BlizzCon ticket drawing winners to be selected soon
by Natalie Mootz 
Aug 26th 2008 at 8:00PM
Zarhym posted on the BlizzCon forum that the opt-in period to get into the drawing for BlizzCon tickets is now over. Blizzard will be randomly selecting winners over the next few days. Account holders who get selected by the drawing will receive an email from Blizzard explaining how to purchase up to two BlizzCon 2008 tickets if they so desire -- so make sure your contact information is updated!So now the forums are all abuzz as to what are the odds of winning the drawing. Let's do the math, shall we? There are 3,000 tickets available and they'll be offered by pairs to each drawing winner. We can assume there will be no more than 3,000 winning accounts (if every winner buys only one ticket -- unlikely) and no fewer than 1,500 (if every winner buys the max allowed: a pair). According to MMOGChart.com, Blizzard has about 10,000,000 subscribers right now. Okay, now, stay with me... Originally, 12,000 tickets were sold to BlizzCon. Let's assume that all the tickets purchased so far went to subscribers, rather than people who wouldn't show up on the subscription rolls. Let's also assume that each subscriber bought one to two tickets in the first batch. That means 6,000 - 12,000 accounts already have tickets, leaving 994,000 to 988,000 folks left for the opt-in drawing. With my mad Excel skills, it looks like if everyone who didn't get BlizzCon tickets the first time around opted in to the drawing, you've got a 0.015% to 0.030% chance to get one of those sweet emails in the next few days.
Since it's unrealistic to assume that everyone opted in, I'd say you have a better chance than that. However, keep in mind that in order for you to even have a 1% chance of winning the drawing, only about 150,000 accounts would have had to opt-in. No matter how you slice it, good luck!
Filed under: BlizzCon, Analysis / Opinion, Events, WoW Social Conventions, News items
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
chilisizzle Aug 26th 2008 8:25PM
Never tell me the odds!
Tato Aug 26th 2008 8:13PM
Ummm...
10,000,000-(6,000/12,000)=9,994,000/9,988,000...
So the odds might actually be lower...
Clbull Aug 26th 2008 8:34PM
I think they would definitely be likelier odds to be honest. Not all of WoW's 10 million subscribers would opt in to the drawing for Blizzcon tickets.
Justin Aug 26th 2008 8:37PM
Wasn't it only open to the US for the lotto?
StalkerofFlames Aug 26th 2008 8:13PM
Your math skills are impressice. :) I wish everyone good luck on being that .015% :D
KneverMind Aug 26th 2008 8:23PM
I just don't understand why they can't say, "We will be sending emails Wednesday morning at 8:00am Pacific." or some such...
I guess the Failbot has trouble with commitment...
kenney Aug 26th 2008 8:31PM
that's really not doing "the math" since your assumptions are so flawed.
It would be nice if Blizzard provided the number of entrants to the drawing, or the number of accounts eligible for the drawing, so that we had meaningful numbers to figure out what the actual odds of winning were.
Zep Aug 26th 2008 8:47PM
1. Not all Blizzard fans are going to Blizzcon.
2. Stop forgetting about Starcraft, Warcraft, and Diablo.
A better test would be:
Find out with mad math skills how many people want tickets based on how fast the site went down when tickets were put on sale.
Like (incoming illogical math) number of seconds before it went down, times 5 for people who were on the far end of a Refresh, times the number of people it could support. (/illogical math)
Liel Aug 26th 2008 8:51PM
Most of the 10mil is in Asia so that helps reduce the odds in half so pretty much no way in hell to kind of no way in hell lol.
Kryptonls Aug 26th 2008 9:01PM
Sounds like a higher drop rate than Baron's mount.... well worth the shot I say. ^_^
Ghostbear Aug 26th 2008 9:24PM
You had to be registered to the Blizzard Store site by that Tues to be eligible for the opt-in. Just because you have an account on WoW doesn't make you eligible. So it is quite less than 10 million people that are competing for tickets.
Plus I think your math is a tad off and I was a humanities major.
Adam Holisky Aug 27th 2008 1:16AM
Oh I lol'd (at the mount drop rate reference).
JTD Aug 26th 2008 9:16PM
You also forget it isnt subscribers to WoW but people who had blizzard store accounts before august 12. I only had the store account because I bought the authenticator.
So i think you have to ask how many people had accounts before the cutoff, then how many didn't opt in etc etc.
I think the odds are decent of wining the right to purchase a pair. Like winning the lottery decent.
Turtlejp Aug 26th 2008 9:22PM
The number of subscribers has no direct effect on the odds of winning. If you had a Blizzard Store account before the cut off date then you could opt in. My guess would be a few hundred thousand accounts and of that maybe 25% actually opted in.
Either way may the Light guide me in winning a pair.
toddjeaton Aug 26th 2008 9:28PM
Let's be realistic: a small percentage of actual Blizz fans even considered going to BlizzCon and chose to opt in. I'd be surprised if there were even 100,000 opt-ins.
Now, if Blizz had only done the lottery in the first place (like I suggested early on) during the ordering fiasco it would have been much more fair to everyone. Not everyone has the time to click the refresh button every 10 seconds for 24+ hours (Some of us actually have jobs and occasionally leave our Mom's basement).
I GUARANTEE a lottery will be standard for events going forward.
Alex Aug 27th 2008 1:50AM
You're VASTLY vastly vastly overestimating the interest in going to Blizzcon. The complete failure of Blizzard's IT team to created a web server that can handle even minimal load should not be mistaken for high interest in the event.
Sab Aug 27th 2008 9:43AM
In addition to it being a blizzard STORE account another requirement for entry was that you didn't already get to purchase a ticket..which cuts down the # of entrys even more....
talkingmike Aug 27th 2008 1:48PM
Wow, just got the email saying that I've been selected. Hooray!
mattriggins Aug 28th 2008 8:08AM
The store is down...
Wow