I don't know what to say after that game, just gutting of course to end up with both blues from a 6/2 red/blue split. I kept hoping we were going to get the first ever 250/250k finish, but sadly that wasn't possible. The 4-box was rather neat with the red 1000 equivalents of the blue values.

Terribly unlucky especially to have a big win snatched away so cruelly, and she ended up going away with the lowest amount at 12-box.

Noel admits the audience turnover problem. Surely this show, with its dependence on viewer continuity in its current format, suffers from being on six days a week?

It's the namesake of one of the most cautious players of all time, and her emotional talk about faith gives Noel a ready-prepared spin (replete with reference to Ramesh) if he wants a guilt-trip should the opportunity arise. Let's all hope it doesn't.

Hang on, when I applied the legalese mentioned it was forbidden to reference product and brand names, and Beryl's just name-dropped one in seconds and it's made the final edit... never mind that, though, ALL-BLUE OPENING ROUND! Whatever the basis of this system, it's served her well so far. Is that the best opening round of all time, with only £156.10 taken out? £12,500 is about what one would expect for such a round on current opening offer patterns, and Beryl is already talking about what she's going to do with the money. Not one to chase the jackpot, methinks.

Two hits from the player's Power 5 sandwiching one from the player's - we're down to one of the bottom five already, shame it's the one box on the board which actually does have a needless psychological impact on conservative players. This will be £NO_DEAL, except it's not, it's a stick, and her namesake would have quite possibly taken this. Beryl makes an instant No Deal this time, as if she has been told to.

Flip-o-blimey, a 12-box board with nine reds and three blues... and the next one to go is an orange! The hole in the Power 5 can be put into context now; the top two are intact at halfway with a block of four five-figure reds for backup. She's having a good time, so she's not going to let Endemol down, not that the offer was worth taking anyway. Twenty grand would have been dealable.

OK, maybe seventeen and a half would have been dealable, we're down to a one-box game at the ADP, albeit a one-box game with three non-trivial backups. She'd be happy to take £3k? Her namesake actually would take £3k on this board... Tom puts the game into context; getting much more is totally dependent on the jackpot, but there is a fallback block, one that will allow her to bail out for something she'll still be happy with. At least, I hope that's why she's played on here, because for a one-box game (if £100k was backed up by £3k, £5k and £10k everyone would call it a one-box game, and that's a lower-volatility board than this) that is far from stingy.

It's all about avoiding the jackpot... and she does it! It's all-red, but it's a survival round. Unfortunately, keeping both blues means the 10% disaster chance is on, which could deflate the offer. It doesn't... Beryl asks for bonus offers, the Banker meets her halfway by offering a four-box offer, and I once again wonder why there has never been a scenario (outside of Love Week, where the player is in control of the bonus offer) where there has been a three-box offer but no four-box offer. (Actually, has it even happened there? It'd be my tactic...)

Anyway, here and now, it's £23k, snuck above the top safety net, you have to take out a blue to get much more, it's probably time to go. It's not? OK, the Just One More Box psychology has kicked in.

£20k, it'll be a stick here and the No Deal will b... oh, should've guessed. Now you have to Deal if you're not a big gambler, and Beryl proved she's not at 17-box. As if knowing it and sensing the opportunity to manufacture something explosive, the producer throws in a three-box twist (let's stop pretending it's a Banker, a real Banker minimising winnings would not do that). Again, the Just One More Box philosophy lures a player on.

To her doom? Nope, but there's no way she's playing on here unless she is being very, very easily led. Or is Corinne in disguise. The stinginess of this offer proves that the No Deal was an unequivocally wrong decision, even though it's an improvement on the last one. £27,500 or a 2/3 chance of £50,000? She's picking the 2/3 chance of £50,000? On blind faith? When she said she'd be happy with £3,000? I cannot, cannot accept that is her true preference. It can't be.

Credit to her, she takes it well on set. Maybe she really was Corinne in disguise - playing for a woefully ambitious target and not recognising the value of large intermediate sums short of that target. Wonder how she took it once the cameras stopped rolling.

sorry Beryl but it was foolhardy to carry on to the end.l'm sure she had a wonderful time just being a part of DOND but l think she must have regrets looking back on her game.

I don't for one minute think that Beryl was over-ambitious or foolish. She seemed like a lovely lady who was very humble and I really feel sorry for her because if anything she was one of the most deserved players of a big win I've seen. Hard luck Beryl, it's just the way life goes but I commend her for her great attitude and determination.

