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Who Wants To Be A Gambler?


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I was just watching Who Wants to Be a Millionaire on GSN, and the following scenario came up which got me thinking about a decision this guy made in gambling terms:He had cleared the $32,000 plateau (meaning he was guaranteed at least that much money no matter what) and had successfully answered the $64,000 question. The $125,000 question came up:What classic poem features the line, "A Jug of Wine, a Loaf of Bread -- and Thou"?A: Kubla KahnB: Paradise LostC: The RubaiyatD: The Faerie Queeneand he didn't know the answer, but had the 50/50 lifeline left. He immediately used it, narrowing the choiced down to C and B, and after shaking his head a bit, stated that he read Paradise Lost in high school, and although he didn't remember the line being in it, it probably was so he was just going to quit and take the $64,000.Fair enough right? Why risk the additional $32,000 you've already locked up on the previous question when you really don't know the answer to this one?Well, once I got to thinking about the math, I realized that he had a "stack size" of $64,000, was literally a coin-flip to win another $61,000, and only had to risk $32,000 since he was guaranteed that much right or wrong. So the way I see it, he was getting 1.9-to-1 on his "call" if he were to use his educated guess where he's actually maybe a 55-45 favorite to get it right since he had read the poem, albeit a long time ago and his initial instinct told him to go with the one he hadn't read.Further, to put it in complete poker terms, Regis went all in and showed AKo, this guy only had to call $32,000 more with 88 to win that $61,000 in the pot and he folded. Am I missing something, or would anyone in the same spot with knowledge of "pot odds" just gamble without knowing the answer, getting laid such a good price and with the implied odds of possibly knowing the answers to a few more questions after this coinflip and running it up to 250k, 500k or even a million?What would you have done if there were a real $32,000 on the line?

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lol thats funny i had a similar experiene. Check out the show deal or no deal and there are much more decisions like this.. too muc to explin here but the peopple on the show are such donkey's they keep going and going and never stop you'll understand if youve watched the show

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What would you have done if there were a real $32,000 on the line?
I'd definately come over the top for all of Regis's money.
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heh, good post from a noob.I gamble..yes.
Hey thanks guy...if you look at my date joined, I've been a lurker here for quite a while, and also have at least a fairly good grip on the English language. And now that I've made that statement, I'm going to stop typing before I make a typo or grammatical error which will then be used to mock me.
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And that's not factoring in the 'implied odds' of being able to go on from there and win the full mil. Definitely -EV to take the 64k but understandable if you really need the 64k.
It doesn't make sense to do these calculation in terms of EV. You have to do them in terms of expected utility, and given decreasing marginal utility, a decision that would be -EV can be correct in terms of EU for a risk-averse individual.
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It doesn't make sense to do these calculation in terms of EV. You have to do them in terms of expected utility, and given decreasing marginal utility, a decision that would be -EV can be correct in terms of EU for a risk-averse individual.
winnar
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You know what's as pathetic as this?I was sitting on my lunch break at work tonight, and was doing odds on Deal or No Deal.

That Regis sure is a slowrollin' son of a b*tch.
FYP
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The first 32k is of significantly more value to him than the next 32k will be.Unless he's ridiculously wealthy, in which case the marginal value would taper off at a fairly steady level.It's for the same reason why we have "The Bankroll Police" discouraging others from playing above their heads even if they'll be net winners at the table.

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odds are for application for long term results such as for poker, in this, he is only going to be able make his decision once, and it will cost him 30k+ if he is wrong, as one of the previous posters said it has to do with utility, if money is an object for you you would have to look at from the standpoint of utils per dollar...for a person in his situationj that probably makes around 50-80k a year the 64k is a lot more than 32k so it would make sense not to gamble for 32k in that spot.

