Jacks are Wild #1701 - A Stand Out Choice

Jacks are Wild #1701 is a strong play this week and no other game is even close. Keno #1409 had a Grand Prize winner of $50k last week rendering the game no longer playable.



At present, only one in four tickets "Jacks are Wild" remains to be sold yet four of the six Grand Prizes remain to be claimed. The odds of finding a $100,000 winner is 1 in 222,000. Yes, your chances are slim but the wager is justified.

Keno #1409 remains the best $1000 Value Play. The best $1-$2 play is Go Bananas, and the best $10 - $20 play is Extravaganza.

Cashes of $10,000 or more this past week were sold in: Port Dover, Walsingham, Brockville, Mississauga, and Ottawa.



Comings and Goings

Super Bingo #3010 and Roulette #1689 were both retired this past week. Super Bingo had one Grand Prize outstanding and 7% of its tickets left to sell. Roulette also had a Grand Prize outstanding and 25% of its tickets left to sell.

By comparison, the OLG continues to sell Horseshoes (20% of tickets left), More Lucky (26%), Cash for Life #1155 (11%) and Classic Black (59%). There are no Grand Prizes left for any of these games. Do you see a problem?

The OLG advises its customers of the following: "This list shows all OLG INSTANT games currently in market. OLG stops selling INSTANT games with top prizes of $100,000 or more once all the top prizes have been claimed. If you are looking for a game that is not on this list, please call our OLG Support Centre at 1-800-387-0098." Cash for Life and Classic Black both have Top Prizes of $100,000 or more. Why are they still being sold? The OLG sold about 60,000 tickets for those two games last week! The OLG must have a definition for "Top Prize" that is different than mine.


Personal Play

Two of two "Jacks are Wild" were winners returning $15. Two of four "Keno" tickets were winners returning $6. That is the best week since reporting has begun but I am yet to show a profit in any single week. Total return on investment stands at 44%.

Meanwhile, a reader in Collingwood reports winning on 3 of 4 "Jacks are Wild" with a return of $75. That was offset by a poor old reader in Scarborough who was 1 for 11, returning $5. That's bad.

Good Luck,
Doug

















 

Jacks are Wild #1701 Continues on Top

Another 5% of the Jacks are Wild #1701 passed through the sales windows this week without a grand prize being uncovered. Thirty percent of the ticket float remains to be sold and 4 out of the 6 grand prizes remain to be claimed. This game is a strong play. The second rated game continues to be Keno #1409. Four percent of its tickets were sold without a winner coming forward. This game is also a strong recommendation  as it remains the top $1000 value play as well.



Crossword #1298 remains the big seller averaging 200,000 tickets being sold. In total, 5.3 million tickets were sold over the past week. The daily average was 660k.

While in the USA I purchased a scratch and win ticket in both Florida and New York State. I applaud the OLG for making public much more information about its games than our American neighbours do. The Florida web site www.flalottery.com is visually pleasing but it fails to provide any information about outstanding prizes. The NY State Lottery site www.nylottery.ny.gov provides information on outstanding grand prizes but also indicates that new blocks of tickets for its games can be issued at any time. Neither State provides its players with the concrete information that the OLG does so hats off to our government.

The remaining "evil" games are: Crazy 8's, Horseshoes, More Lucky Lines, Cash for Life #1155, and Classic Black 2. In total, 224,000 tickets were sold for which the grand prizes had all been claimed. And yet, the OLG keeps these games alive while canceling games that have Grand Prizes outstanding. Not good.


Comings and Goings

Deal or No Deal #1694 and Bonus Keno #1411 were retired this week. We're sorry to see Deal or No Deal go as 15% of its float remained to be sold and one of its 3 Grand Prizes remained to be claimed.

New games this week include the $1 Bingo Express #1707 and Black Jack Tripler #1716. Bingo Express is a simple game. You have one chance in 3.84 to have a winning ticket. 52% of the prizes are for more than the cost of the ticket. You have one chance in 45 to win more than $2.

Black Jack Tripler provides one chance in 4.18 to win and 58% of prizes exceed the cost of the ticket. A special aspect of this game is that 40% of all winners win more than once on the same ticket.

Nine grand prizes of $50,000 or more were claimed this week. Winners hailed from: Midland, London, Dundalk, North York (2), Ottawa, Etobicoke, Oakville, and another out of province winner from St. Hubert. That's two prizes in two weeks for visiting Québecois.

Personal Play

I went crazy this past week purchasing 4 Jacks are Wild tickets and 4 Keno tickets. There was one winner of each returning $5 in each instance. The cash rate to date is 1: 5.3 tickets with an ROI of .27. Poor. Back to normal play this week.