Almost but not quite. Margaret in November 2006 had a opening round of £151.61.

Rule #1 of DOND is never reveal your target. Without doing that, Beryl may have got a 3 box offer of at least £30k and possibly a 2 box guarantee of closer to £70k.

After ages of the £250k not being influential, we get 4 games in a week where it stays to 5-box with completely different results. The comparisons with Corrinne were apparant but she seemed to take it well - as KP said, whether she regretted it after is another matter.

Not quite, but it's a very close second. The best ever was Margaret in November 2006, who took out a total of £151.51




Why is it that if the first/second offer is low, you say it's £NO_DEAL, but if it's high, you say it's so that people will chase their losses later? You can't win...




Why do you always assume that players are going against their true preferences? She wanted 50k in order to pay off her mortgage, and perhaps she felt that aiming for that would be better than taking 20k or so in order to enhance her life in other ways... Just because someone has an abnormal utility curve doesn't mean they're going against their 'true preference'...

Also, 27.5k was a poor increase from 26k considering she took the 10k. So really, seeing as how she'd already turned down 26k it would be illogical not to turn down 27.5k...



I think you're being a bit harsh. She did consider 23k, 26k and 27.5k carefully; she recognised they could do a lot for her, but decided that she'd rather try and pay off her remaining mortgage instead. Whereas Corinne turned down all her offers instantly...

If she couldn't stand losing the money, she wouldn't have gambled. Plain and simple.

Credit where credit's due, they weren't snap No Deals like Corinne's. She gave them thought.

I think the real flaw here is one that's more commonly seen in lower-stakes (and hence consistently more cautious) target-driven players; they get so fixated on the inflection points in their utility curves that they end up incapable of taking less or turning down more, even when the board clearly warrants doing so. The Brunhilde comparison is very apt here.

This Beryl, on Miljoenenjacht, may well have taken the second offer, certainly the third if the board was any good. Even Corinne, with her huge target, would Deal sooner than me on her utility function. Perhaps this is how the "OHO" philosophy works; our prize tree is such that life-changing money is available, but usually only through very aggressive play (unless one takes a more conservative approach than me towards what is 'life-changing' - although the 'Power 5' references implicitly place that as £35k upwards).

For that gamble to be justifiable for Beryl, £50,000 needed to be more than 1.5 times as useful to her than £27,500. I can see why she thought that would be true, but it might not have held up against a really detailed analysis. Very few people could do such an analysis, though, so it's easy to see why she took the simplified assumption. Indeed, most players probably set a target as a greatly simplified version of utility curve setting, but without Beryl's clear knowledge of where that inflection point is...

(And for what it's worth, two things made me think Beryl may have been playing against her true preferences today. Her explicit mention of faith, which reminded me of Ramesh and made me think his game might have influenced her, was one; her immediate reaction to the £12,500 opening offer as being very sizable to her, implying a more cautious player with a lower target.)

I think people are getting confused between foolishness and bravery. Both Corinne and Beryl were courageous and trying to fulfill their dreams. Both also recieed some mery poor offers such as how Beryl only managed to go up by £1,500 at 3 box. Beryl just wanted to get her house and although it may have led to her downfall she must be commended for her bravery.

I think given her background, and the fact she was prepared for the worst-case scenario, it wasn't a foolish decision to gamble at all!

£27,500 was a horribly placed offer; the highest yet could have been £30,000 at least...and to think all she needed to do was open the other remaining box for the £50,000 OPW we all prayed she'd get!

Ah well...a very gripping, and rather emotional game to say the very least!

You say that, but some extent many people would feel that. Once you start getting into really big, life-enhancing sums of money, it can be very hard to turn down even if it's a golden board. Take two situations: an offer of £1,600 on 50p vs £10k, and an offer of £40,000 on 50p vs £250k. They are the same generosity wise, but what would the expected reaction be? Most people would consider the former a cast-iron no deal, but a lot of people would deal the latter because "it's too much money to risk on a coin flip".




I'd argue that 20k would be life-changing for quite a few people; for me it would be. If you're at the really low end of the spectrum then 15k might even be considered life-changing!




I'm sure she knew what she was doing. If she didn't, I'm sure she'd have been a lot more visibly upset than she actually was. Besides, anyone who doesn't have a basic grasp of stats (e.g. 60% chance of taking out 250k at 5-box with three to open) and their utility curve shouldn't really be on Deal or No Deal in the first place...