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I've been watching Deal or No Deal all week and been thinking about what my approach would be to the game. I would definitely be calculating the odds, but in most cases marginal utility would be the most important factor. If I could get to the $100,000 point during the game and I have only 1 case larger than the offer left, I don't think I could continue even with a 75% chance that the case I would pick would significantly increase the offer, because even a 25% risk of ruin is too high, no matter what the EV.It's basically the same concept as someone walking up to me and handing me $10,000 on a freeroll and saying they'd give me $20,000 on the roll of a die as long as I rolled a 3 or higher or nothing with a 1 or 2. I'd pocket the $10,000. Give me the same proposition with $10 vs. $20, and I'd gamb00l, because of utility.

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One thing that is important to consider is the fact that you cannot run this trial more than once and thus will never realize your long-term edge. Is the same reason a casino would decline your action if you walked up to a roulette table and wanted to bet $1 billion on black. The short-term volatility of your wager could bankrupt the casino and they could never convice you to bet $1 billion enough times to actually guarantee their edge.Same goes for Who Wants to be a Millionaire?. You get one change in the hot seat and if you go for the $125k you are risking $32,000 on a bet that has an EV of $14,500 (assuming a true 50/50 guess). Are you willing to risk $32,000 for a theoretical profit of $14,500? For my one chance I'd be must more interested in the cold, hard cash than any notional value.

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Great post by the noob.I gotta say that I am impressed.I really am.
Seconded.
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Dang wish it was me instead of him, because it would have been like using Tris's program where I could see the cards. The Rubaiyat, written by Omar Khayam...Next question? Double or nothing?

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Great post by the noob.I gotta say that I am impressed.I really am.
That really means a lot coming from someone such as yourself. Appreciate the kind words.Anyway, in response to people posting about the utility of the situation...did you work hard to get on the show with visions of winning 64k or did you come to win the million?It's like being put into the same situation I described with 88 vs AK on the bubble of the WSOP ME (or perhaps right before a big jump in pay more appropriately), of which someone like you or I got into via a bankroll-friendly super satellite. Did you make the trip to Vegas to fold your way to a guaranteed year's salary at your job back home, or to give yourself the best chance at the $7.5mil and the title of world champ? If you'd fold in that spot at ANY point of a tourney getting laid that price as a favorite, give up poker now or be content to languish in mediocrity.Who knows...maybe I wouldn't actually have the balls to pull the trigger and gamble if I was in the situation this guy was, but at least in theory it appears to be the right thing to do since I would never pass up those same exact odds in my $10 weekly home game tourney.
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Anyway, in response to people posting about the utility of the situation...did you work hard to get on the show with visions of winning 64k or did you come to win the million?
They came to win money, period.
If you'd fold in that spot at ANY point of a tourney getting laid that price as a favorite, give up poker now or be content to languish in mediocrity.
Utility calculations aside, folding a marginal favorite on a significant bubble is often a winning move in dollar terms too. For what should be obvious reasons. When giving consideration to the expected utility of the decision, it's not even close.If you're calling all ins with (what you somehow know to be) extremely marginal favorites on big bubbles playing for stakes way over your head, you're well below 'mediocrity'. But the whole idea of super satellites are retarded to beginw ith if you wouldnt otherwise buy into the tournament. Where is the sense in playing in a tournament where the prize pool is distributed in such a way that it FORCES you to buy into a higher stakes tournament with the money you win? Why not just play for the cash equivalent? And if you win the equivalent prize pool, you can spend it accordingly and buy in if you really want to. You would be at LEAST as well off, and almost always worse off. Generally speaking, if you have to play a satellite to get into the tournament, you would not have otherwise purchased the spot - because the buy-in is generally more than you're willing to spend. That is why people buy into the satellite to begin with. Which implies that you otherwise would not spend the money. The increase in wealth that winning the satellite accounts for (the cash equivalent) would have to exactly correspond with the amount you'd need to justify buying in. But that's almost never the case.It's for gamblers who love to dream about making the big score... as if they want to force themself to gamble even MORE if they win money, because they know if they were ever faced with the decision of spending the money on an absurdly high buy in tournament, they might (rightfully) second guess their retarded behavior.
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Maybe I'm not that familiar with the show...but from the initial post isn't the risk $32K for a return of an additional $61K. So in other words, if he only has two choices and he's a gambler definitely go for it. $32K for $61K...that's a good bet when the odds are 50/50.

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