Reply #12: Results without simulation [View All]

[Nexus7]

OK, I see why you do this, but ...
Since you start off the simulation for each state with given win and undecided voters' breaking probabilities, the outcome is fixed. You can run 1000 simulations, but the result you get is given by the following.

P(A_win) = P(A_poll) + P(undecided)*P(undecided_breaking_for_A)

If this is > P(B_win), then A wins that state and gets the EV.

Over all states (say N in number), you have only 2^^N possible
outcomes. Using your example, you can calculate the probability of each outcome.

P(A gets 35 EV) = P(A_wins_1)*P(A_wins_2)*P(A_wins_3)
= 0.90*0.51*0.49
P(A gets 18 EV) = P(A_wins_1)*P(A_wins_2)*P(A_loses_3)
= 0.90*0.51*0.51

Then you add up the probabilities of all the outcomes that give A a winning number of EV.