A Different Perspective on Expo Odds

dryflyelk

dryflyelk

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LAST EDITED ON Jan-20-11 AT 08:30PM (MST)[p]A little perspective on the odds of the expo, using last year's numbers, simplified based on what we've been given by SFW. I may be way off here, but I think it's close.

Let's take the example of brothers Joe and Ted.

Joe decides to put in for all the deer and all the elk tags. He spends $290, and his odds of drawing elk are 1/107, and deer is 1/219. Combined odds are 1/143 that he'll draw one of those tags.

Ted decides to take his money and go to Wendover. He likes to gamble, so he uses his $290 and puts it all on a single number on the roulette table. The odds of him hitting that number are 1/38 and his payout would be 35/1. If it hits, he'd make $10,150.

Ted's odds of winning are 3.7 times as good as Joe's chances. If he wins, he plans on buying whatever deer or elk tag he wants at a banquet. There would be a couple he couldn't afford, but he's ok with that. He may even use the extra money to buy a tag for his brother.

Which brother would you rather be? :)
 
Ted stayed up almost all night celebrating when he decided to drive back home at 3:00 AM. He fell asleep and rolled his vehicle. He died and the extra money was there for his funeral. (Lucky him) So, lesson of the day, #1. Don't win big in wendover. #2. Going to the expo and taking your chance on tags doesn't equal driving home at 3:00 AM and killing yourself.
 
Hell no, ted would get super drunk partying it up cuz he just won ten grand. Then he would sit at the dollar slot all night and piss it away. At 7 a.m all his money is gone and he is so pissed that he drinks until he passes out. When he awakes, he is in a hotel room with someone else in his bed. as he rolls over, he notices that this other person has more facial hair then he does, and is infact a man. He then is more pissed off because he just had his first homosexual experience that he goes to the top of the hotel and jumps off to end his life.

The End
 
LAST EDITED ON Jan-20-11 AT 10:09PM (MST)[p]LAST EDITED ON Jan-20-11 AT 10:06?PM (MST)

You got to be fast to get your sacrarium in here first. By the time I fat figured mine, ya'll stole my thunder. Oh, well.

You forgot taxes there st.croix! Bus ticket, meal, juice, whoops, forgot the extras that you got into it before you come out with that $10,150. And.........after taxes, your budget at the banquet is still good but your right, no Henry hunt for you ole rock roller, and with the extra that's left over.......... you think Joe's going to enjoy that cow elk tag while your our on your DYI Thousand Lake Deer Hunt.

Oh, the cost to lay that $290 on the rug in Wendover, not completely accurate when you figure bus fare runs $30, lunch $4.99, whiskey, $3.99, (it's not free if your only going to spin once), $2.99 for snacks on the ride home. That's $41.97 to make the $290 bet so you in it $331.97 but if you win it's worth it cause after taxes you'll have enough to still buy that Thousand Lakes tag at the banquet of your choice. Course, in the unlikely event you loose, you get to nurse that shot of whiskey all day while you wander the streets while you wait for the bus ride home. Fun. Great day on the Salt Flats though. Well, none of this is applicable if Ted's from Wendover but I just figured.........................

But we got your point. I just figure we can do both. So, put that old tippet twitcher behind the seat for a day and join us a AWHOTELOT'S Expo bungalow after you get back from the roulette table. You might find an outfitter at the Show to share you roulette winnings with. Then seeing as your in the building (so you can see us all) you may as will throw a little of that Wendover windfall at the Hunt Draws and the sheep tags, hell, it's easy money so why not see if your luck holds. Who care what the odds are when you got a pocket full of 35/1, know what I mean.


Couldn't help myself dryflyelk, hope you draw a great tag at the Expo this year.

DC
 
With good therapy you can be saved, don't give into that feeling you need to turn back. Practice ahead off time, take a few trips down to the Salt Palace ahead off time, so the negative feels start to subside.

DC
 
GAWD I'm glad I never have won anything in BendOver like wet_boot has!:D

God is Great!
Life is Good!
And People are Crazy!
I love not acting my age,
Damn I love my NASCAR race,
And Hell yes I love my Truck!
And a good BBQ!
I am Medicine And I am Poison!
What Voltage of Cordless Sawzall are you running & what's your quickest Drive-By at hackin the Horns off of RoadKills?

This Favorite Shhit is getting old already!
 
