If there's any luck, this will be £20,000

Box 15 with Max contains the £20,000

I need therapy jokes Balbina

But it's not...I was gonna vote this for game of the month until that happened!

When is there actually going to be a game where it goes right all the way through?

When you can gain another £2,500 or lose £2,500 from the offer? A bit to lose yes but not that much, so no point in dealing.

It's a neutral EV deal.

Let's say you had £17,500 in your bank account.

Would you be happy to take £2,500 out of it and put it on red/black on a roulette table (assuming it's a genuine 50/50 chance obv). If the answer is no then you should be dealing the offer.

I'm normally risk averse, and would never go near a roulette table - but I'd ND that offer on that finish as I'd be more than happy to walk away with £15,000.

I don't have that psychological attitude so would've been £17,500 for me... but that was a classic, and it was opened up by the dire eight-box offer. Low twenties, you have a decision, but the Banker didn't even try and buy the box there. Was very lucky to escape with only that much again as his eventual payout.

I'm in a secure enough position to gamble at five-box, but would not think any less of someone who took the money there. I'd hope for a stick or better for a £100k-high finish, and with my mathematical attitude I might have got it, certainly with a £20k kicker.

But as there is 'a bit to lose', I disagree that there is no point. If someone wanted to guarantee that extra £2,500, or specifically needed £16,000 for something, then why risk losing it?

Very similar 5-box to Amy's but the offer was a whole £30k less - who's trying to manufacture a big finish then? (Yes Noel, there has been a 5-box like that in active play before!!!)

What a shame Balbina couldn't have been playing Stephen's game but I guess not even he had 10 grand guaranteed at 5-box.

Ditto. I know Amy's game was over a year ago but how can a £75k 5-box deal be easily forgotten.

£45k was too low for me today at 5-box. Can't blame Balbina for gambling with £15k guaranteed with a 70% chance of the offer being at least what she turned down.

Fantastic game i thought.

Personally i thought the 5 box offfer was worth considering, and i wouldn't have criticised any player for actually taking it, but at the same time I think Balbina was right to take a punt at the big one. It's a shame she couldn't have kept one of the big two in play till the end but still a valiant attempt

What an incredible game! I haven't got that into one for ages. At times, I was literally cheering and saying "come on"!

No problems with her no dealing the £45k, completely justified, it's just a shame she didn't keep one of the big two..ah well. Incredible game!

I agree, probably the best game of the season so far, shame it collapsed right at the end but 15k is still a decent sum, reasoning for most to decline the 5-box offer which was below par for the board. Interesting comparing the offers to my EV calculator lately, seem to have worked out a 'formula' of sorts to the offers, which I'll explain more in the next couple of days!

Incidentally, today it reckoned the 'buy-the-box' value to be around 57k at 5-box, which I don't think is outlandish, and more illustrative of the 45k being a force-on offer, amazing considering the enormity of that sum.

I'm surprised that most of you think the offer at 5 box (45k) was not enough. I thought it quite generous and would have had me dealing

Hmm, you get the players who marvel at an offer and then say "That's a lot of money". I always say to myself at that moment "There's a difference between good money and a good offer". I sometimes wish the players would stop praising the offers just because it's a good amount of money, because sometimes what I have seen on the board they could be getting a lot more.

£45k was an example of this. It's great money, of course it is. But it's not a great offer. With £10k guaranteed and a chance to win one of the two largest prizes, I think it was the right decision to have a stab at it.

My reasoning that it was a good offer (45k at 5 box) was because the only way she could guarantee a better offer would be by keeping the 250k in play, which was odds-on losing. Even if she had kept the 100k and say 20k there was no guarantee of a much better offer. I always think that if the offer is over half the average, which this was, you need quite a bit of luck to get a better offer.