Deal Or No Deal

[LochnarITB]

It's probably the biggest dumbing down of game shows ever (some would say dumbing down a game show is a redundancy), knowing how to say deal or no deal is the extent of the knowledge required, but I still have to watch. Trying to guess the next offer, the gorgeous models, calling the contestant an idiot for not taking the offer - it's all good. Does anyone else watch this guilty pleasure? Who is your favorite DonD girl?

#25 Hayley Marie Norman - what a sweetheart, and so gorgeous!

[Rhydderch Hael]

Hard to choose— their portraits make them look like they all came straight off the pageant circuit.

In such cases, it's like regarding a pisanka egg: you can admire the paintjob that's been applied to the surface, but every one is the same underneath— devoid of substance.

[Mithrandir]

I love this show. My friends and I are pretty nerdy about it though... you have not lived until you have calculated the EV of a given Deal or No Deal decision based upon bankroll considerations.

[LemmingofGlory]

I love this show. My friends and I are pretty nerdy about it though... you have not lived until you have calculated the EV of a given Deal or No Deal decision based upon bankroll considerations.

That's exactly the kind of thing I miss doing with my best friend. One time we calculated the probability of hitting the wire separators on his dart board. At one point his wife came outside, we explained what we were doing, and she rolled her eyes and went back in. Ahh, the good old days...

-Lem

[DeeBye]

That's exactly the kind of thing I miss doing with my best friend. One time we calculated the probability of hitting the wire separators on his dart board. At one point his wife came outside, we explained what we were doing, and she rolled her eyes and went back in. Ahh, the good old days...

My friends and I used to throw darts at each other instead of the dartboard. Getting hit in the back of the head with a dart feels like getting hit in the head with a hammer.

[yangman]

I love this show. My friends and I are pretty nerdy about it though... you have not lived until you have calculated the EV of a given Deal or No Deal decision based upon bankroll considerations.

So, have you worked out the equation to how much the banker offers given the set of amounts still in play?

I can't stand the show long enough to try and solve it myself.:P

[Nystul]

One time we calculated the probability of hitting the wire separators on his dart board.

Based on my empirical evidence, the probability of hitting a wire separator on any dartboard is roughly 90%. Of course, if you move further back, the probability of hitting the wire separators goes down, in favor of hitting the wall above or below the board.

The most entertaining episode of Deal or No Deal that I ever saw involved a very enthusiastic guy who got all the models to stay on stage with him after he picked their case. He enjoyed a tremendous hot streak early on, but things turned on him in the worst way. He ended up taking his original case, which had like $2 in it.

[Mithrandir]

So, have you worked out the equation to how much the banker offers given the set of amounts still in play?

I can't stand the show long enough to try and solve it myself.:P

It doesn't seem to be 100% consistent. The offer always has a negative expected value (obviously), but there definitely isn't a simple relationship between amount in play and amount offered. It would actually be kind of interesting to watch a bunch of shows, record amount in play vs. amount offered and graph it in Excel.

[LochnarITB]

It would actually be kind of interesting to watch a bunch of shows, record amount in play vs. amount offered and graph it in Excel.

Many people are hooked on this mostly mindless game that I find myself watching too much. Thus, there are also a fair number of web sites that strive to explain the banker's offers, often even providing spread sheets so you can predict his actions. Some explanations even go into the psychology of offer deviation for the sake of taunting the player and creating buzz in the audience. Like I said, the show is a guilty pleasure, but it clearly wastes too much time and thought for way too many of us.:blush::lol:

[Maitre]

It doesn't seem to be 100% consistent. The offer always has a negative expected value (obviously), but there definitely isn't a simple relationship between amount in play and amount offered. It would actually be kind of interesting to watch a bunch of shows, record amount in play vs. amount offered and graph it in Excel.

I tried to creat a spreadsheet versino of the game that used a prize-preference function to determine the amount offered. The theory of my version was that each prize amount left in play had associated with it a certain preference score, so that multiplying each available amount by the preference score and summing the resulting values, and dividing my the sum of the preference scores, would give you the amount offered. My first attempt simply took the probability of each of the remaining amounts and multiplied that by the raw amount numbers, but that version resulted in offers that were too high, or was it too low? One or the other. The preference score method seemed to track better, but I was still off from the show offers. I'm pretty convinced that the show uses some non-parametric distribution estimated by the amounts left in play and then the offer is picked somewhere near the median value of that distribution.