LAST EDITED ON Jan-21-11 AT 02:11AM (MST)[p]If Ted were a nonresident, his drive, food, lodging and oyher travel expense would be much lower than going to the expo....plus he would avoid the dangerous drive across the flat:)

This Ted could get a motel in Vegas and buy a show or two, maybe even an extra night or two with the gas he would save driving the extra 450 miles each way to Salt Lake...
 
But both brothers would give equally to benefit wildlife..

Nothing from the Expo $$$ and nothing from the Bendover winnings.

Equals out just, I guess---Nothing.

Robb
 
The more I think about this the more I'm sure 2 things are true:

1-wet_boot ain't coming home from Bendover with 10K after winning it!

2-I ain't pulling an EXPO Tag!:D

God is Great!
Life is Good!
And People are Crazy!
I love not acting my age,
Damn I love my NASCAR race,
And Hell yes I love my Truck!
And a good BBQ!
I am Medicine And I am Poison!
What Voltage of Cordless Sawzall are you running & what's your quickest Drive-By at hackin the Horns off of RoadKills?

This Favorite Shhit is getting old already!
 
Robb hit the nail on the head. Either way, none of the money is actually guaranteed to be spent on wildlife conservation. Would you rather donate to the operation and maintenance of the Pepermill Casino or Don Peay's beachhouse in Hawaii? At least the money "donated" in Wendover is taxed so that a portion of the funds goes to education, roads, etc. We have no clue where or how the $1 million plus a year generated from expo tags is spent.

Hawkeye

Browning A-Bolt 300 Win Mag
Winchester Apex .50 Cal
Mathews Drenalin LD
 
LAST EDITED ON Jan-21-11 AT 09:33AM (MST)[p]Your right B Bop, you have never won big in bendover, but you were the hairy scrub I woke up next to that awful morning. :) lol

My excuse is I was drunk and passed out. What's yours?
 
You forgot about the third brother John. He took the $290 to the house of ill repute in Wendover. He left with a smile and his 100% odds.

Eel

it's not a 40 incher but it's closer than the last 40 incher you posted....

JB
 
A nasty disease and a guilty conscience. ;-)

Hawkeye

Browning A-Bolt 300 Win Mag
Winchester Apex .50 Cal
Mathews Drenalin LD
 
>Let's take the example of brothers
>Joe and Ted.
>
>Joe decides to put in for
>all the deer and all
>the elk tags. He
>spends $290, and his odds
>of drawing elk are 1/107,
>and deer is 1/219.
>Combined odds are 1/143 that
>he'll draw one of those
>tags.
>
>Ted decides to take his money
>and go to Wendover.
>He likes to gamble, so
>he uses his $290 and
>puts it all on a
>single number on the roulette
>table. The odds of
>him hitting that number are
>1/38 and his payout would
>be 35/1. If it
>hits, he'd make $10,150.
>
>Ted's odds of winning are 3.7
>times as good as Joe's
>chances. If he wins,
>he plans on buying whatever
>deer or elk tag he
>wants at a banquet.
>There would be a couple
>he couldn't afford, but he's
>ok with that. He
>may even use the extra
>money to buy a tag
>for his brother.
>
>Which brother would you rather be?
> :)

I think your math is a little fuzzy. The odds on the expo tags are for 1 ticket. If you are buying multiple tickets your odds are going to improve dramatically. If the tickets are $5 each and you are buying $290 of them then you have 58 cracks at it.

The odds for each hunt are going to be different but if the average really comes down to 1 in 107 for elk and 1 in 219 for deer and you have 58 cracks at it then you are going to end up with odds of 58 to 326 of drawing a tag which comes down to a 17.8% chance of drawing. The chances at the roulette wheel are 2.6% so Joe is almost 7 times more likely to draw a tag at the expo than Ted is going to win at the roulette wheel.

Now some of the tags in the drawing are not nearly as desired as others are and the odds for each specific tag may be dramatically different, but if you did buy one of each tag like you presented then your odds would actually be pretty decent that you would win one of them. Maybe not the one you wanted, but you almost have a 20% chance to walk out of there with a tag.
 
I don't know how many of the tickets would be for elk and how many would be for deer so I just added them together.

More than likely the odds would end up being even better because I think there are more elk tags than deer tags in the draw. No idea if some of the elk tags are for a cow elk or something, but the only published odds are for all of the tags combined by species.
 
Nah, not so. The odds that SFW gives us are for all tags and all applicants. We can't get the numbers exactly right because there are some units with more tags than others, etc, but we can guess and average it out.

I'll never be mistaken for a mathematical genius, but I did stay at a holiday inn last night.

