Re: Deal or No Deal
 

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If I was on the game the first offer I had over 10grand or so I'd take it just because I'm flat ass broke, no matter what the EV. And unless these people are millionares there's NO reason they should be rejecting these 100k+ offers even if it's -EV.

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Play the online game at nbc.com a few times, and you'll see how crazy this approach is. Your EV at the very start is over $130,000 (I worked it out, but forget the exact number). With the low offers they give you, there's no way you should accept anything until there are, say, 8 suitcases left. It's extremely unlikely that you'll wind up with less than $10K if you stop gambling around that time, and even then you'll usually be in a position to keep going for a little bit while getting odds you can't pass up and a variance you can stomach.

Re: Deal or No Deal
 

Online gives you an idea the algorithm the bank uses to figure out their deal, and after a while, the correct strategy seems to be to whittle down to eight, and you get about 50% of EV around there. At 5, it's about 60%. At 4, it becomes about 70% of EV(going all the way), and at 3, it's about 90% of EV(going all the way).

The 4 to 3 jump is immense.

This game would be really nice to play compared to other game shows, where your EV looks to be about $20,000, max. With this, you're looking at an average EV of $100,000.

Re: Deal or No Deal
 

I actually like this show just for trying to figure out what the people are thinking and what they are going to do.

I am curious as to whether there is an algorithm for the "deals" they offer or if the bank sometimes [censored] with people. Like if it's down to $0.01 and $1,000,000 offer them something like $100K. Or if the bank knows the contents and tries to drive them towards a decision... or bluff!

Even better would be investigating their lives and coming up with evil amounts:

"OK, Tom... your daughter just got accpeted to college. Her 4-year education at Maryland is going to cost you $65,235. The bank's offer is $65,235."

Re: Deal or No Deal
 

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If I was on the game the first offer I had over 10grand or so I'd take it just because I'm flat ass broke, no matter what the EV. And unless these people are millionares there's NO reason they should be rejecting these 100k+ offers even if it's -EV.

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the problem is that if you are doing well there is a good chance your next deal is going to be lower than the one you currently have. so taking the deal earlier might be a good play if you are going to get nervous and take a worse one later on. your EV for the current deal is kind of moot if you aren't going to go all the way and just settle for a lower (and still -EV) play at the end.

Re: Deal or No Deal
 

The calculator for the online version is screwy. When you're down to three cases left, they almost always make an offer above EV.

Re: Deal or No Deal
 

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The calculator for the online version is screwy. When you're down to three cases left, they almost always make an offer above EV.

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yeah. it's safe to say the online calculator was just made up by some web person who wrote the flash thing.

i wish they would elaborate on what the banker is doing. i think it would be better if we knew he was [censored] with people and not just plugging numbers into something. or if we knew that he knew which case we had.

Re: Deal or No Deal
 

Is anybody else really hoping she just picked the million?

Re: Deal or No Deal
 

dude this guy sucks, picking the 750k and 1 million cases early are very bad strategy.

Re: Deal or No Deal
 

Heh, yeah.

The early bets seem huge -EV though. They're offering you like 10% of total prize pool. You should be able to wait for a 50-70% of prize pool package.

I'm probably going for about 80%/50+k.

Re: Deal or No Deal
 

I'd love to play this game, obviously since the initial ev is like 130k, but also because it's such a no brainer to gambol. Gotta love a game where the by far superior strategy is to just go for it.