Games Worth Playing, a Studio on Scratch. Feb 02, 2017 Scratch-It tickets seemed to be much better in this little experiment. Your odds are so little that it may not be worth it except for the fun to think about winning because you’ll likely not win. You’re WAY better off investing that $100. The uncertainty of scratch-off tickets is what makes them so fun and exciting — are your tickets a bust, or will you win big? While there's no way to know for sure until you scratch them off, there.

1. Maryland Scratch Offs
2. Are Scratch Offs Worth Playing Right Now
3. Are Scratch Offs Worth Playing Games
4. Are Scratch Offs Worth It

Secrets of State Lottery Scratch-off Contracts

When most people think of advantage gambling, state lottery scratch-offs are the last thing that enters their minds.

Everyone’s heard of counting cards at blackjack. There are even several moviesabout it.

And poker has been shown to be a game of skill; just look at the repeat winners of major tournaments like the World Series of Poker and the World Poker Tour.

But most people still refer to the lottery as an “idiot tax”.

And scratch offs have a notoriously bad expected value (which you can think of as a gambling game’s return on investment).

To give you an example of how bad lottery tickets can be, most $1 scratch offs have an expected value of around 60%, meaning for every $1 you spend, you’re expected to get back just $0.60; a $0.40 loss.

Most penny slots have paybacks that are better than that.

And other gambling games, like blackjack, can approach 99% payback without any card counting at all.

I’m here to shed light on a new way of thinking about scratch-offs and show you how you can improve your odds. It won’t always be profitable.

But under the right circumstances, it can be. If you’re going to play regardless, you might as well maximize your chances of winning.

Here are my insights about how to win at scratch-offs. I’ve gained these insights by reading the contracts and procurement documents that state lottery organizations have with their ticket printers.

Combine these insights with sites that calculate a scratch-off ticket’s odds, and you’ll be playing like a sharp

Where Are Scratch-off Grand Prizes?

Grand prizes are not random.

I’m sure all of these insights will come as a surprise.

But this one is probably the biggest.

Surely the state wants to ensure a fair game.

How can it be fair if the biggest prizes of all aren’t even random?

Here’s an image of the procurement document that the Massachusett’s lottery used to elicit bids from ticket printers:

You’ll see that they require the grand prizes to be distributed evenly throughout the game.

Note that “distributed evenly throughout the game” is not random.

If the prizes were random, then they might all appear at the start of the game. Or they might all appear at the end of a game.

But the state doesn’t want that to happen. If all of the grand prizes were claimed at the start of the game, then people would stop playing the game because they would have no shot at the big money.

You can take advantage of this fact by figuring out how many tickets are in a “pool” where a grand prize should be. If there are 9,000,000 tickets and 3 grand prizes, then divide 9,000,000 by 3 to figure out that there must be 1 grand prize every 3,000,000 tickets.

Then, use the state’s lottery website to figure out how many tickets remain. Most states publish this information for each game.

In the example game just mentioned, if there were 7,000,000 tickets remaining and still 3 remaining grand prizes, then you know the first grand prize must be in the next 1,000,000 tickets. Your odds just improved from 1 in 3,000,000 to 1 in 1,000,000.

That may not seem like much, but it can mean the difference between negative and positive expected value.

Is There A Limit To The Number Of Big Winning Tickets In A Roll?

Here’s an image from documents filed as part of a Texas lawsuit against the state and the ticket printer:

In this contract that Texas has with IGT, there’s a clause that states that there can be no more than a certain number of $25-$50 winners per pack of tickets. There’s another clause that states there can be no more than one winner of $75 and higher per pack. (The “one” is redacted, but we can deduce that tit’s one by looking at the word following the redaction, which is “winner” rather than “winners”).

How can you use this to your advantage?

Buy only one ticket from a pack at a time and scratch it right there at the store.

Maryland Scratch Offs

If it happens to be a big winner, don’t buy any more tickets from that pack.