Take deer for example. 8,526 applicants applied for 39 tags. The average odds of walking out with a deer tag are 1 in 219. That means that there are 219 applications for every 1 tag. You're already factoring in the multiple tags and aps per person.

It might be easier to think if in terms of the Desert Sheep. There are 2 tags and 3,456 applicants (we'll round up to 3500), and let's say you applied for both. Odds are 1 in 1,750 that you draw. That figures into the fact that you applied for both tags. Maybe one of those tags had 2000 applicants. Your odds for that specific tag are 1/2000. The other tag had 1500 aps. Your odds for that tag are 1/1500. Together, your odds of drawing a sheep tag are 2/3500, or 1/1750.

SFW used the total number of tags to round out your odds, not just one tag. If you applied for one specific tag, your odds may be better or worse.
 
I sold ted a 300,000 dollar life insurance policy and his Wife bought the GOV tag for both deer and elk. she was so famous that she married ted nugent and hunted on a private ranch for the rest of her life.
 
What if I had put the $290 on my Packers to win the Super Bowl last year at Expo time? Bet I'd have enough to go on a solid Colorado landowner muley hunt with those funds. (If they win - I KNOW!)

Or what if someone had bet on the Bears and Packers to be playing in the NFC Championship game? Bet those were long odds in July.

Maybe we ought to start a pool for who shoots the biggest unguided public land muley in 2011. Everybody puts in $50 and the winner gets to keep the money. Everyone send me your $50 and I'll get it started. :)
 
This ad brought to you and paid for by The Pepermill Casino in Wendover! They should give you a free nights stay and $100 worth of poker chips DFE!


It's always an adventure!!!
 
Why don't you just get 35 friends together to put $290 in a pot then draw straws? You would save that nightmare of a drive to Wendover and no taxes. The winner would then get to choose which hunt they wanted to buy.
 
Dang it pm you could ruin Nevada and the Expo with that kind of logic. Someone may put out a contract on you if you keep coming up with ideas like that. They say, "Don't be messing with the guy's that own those roulette tables". Now you've gone and pissed both Joe, Ted and dryflyelk off.

The IRS may even want to have a little chat with you. In fact, is that your phone ringing? :9

DC
 
dryflyelk,

Obviously, these odds (1:219) are misleading, deliberately. Since each hunt is drawn independently from the other, you can't run straight-line odds for all deer hunts. Plus, you gave no increased drawing odds for increased applications. Putting in more applications doesn't increase the odds of a single APPLICATION getting drawn, but it does increase the odds of the HUNTER getting drawn.

Here is an example...

Using your straight-line math,

Hunter A applies for Henrys Rifle - odds 1 in 219.
Hunter B applies for West Desert Archery - odds 1 in 219.
Hunter C applies for all 39 Deer tags - odds 1 in 219.

That is obviously not accurate.

The only way to obtain average odds of 1 in 219 for deer is to apply for all 39 available deer tags, then your odds will average out to 1 in 219...or roughly .456% for each APPLICATION, not HUNTER.

To then account for individual application odds of .456% with 39 applications you need to do some fairly advanced statistics ( (1-.456)^39=x then 100(1-x) ).

Ultimately, if you apply for all 39 deer tags with an average success rate of .456%, you have a 16.33% chance of drawing one tag.

Grizzly
 
Also assuming the "penny" being tossed weighs the same on both sides. Some of the pennies may have a bit more weight on one side depending on the applicant.
 
Now, that what I'm talk'en about, 16%, or non-statistically speaking, one chance in six if we all come and buy a chance on every tag.

I'm all in.

OutdoorWriter, grizz just solved your concerns over odds so I'll be buying you a drink at the Expo this year. Meet you at WHOLELOT's booth on Sat. morning.

Oh, you buy your tag chances right outside the main entrance on your way in, then the sheep draw stuff is right inside the Expo entrance.

Now that griz has help solve your concerns, I'm sure dryfly will join us to. Yes.......

See you Sat.

DC
 
I have a few questions. What were the odds over the past several years at the expo? Are more and more people getting $5 tickets each year or are people mad at the expo crew and stopped applying?

Last year the elk odds were 1:107, and the deer were 1:219. That has no bearing on what will happen this year. I would like to see the odds over the past three years and make an estimate of how many people will put in this year (which would probably be way off).

I am going to drop a few $20 bills in the draw, but with few expectations that I will actually get a tag.
 
