Win Deal or No Deal

Deal or No Deal is a television show that involves 26 briefcases with varying amounts of money, ranging from $.01 to $1,000,000. The player picks a briefcase to start, and then opens the other briefcases one by one. At certain points, the round will end and the "banker" will offer a certain amount of money to the player based on how much is in the player's briefcase. The player can choose to take this deal, or continue playing. The objective is to beat the banker by winning more money than the contents of your selected case.

Steps

  1. Watch the show a few times to get a better understanding of player strategies. Watch for the mistakes that some people make when they get caught up in the drama of the show.
  2. Once you're on the show, the actual actions you take are quite simple. First, choose your own case. It doesn't matter which one.
  3. Choose cases to open. Remember, which cases you choose doesn't matter; you're just as likely to do well whether you choose in order (e.g. 1, 2, 3...) or at random (e.g. 24, 7, 16...).
  4. Choose "Deal" or "No Deal" once each round ends. This is the hard part, and is covered more extensively in the Tips section below.
    • The number of cases you have to open varies by round. From the time you pick your case to the time the deal/no deal button needs to be pressed, you'll have to pick 6 cases. Each successive round there after, will require you to pick the past round's amount minus one (in round 2, you'll have to pick 5 cases instead of 6, and 4 cases in round 3, 3 cases in round 4, 2 cases in round 5, and 1 case until all other cases but one are shown onstage. After a no deal decision has been reached, you'll be able to switch cases if you'd like.
  5. Keep in mind your money goal and never be too greedy.

Tips

  • The general rule of thumb is to take the deal when the banker makes an offer that is above your case's current expected (i.e. average) value.
  • Expected value can be difficult to calculate in your head, but you can estimate it by adding up only the highest remaining values, rounding up to take into account the lower values, and dividing by the total number of remaining cases.
    • Example: If you have $1,000,000, $750,000, and six smaller values remaining, you could round up to 2 million and divide by 8 to get $250,000.
  • The banker has a tendency to make offers well below expected value at the beginning of the game, with higher offers (relative to expected value) toward the end. That means that it's generally a good idea to play a few rounds - just don't get carried away.
  • The most important rule: your choice of whether to take the deal should be based on logic, not emotion. It sounds obvious, but if you watch closely, you'll see many players commit major logical fallacies.
    • Examples: "I believe in my ability to choose the right case", "I don't care about the money anymore, just this experience is enough", "I've come this far, I can't stop now", etc.
  • Statistically speaking, as long as there are high values on the board, all the values on the left half of the board are so close together that they may as well be the same. Eliminating the $.01 case will have nearly the same effect on expected value as eliminating the $750 case.
  • Keep in mind the number of cases you have to open before each round is over. This ranges from six in the first round to one the final rounds.
  • A good benchmark to remember is that at the start of the game, the expected value of your case is about $130,000 (all the possible values divided by 26, the starting number of cases). However, the expected value changes each time you open a case.

Warnings

  • The crowd will pretty much always tell you to say "No Deal". Don't cave in to the pressure; they're only saying it because it's not their money on the line, so they can afford to "risk" it.
  • Don't fall into the trap of being irrationally convinced that your case contains the million dollars (or the largest value on the board). In reality, it probably doesn't. Again, it should be obvious, but players often make this mistake, rationalizing in order to make themselves feel better about their choices.
  • Keep your personal financial situation in mind while playing. If you're going through hard times, it's tempting to take big risks for big money, when settling for a moderate sum could be more practical.

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