What Is The Minimum Payback for a Roll of Scratch-off Tickets?

This next image is from the request for a proposal from the New Mexico lottery association to ticket printers:

It shows that each pack of tickets has some guaranteed payout. The details of the guaranteed payout aren’t specified, but from other contracts and personal experience, I’ve found it to typically be about 50% of the price of a pack of tickets. If an entire roll of tickets costs $600, then the GLEP is usually about $300.

What this means for the advantage player is that you should not stop buying after a string of losers.

Since each roll of tickets is guaranteed to have a certain minimum payout, then every loser you see increases the chance that the remaining tickets are winners.

Conclusion

While none of the above insights will guarantee you will win, they are just a few of the things you can do for yourself if you want to know how to beat scratch-offs.

Combine these insights with some expected value calculations from the remaining prizes that get displayed on the state lottery websites and you’ll be doing way better than the average lotto player.

Good luck.

About the Author

Are Scratch Offs Worth Playing Right Now

Eric Ihli, a professional gambler/programmer, spent 10 years as a full-time professional gambler and 5 years as a software engineer. He now combines those two passions by writing software to discover and evaluate profitable gambling opportunities.

Today I want to talk about how to play a scratch-off. Andwhy you should play it the RIGHT WAY.

First up. Scratchers are NOT games of skill. You cannot winmore on them by being 'better at playing scratchers'.

This comes as a big surprise to some people.

And yes, this does apply to all scratch-off tickets. Even theones that 'seem' to have an element of skill. So it doesn'tmatter if it is a crossword, Monopoly, word search, pokeror whatever!

How do scratchers work?

Every ticket is either a 'win' or 'lose' the moment you buy it.It does not matter who plays it.

Now there may be some element of skill or knowledge inUNDERSTANDING if you have won (and yes, there are ways to work out what are the best scratch offs to buy). But you cannot loseby being bad at playing. And you cannot win more by beinggood at playing.

Hopefully that's clear :-)

Make sure you get the whole story - get all my free tips with how to win lottery scratch offs from here.

So technically you don't even need to know how to play scratch off tickets - or even play the game. Youcan just hand the ticket over to the assistant and ask themto scan it, and tell you if you've won.

But please do NOT do that!

That's not the best way. Play the game as it was meant to be played.

For 2 very good reasons.

Are Scratch Offs Worth Playing Games

[1] Would you normally hand a blank signed check over toa total stranger..? :-)

That ticket could be a jackpot winner. So blindly handingit over without having any idea what it's worth is not a goodidea.

Think this isn't a problem? Just have a read of some of thecomments on my blog post here. It is pretty shocking.

Are Scratch Offs Worth It

Of course, the vast majority of shop assistants are really nicehonest people. Who would just be happy for you that you won.But some are not. So why chance it?

Yes, you could (and should), put your name and sign the backof the ticket before handing it over... but...

[2] Part of the reason to play lottery games is the fun element.It's the buzz of finding out if you have won, and how much.

How do you win scratch off tickets? Firstly - one of the 'secrets' is to play it as it was meant to be played!

If you actually play the game instead of just scanning it, you get some real entertainment value foryour money. That way, even losing tickets are never really losers :-)

Why not go even further. Take your time playing it. Scratchjust one symbol at a time. See how close you are getting toa win before you scratch the next one.

If you buy multiple tickets in one go, don't play them all atonce. Spread them out over a day.

I know someone who spends a whole day playing a singleticket. She loves playing. And gets massive value out of herhobby - and when she wins on one (and she does win), what a massive BONUS!

Now that's how to play the scratch off lottery :-)

What If I Don't Understand The Game?

This happens. Some games are quite complicated. There arelots of ways to win, different games within a ticket, or confusingwin conditions.

Bottom line - if you don't understand it, either get the assistantto explain it to you fully before you scratch it. Or avoid thatticket in future, and only buy the ones you do fully understand.

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