LAST EDITED ON Jan-24-11 AT 12:57PM (MST)[p]Dillon-

Good luck on getting any further information regarding drawing odds for the Expo. We met with Don Peay and several SFW board members in February of last year and we were assured that SFW was going to follow through on its prior agreement to provide detailed drawing odds for each specific tag at the Expo. Several months after that meeting, SFW still had not produced anything. In the summer of 2010, I attended an SFW archery shoot at Timp Archers and had an interesting conversation with John Bair. When I asked John why SFW had not produced the promised detailed drawing odds, he said that SFW intended to follow through on its commitment, but its partner at the Expo (MDF) refused to allow the drawing odds to be released. In other words, SFW was blaming MDF for its alleged inability to release the drawing odds. Shortly thereafter, SFW posted the "2010 Hunt Expo Odds of Winning a Tag" on its website. As you can see from the prior posts on this thread, the information provided by SFW does not include actual odds for each tag and certainly does not include the detailed information promised during our meeting last February.

Hawkeye

Browning A-Bolt 300 Win Mag
Winchester Apex .50 Cal
Mathews Drenalin LD
 
Dillion,
Now ask Hawkeye how the odds for the expo have worked out for him. You guys and this odds crap crack me up. For heaven sake, throw some money in the pot and spin the wheel. Or don't it is up to you. The odds are crappy in most lottery type draws. I have bought tickets from the scouts the local ball teams, cancer drives, the local shooting club. Never once have I expected to win or cares what the odds were. Go enjoy the show.
 
"Last year the elk odds were 1:107, and the deer were 1:219. That has no bearing on what will happen this year. I would like to see the odds over the past three years and make an estimate of how many people will put in this year (which would probably be way off)"

I would guarantee that there wasn't a single elk hunt with 1:107 odds, or a single deer hunt with a 1:219. The odds posted on the expo website assume we are all morons. The best way to look at it is the worst case scenario for an elk tag was 1 in 8,748. The worst case scenario for a deer tag was 1 in 8,526.
 
LAST EDITED ON Jan-24-11 AT 04:02PM (MST)[p]Dillon-

I personally boycotted the Expo in 2007 because I was irritated that the State of Utah pulled 200 tags out of the public draw without requiring that a single penny be spent on actual conservation. This equates to at least a $1 million annual slush fund for SFW and MDF. In 2008, I realized that my "one-man boycott" was having no impact so I sold out and applied for some tags. As luck would have it, I drew a deer tag. In 2009 and 2010, I applied and drew nothing. No sweat, at least I took solace in the fact that I was donating my money to a good cause.;-)

My beef with the Expo is not that I think the odds suck . . . we all know they do. Rather, I am frustrated with the State of Utah, SFW and MDF because they have taken these tags out of the public draw in the name of "conservation" but there is no requirement or oversight that the funds generated therefrom be spent on actual conservation. I am also irritated that SFW and MDF have refused to release the draw odds despite promising to do so. In other words, my issues with the Expo have nothing to do with the actual drawing odds and alot to do with the lack of transparency and accountability.

With that in mind, I will likely plug my nose and drop a couple hundred dollars on tags again this year. Like a dog eating its own vomit, I cannot seem to stay away from the chance at a quality hunt.

Hawkeye

Browning A-Bolt 300 Win Mag
Winchester Apex .50 Cal
Mathews Drenalin LD
 
I would LOVE to send this post to a statistics professor. HYSTERICAL! So many mathematical errors it's not even funny.
 
LAST EDITED ON Jan-25-11 AT 05:36PM (MST)[p]"I would LOVE to send this post to a statistics professor. HYSTERICAL! So many mathematical errors it's not even funny."

Let us know what this professor says!

What do you think the odds of the Henry's deer tag was if there were 8,526 people who put in for deer? My guess is a lot closer to 1 in 8,526 then 1 in 219.

I once talked to a man who had four children, all boys. His wife was pregnant and everyone kept telling him that the odds of it being another boy were pretty slim. Wisely he stated that actually his odds were 50%. He had another boy. The point is, you can make the statistic look any way that you want and that is exactly what SFW did.

Now that I think about it, will you have the statistics professor help us understand SFW's mathematical error?
 
>I would LOVE to send this
>post to a statistics professor.
>HYSTERICAL! So many mathematical errors
>it's not even funny.


True.

Bottom line is this:

There is no way to calculate real odds unless we have the odds for individual hunts included in the numbers. Each hunt will have much different odds and results. Combining them is simplistic at best and full of problems, but it's all we've got.
 

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