Can you explain the odd on a scratch ticket?

Question

the back of the ticket says 1:3.10

or

1:3.63

thanks

Answer 1

Asker, please see edit below.

That is your overall chance of winning - could be a dollar, could be 100k. It tells you that if you bought every ticket it would cost you $3.10 to win $1. terrible odds. So unless you get very very lucky, you will throw away more or less $2 for every three $1 tickets you buy.

The odds remain 'true' even if all of the losing tickets have been sold. (which can't really happen til the very end of the game) Each ticket had and will always have more or less 1:31 chance of winning.

The reason it remains 'true' is because of the distribution of winning tickets in any given roll, any given area, or throughout the state. Within a certain standard deviation - the ratio of winning and losing tickets sold make your chances 'pretty much' the same on the first ticket purchased from a series as the last ticket.

Now, to bring home the first answer's point - there can be an advantage. In my state when a game is nearing its end, the lottery commision will publish the current status of a game - the odds may be a bit better and they may be a bit worse. If you can get your hands on that info you could make some informed decisions - but again, it would be rare for the 'mean' to fall very far from the initial published odds for any remaining tickets because of their distribution formalae.

Hope that wasn't too much blablabla :)

EDIT:

If I print ten raffle tickets and the top prize is $10, but there is also a $5 prize and a $1 prize, with each ticket you buy you have three chances out of ten of winning a prize, right? Your overall odds are 3 in 10. Ten divided by 3 = 3.33 your overall odds whne buying one ticket are 1:3.33 The 1 represents the ticket, and the 3.33 represents your chances.

Hope that helped :)

Answer 2

that means you have a 1 in 3.10 chance in winning when those tickets were printed.  However once tickets are sold the odds change, because they could sell alot of winners off the bat or alot of losers.  So that number is actually useless.  The tickets are sold statewide to every small or big store in your whole state so they can't track the odds once they start selling.  Your cashier can print you a list of how many grand prizes are left on that game off of the lottery machine, most cashiers may not know how to do it though.  I think I'm the only one at work that knows how.