before your chances work their way up to zero?

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

NY
United States
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October 16, 2005
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Feb 7, 2017, 3:02 am

If you buy a million tickets your probability of winning is only 0.0034. That's still 2 decimal places less than just 0.
RJOh

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Feb 7, 2017, 10:48 am

Quote: Originally posted by KY Floyd on Feb 7, 2017
If you buy a million tickets your probability of winning is only 0.0034. That's still 2 decimal places less than just 0.

Any positive number is greater than zero, if it was less than zero it would be negative with a minus sign in front of it.

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

Dump Water Florida
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Feb 7, 2017, 7:27 pm

Quote: Originally posted by RJOh on Feb 7, 2017
Any positive number is greater than zero, if it was less than zero it would be negative with a minus sign in front of it.

It's a rounding thing. Would it make more sense to say, less then one percent? Your odds are between 1 and 0 leaning way way toward the zero side. OK, your odds are virtually zero. I'm sure my schoolmarm would take your side . . .

BobP
Sunglasses

Belgium
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March 26, 2016
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Feb 8, 2017, 3:28 pm

Quote: Originally posted by KY Floyd on Feb 7, 2017
If you buy a million tickets your probability of winning is only 0.0034. That's still 2 decimal places less than just 0.

You plan to buy a million tickets. Ask Bobp to make a wheel with a million lines. Write your tickets and validate them.

Your p = 0.0034 ? Well look at the results after the drawing and stop that probability mumbo jumbo in lp style.
RJOh

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Feb 8, 2017, 4:42 pm

Quote: Originally posted by Sunglasses on Feb 8, 2017
You plan to buy a million tickets. Ask Bobp to make a wheel with a million lines. Write your tickets and validate them.

Your p = 0.0034 ? Well look at the results after the drawing and stop that probability mumbo jumbo in lp style.

If he really wanted to buy a million PB tickets he could get a copy of CoverMaster from BobP's website to create the wheel and use a lottery probability program to figure out he could expect to have at least 40,213 winning tickets paying $229,517.00 or 11% of his cost.

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

Eagle Sun

IA, MN, WI
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December 7, 2001
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Feb 8, 2017, 5:10 pm

Quote: Originally posted by Sunglasses on Feb 8, 2017
You plan to buy a million tickets. Ask Bobp to make a wheel with a million lines. Write your tickets and validate them.

Your p = 0.0034 ? Well look at the results after the drawing and stop that probability mumbo jumbo in lp style.

At 5 lines a play slip, with no error ticket printing, no breaks, non-stop printing,
it would take 4 days 15 hours 6 minutes 40 seconds to cover all 1,000,000 lines.

Assuming an average ticket length of about 6" (15.24 cm) and 12" (30.48 cm) for play slips,
you'd need 18 miles 4,960 feet (30.48 km) of ticket paper to print them all,
and about 37 miles 4,640 feet (60.96 km) of play slip paper to play them all.

You're going to need about 134 reams of play slip paper to play 1,000,000 lines.

The One Over None
I Know...
mypiemaster

LOOK WHO IS LAUGHING NOW.

EUPHORIA.
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Feb 8, 2017, 6:17 pm

If you have the money, knock yourself out. You only live once.

Seek and ye shall find -Matt. 7:7 ...Ask and ye shall receive -John 16:24 ...Give and it shall be given unto you -Luke 6:38 ...Be careful what you ask for!!! -Mypiemaster 1:1

Having Money Solves Problems That Not Having Money Creates ****John Carlton****
RJOh

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mid-Ohio
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Feb 8, 2017, 6:55 pm

Quote: Originally posted by mypiemaster on Feb 8, 2017
If you have the money, knock yourself out. You only live once.

For me, even if I had the $2,000,000.00 to waste, time would be a bigger problem since I pick combinations to play based on the most recent drawing which means I would only have 3-4 days to come up with one million combinations, fill out 200,000 play-slips and play them.

* you don't need to buy every combination, just the winning ones *
Stack47

Kentucky
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February 14, 2006
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Feb 9, 2017, 3:48 am

Quote: Originally posted by JADELottery on Feb 8, 2017
At 5 lines a play slip, with no error ticket printing, no breaks, non-stop printing,
it would take 4 days 15 hours 6 minutes 40 seconds to cover all 1,000,000 lines.