Faith is often used as an excuse to gamble, regardless of whether or not a successful gambler has preceded them. It's flawed either way tbh (since they're just boxes after all). Also, I think £12,500 could be considered "very sizable" for many people. The average salary is 24k per year, and when you account for taxes and whatnot that whittles down to ~15k. And she's retired, so all of that doesn't apply since she would earn considerably less... 12.5k could be greatly valuable to almost anybody really, be it for a new car, family holiday, university fees, credit card loans, all sorts of things really... In that sense, it's good that people acknowledge it's a lot of money rather than imply saying 'Oh, 1st offer, automatic no deal'.

A tense gripping game, for a while there it looked like Beryl was all but guaranteed a 5, even 6 figure sum, she was extremely unlucky to take out all three reds in that final round.

Certainly there was a strong case for taking any of the last three red offers and even if she needed £50k taking just over half of that seemed to me like a sensible stop gap solution if nothing else, but I have to say I have no doubt that Beryl followed her heart and every no deal was completely without regret.

It was a risky but justified gamble that sadly didn't pay off.

Thanks for the summary folks as I missed today's show, sounds like a real heart breaker, Poor Beryl

A very emotional game but full credit to Beryl who took it well and pretty much laughed in the face of adversity. I don't know if it was just me but some on the wings looked even more upset than she was come the end result.

But to summarise, I agree with KP. The thought was there with the offers, but unlike Ramesh, they did not pay off this time. But that said, he was an inspiration. When you see a 5-box board as precarious as that, I for one would deal and hope the proveout works.

Phil.

what was beryl like hey thought she would have took offer i mean as she owed £50,ooo on her house even if she took £26,000 she could have used half of it to pay it off i don,t like it when they useing the word couragous and bravery i mean think of all those men in afhgasthian they are brave and courages i think more?????..............................i know beryl didnt seem bothered but she must be a bit gutted she didn,t take offer ,she had a good attitude but sometimes think people lose sight of reality?????

Yep and watch today's player being cautious at the most extreme and suddenly deal at 11-box...

WRONG!

I agree that it's useful for contestants to have a rough idea of the statistics, but it certainly shouldn't be a requirement. Noel said in the very first show that the show is open to everyone - and that includes both people who have no idea about maths and those who do.

I know this isn't what the mathematicians on here want to hear (although it probably won't come as a surprise), but most contestants have little idea of the odds and chances and so on. I think most can judge how generous an offer is but that's probably based on offers that have been made on similar boards in the past. When Daniel Judge was on the wings, he blinded everyone with his statistics but most of the contestants didn't understand any of it.

There have been plenty of exciting and interesting games provided by memorable contestants who clearly have no knowledge (or no interest) in the maths side of things. Personally, I still don't really understand the utility curve (despite being told what it's all about) and I don't really understand odds and probability. I literally missed our first probability lesson in Year 8 because I was ill, and never understood it properly because of that! I do remember querying a textbook which said that the chance of the sun rising was 1 in 1, though, because there can't be a guarantee that the sun will rise each morning.

Stuff like the example I listed is pretty simple though. There are five boxes left, and three to open, so the chances of finding any specific amount are 3 in 5.

Now, if it's something along the lines of 'What are the chances of having an all-blue round if at 11-box you have seven blues and four reds?', I acknowledge that some people may have trouble working that out in their head (the answer is 7/33, roughly 21-22%). Speaking of which, are you allowed calculators on the show? Bcause that would allow you to work out the odds if you can't work them out manually, but I don't think any of them have been seen with calculators in-game... Are they explicitly forbidden?

I'm not aware of there being any rules regarding calculators. I saw a calculator when I was looking through the pound table in my game though, and I'm fairly certain Noel got it out in a show quite recently. So I doubt they'd prevent anyone from using a calculator, but watching someone punch numbers into a keypad isn't the most exciting TV, so they probably would rather people didn't use one! And if someone was that fussed about the maths then they'd probably know it all off-by-heart anyway.

Ah, yes, it's a twist on the old "who should play the game" discussion. Not had this in a while, and I still haven't decided the answer. It's worth noting that this show originated as a bonus round for a quiz - and still operates that way in the Netherlands. However, there is something uniquely democratic and fascinating about an all-encompassing policy to let anyone in, and it is certainly notable that this show has the most socially diverse (in terms of ethnicity, age, class and possibly sexuality) contestant pool in British television history. That, on a show airing in a timeslot that draws a lot of children, is unequivocally A Good Thing. Not enough gameshows have a genuine cross-section of the public, and indeed I've never seen a finalist on Miljoenenjacht I couldn't immediately identify as white and middle-class.