On the plus side I can report that a reader bought 3 Jacks are Wild in Scarborough winning twice for a total of $40. He reinvested part of the profit winning twice more. In total, he bought 7 tickets and showed a profit of $45.

Best of Luck

Doug

Jacks are Wild #1701 Remains the Best

Jacks are Wild made it through the week selling another 4% of its ticket float without losing a Grand Prize. At this point in time, 36% of the tickets remain to be sold and 4 of the 6 Grand Prizes of $100,000 are still out there somewhere. The next best games are Keno #1409 and Crossword #1298 (not the much worse #1297).

Determining which is the "best" game to play can have more than one interpretation. For the main purpose of this blog, it is the percentage of Grand Prizes that remain versus the percentage of tickets that remain to be sold. I'm assuming that we all play the games with the goal to win the grand prize. I also look at the best value chance to win $1000 or more. This evaluation  takes into account the cost of the ticket. If one buys a $5 ticket, one would expect to have a better chance to win $1000 then if one bought a $2 ticket, but is it a better play after taking into consideration the cost of the ticket? I also look at the absolute chances of winning the grand prize. Each of these evaluations can produce different recommendations.

What is more straight forward is games to avoid playing. At present, four games are in play for which all of the grand prizes have been claimed. They are: $2 Crazy Eights #1699, $3 Horseshoes #1705, $3 More Lucky #1651, and $10 Classic Black #1697. The OLG has a big problem with the latter. They're selling $10 tickets for a game where all of the $500,000 prizes have been claimed. In fact, 60% of the ticket float remains to be sold. Buyer beware. The OLG sold 140,000 tickets for these games last week. Make sure that you're not in that group.

The best $1000 Value Play remains Keno #1409. This game is also the second rated game to win the grand prize. If it's instant gratification you're after then the $5 Instant 649 is a good play. The odds of winning $100,000 are 56,000:1. What you give up is the chances to win smaller prizes; there are very few as compared to other games.

Comings and Goings

No departures, one addition this week. The $1 BingoExpress was introduced. Details of the game have yet to be posted.

Two Grand Prizes were claimed this week. Bingo #3007 had a $50,000 winner in Aurora and Super Bingo #3010 had a $50,000 prize claimed in Amherstburg.


Personal Play

A wipe out week. Four Jacks are Wild tickets played, no winners. I'm now 1 for 8 with an ROI of .25 for this game. I'm due!


Doug

Jacks are Wild #1701 - Damaged but Still #1

A lucky visitor from Boucherville, Quebec claimed one of the Jacks are Wild grand prizes last week. Regardless, the game remains the best choice albeit somewhat diminished from last week. Players have a 323,000:1 chance to win $100,000 with a $5 investment. Other recommended games are $3 Keno #1409 and $3 Bingo #3007.

Games to avoid are: $10.00 Classic Black #1697, $3.00 Lucky Dragon #1708 and $3.00 More Lucky #1651. The OLG should be ashamed to continue to sell Classic Black tickets. All six of the grand prizes have been claimed yet they sold 130,000 tickets over the course of the week. The problem they face is that 60% of the ticket float remains to be claimed. The game is a loser for them. The best strategy, from their perspective, is to continue to pump the tickets. Your strategy is to avoid the game like the plague.

The big seller continues to be the $3.00 Crossword #1298. With a ticket float of over 20 million, the tickets will be predominantly displayed where you play. To date, 24% of the tickets have been sold and only 1 of the 16 grand prizes has been claimed. This game may get interesting. The best chance at winning $1000 (or more) continues to be $3.00 Keno #1409 although the $2.00 Golden Goose #1700 is sneaking up on the long time king of this evaluation method.

Comings and Goings

We said goodbye to MultiMult, one of the Cash for Life games and one of the Crossword games. No loss there. New games include the $3.00 Scrabble #1702 and the $1.00 Fast 100 #1688. The latter is a novel game based upon the premise of a small grand prize but offering many of them. There are over 3700, $100 prizes in the game but nothing larger. If you play this game, pray that you don't get a $30 winner. The odds of getting that prize are 10,000:1 whereas the odds of winning $100 are 800:1. You don't want to use up your luck that way. It's a bit upside down but the goal of the game is to maximize the number of $100 prizes, as indicated by the name of the game.

Personal Play

Four Jacks are Wild tickets last week contained one $10 winner. That is a .50 ROI (Return on Investment) - less than expected. I will be henceforth reporting on my personal play on a weekly and accumulated basis.

Good Luck to all.

Doug