SCRATCHCOCK

I'm just wondering how many of you have either won or know somebody who's won more than £50 on a scratchcard. Please specify instances and amounts :>)

I won £320 on one last year, and last week I won £120. w00t!

Ace. I'll keep buying 'em. Were they £1 scratchcards? What's your break even ratio? I've bought one £1 scratchcard on each of the past 24 Sundays and won a total of £12 so far.

They were both £2 ones. I'm defo up on what I've spent on them. I've won a quite a few £20s, £10s etc as well. Sound's bad but I usually buy at least one a day (since I'm in a shop that sells them), but I've figured out the scratchcard system and know if a pack has a good win ratio, etc.

That's handy. Have I more chance of a big win with a £2 one, then? If so, I'll buy one every other week. What's the best day (and time of that day) to buy? Also, do you remember the gimmick of the cards you've won the big amounts with? I'd be grateful of any tips re: the system generally.

Well it's kind of hard to explain to someone who doesn't work in the shop. Obviously I serve them all the time and people bring them back to me or do them in the shop, so I know if that certain pack has lots of wins on it. Some packs only have a couple of wins in, where as other packs have a win every other card. Tip: Don't buy the basic £100,000 scratchcards that cost a quid. They're shit. Shittest of the lot. EVER.

If you go on the national lottery website, you can see which scratchcards are the newest and how many prizes are still to be won.

Every other card box sounds coolio. I'll buy £2 cards only from now on. Best to scratch it in the shop. Then, if it's a win of say...£5, buy two more from the same box. I'll have a look at the site you suggest. Cheers for now :>)

Spending it straight back on crads is pointless....the don't pack winners close together.

Hmm...But Plecko has firsthand knowledge and she says some boxes are wins every other card (and I'd only use such a strategy if I won between £4 and £8 with my first £2 card).

I've had a gander at the page in question. Are the prizes remaining based on tickets as they sell or as they're claimed?

Not every other....just a few wins...and they'll be spaced so that you'll lose money over all...thats the point of them.

Don't listen to Hippo, he obviously doesn't buy scratchcards. They don't ALWAYS pack winners close together, but occasionally they do. When I won that £120 last week, the one before it had £6, then the £120, then £4 then £2. Not mega prizes after the big win, but still there.

But still, just because you've won £2 on a scratchcard, don't buy the one after it just to be on the safe side. It might be a shit pack and that's one of the very few wins in the whole lot. If you win £2, buy 2 £1 instead.

Okiedoke. If I won £2 with a £2 scratchcard, what would be the odds (as an approximate percentage) of the box it was from containing lots of other winning cards?

anyone know if i won the lottery on Saturday?

Can I win the lottery if I don't enter?

well, it only makes it slightly harder if you think about it.

What features of a pack help you identify whether or not it will contain many winners? It doesn't sound like much of a Plus EV scene to me.

What does Plus EV mean?

You won't know.. Unless you ask the person who works in the shop. The only reason I know is because I serve £200+ scratchcards a day, and the majority of people do them whilst in my shop, or come back with them.

Fuckpencil wrote:

What does Plus EV mean?

Positive expectation value. Sorry, it's more of a casino/poker term. Speaking of which, you'll have much better odds just getting good at internet poker.



And Plecko, you're saying that having served scratchcards to hundreds of people has somehow given you a mystical spidey sense which tingles when you hold a winning pack?

Takes much less time to buy a scratchcard every other Sunday, though. I don't even know how to play poker.

i get too gung ho at poker but i've never played for cash. maybe i'd be a bit clevvererer then.

No, I'm not claiming to be some sort of psychic.. but I know which packs in my shop are worth buying cards from and which aren't. It's not just one specific card or one specific scratchcard code, it's the packs. I cannot advise you on which cards to buy because some packs are brilliant, some packs are shit. I only know which packs are good and shit in my shop. Although I can guarentee the £1 base game with £100,000 prize are shit. You've got 3x less chance of winning on them than any other card.

I won about £60 from three/four scratch crads in a row

Fair point, Fucky. If it's the excitement and adrenaline you want then by all means timetable it into a fortnightly schedule.

I have a couple of mates from uni who are or have been quite immersed in internet poker. Two of them got pretty good at it; one was even betting thousands of dollars on single hands last Summer. He pulled out while he was up, and quite sensibly too. I think he still sneaks on sometimes though.

plecko wrote:

No, I'm not claiming to be some sort of psychic.. but I know which packs in my shop are worth buying cards from and which aren't. It's not just one specific card or one specific scratchcard code, it's the packs. I cannot advise you on which cards to buy because some packs are brilliant, some packs are shit. I only know which packs are good and shit in my shop. Although I can guarentee the £1 base game with £100,000 prize are shit. You've got 3x less chance of winning on them than any other card.

I must be missing something, having never played scratchcards. Are there particular types of packs, with different proportions of certain types of cards? In which case I forgive you there probably is a difference in winning ratios. But if you're saying that you can tell when a pack is better than another when there are no discernible external features, then you might have to bear with my scepticism.