Assuming an average ticket length of about 6" (15.24 cm) and 12" (30.48 cm) for play slips,
you'd need 18 miles 4,960 feet (30.48 km) of ticket paper to print them all,
and about 37 miles 4,640 feet (60.96 km) of play slip paper to play them all.

You're going to need about 134 reams of play slip paper to play 1,000,000 lines.

And after that there is still only a 0.34% chance of winning the jackpot. Matching 5 numbers is worse because while there is a 8.5% chance, it's still a $1 million loss.
RJOh

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Feb 9, 2017, 5:15 pm

Quote: Originally posted by Stack47 on Feb 9, 2017
And after that there is still only a 0.34% chance of winning the jackpot. Matching 5 numbers is worse because while there is a 8.5% chance, it's still a $1 million loss.

Even if you match five for $1,000,000.00 with $2,000,000.00 worth of tickets you end up $1,000,000.00 short.

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

The land of fantasy 5 and other daily draws
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Feb 10, 2017, 5:12 pm

I think I started to post this last night but didn't finish. So, powerball is the worst bet. It increased $2 and then they also increased the balls. Which makes it more expensive plus less likely to win. The reason it got to 1.5 billion last year is part of that reason.

Id play hand at megamillions before powerball. Which I do. I think I bought less than 10 powerballs last year but way more megamillions than I should of.

I was feeling suicidal when I lost $38 at megamillions the other month, $210 would have sent me to the poorhouse. It's just not worth it. It's a fun experiment, but that's it.

The O.P. Will have much better luck spending $200 on various $5, $10, and $20 scratch off games.

More and more it feels like PowerBall and Mega games are for lottery pools at work and such. If the 300 or so active members here all chipped in $2, it would make it much easier to grab a spot at the table. Playing it alone spending that much money is just throwing away money
Redd55

United States
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Feb 10, 2017, 5:43 pm

I forgot when they changed the PB odds. It was October of 2014 or 2015. I think it was 2015. I rarely bought PB tickets bc of the price but that year I noticed people were winning PB all the time. It seemed like once or twice a month someone was hitting the jackpot. So, I started buying PB tickets. Good to remind myself that the odds are horrendous, tho. But, when I buy the Calif Super Lotto which has much better odd - we dont get a winner for 6 months and then 8 months.
RJOh

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mid-Ohio
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Feb 10, 2017, 8:52 pm

Quote: Originally posted by NeedyNotGreedy on Feb 10, 2017
I think I started to post this last night but didn't finish. So, powerball is the worst bet. It increased $2 and then they also increased the balls. Which makes it more expensive plus less likely to win. The reason it got to 1.5 billion last year is part of that reason.

Id play hand at megamillions before powerball. Which I do. I think I bought less than 10 powerballs last year but way more megamillions than I should of.

I was feeling suicidal when I lost $38 at megamillions the other month, $210 would have sent me to the poorhouse. It's just not worth it. It's a fun experiment, but that's it.

The O.P. Will have much better luck spending $200 on various $5, $10, and $20 scratch off games.

More and more it feels like PowerBall and Mega games are for lottery pools at work and such. If the 300 or so active members here all chipped in $2, it would make it much easier to grab a spot at the table. Playing it alone spending that much money is just throwing away money

"More and more it feels like PowerBall and Mega games are for lottery pools at work and such. If the 300 or so active members here all chipped in $2, it would make it much easier to grab a spot at the table."

I doubt if even ten active LP members would be willing to chip in $2 to any LP member running a lottery pool twice a week and responsible members wouldn't run one.

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

Jacksonville
United States
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March 26, 2014
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Feb 10, 2017, 9:55 pm

Quote: Originally posted by RJOh on Feb 10, 2017
"More and more it feels like PowerBall and Mega games are for lottery pools at work and such. If the 300 or so active members here all chipped in $2, it would make it much easier to grab a spot at the table."

I doubt if even ten active LP members would be willing to chip in $2 to any LP member running a lottery pool twice a week and responsible members wouldn't run one.

I agree with the PB and MM pools. I lost a lot of interest in PB and MM when they made the second place prize much harder to win - in truth, that is about the only prize you can really hope to get even if you are super lucky. Now I play as part of a 30 person office pool. We only buy tickets when the jackpot for a game is greater than $250MM. Even though we typically buy about $60-80 worth of tickets for an individual drawing, we usually end up with about $8-12 back which is disappointing.

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