Rat Race Questions?

[MrPlinko]

Hey guys.  Some Rat Race questions?

1.) Is the game set up like in Spelling Bee, where if you get a small price exactly right, you automatically get all rats won?
2.) How many "Perfect Playings" with all rats won have we seen?
3.) How many rats are backstage as game props?  How often are they tested and rotated before game play?
4.) What's the rule if a contestant wins a rat or rats that does not finish the race?  Has this happened?
5.) Does anyone think that any prize range to win the rats is too hard?  I often have trouble with guessing on this game at home!

Joe

[GameShowFan1987]

Hopefully this helps.

1.) No.
2.) 3 times, all 3 in season 39.  Source: http://tpirstats.com/Other/PGStats3.html#rat
3.) Not sure how many exactly but it's been said by the staff that they have several they pick from at random before the show.
4.) If the rat doesn't finish then it doesn't win you anything.  Yes.
5.) I think the range is fair so long as they don't go too ridiculous with the 3rd prize.

[SteveGavazzi]

I think the range is fair so long as they don't go too ridiculous with the 3rd prize.

And I wouldn't worry about that happening -- they seem to intentionally make it impossible to get wrong as long as you bid $200.

[TPIRighteous]

And I wouldn't worry about that happening -- they seem to intentionally make it impossible to get wrong as long as you bid $200.

If anything I think they've made the second prize too hard. You'd never see a $70-80 prize in Spelling Bee, yet in Rat Race it seems to be a pretty regular occurrence.

[SteveGavazzi]

If anything I think they've made the second prize too hard. You'd never see a $70-80 prize in Spelling Bee, yet in Rat Race it seems to be a pretty regular occurrence.

I agree, but the third prize really does balance it out.  If you know what you're doing, you really can't get it wrong.

[tpir04]

And I wouldn't worry about that happening -- they seem to intentionally make it impossible to get wrong as long as you bid $200.

In the playing I've seen, $275 or so is almost always good enough.

[DYC]

In the playing I've seen, $275 or so is almost always good enough.

The 3rd prize never exceeds $300, and has never been under $100. A $200 bid on the 3rd prize is always an auto-win so far in the game’s existence.

[ThatDonGuy]

4.) If the rat doesn't finish then it doesn't win you anything.  Yes.

I think there's an exception to this, although it's almost impossible; if, somehow, three or more of the rats don't finish, they are ranked in order of how far they got, so if only two rats finish and one of the contestant's rats got the farthest among the other three, I think the contestant wins the third place prize.

[SteveGavazzi]

I think there's an exception to this, although it's almost impossible; if, somehow, three or more of the rats don't finish, they are ranked in order of how far they got, so if only two rats finish and one of the contestant's rats got the farthest among the other three, I think the contestant wins the third place prize.

I'm not sure where you're getting this, but unless it's been within the last two months (which is how far behind I am right now), this has never happened.

[Flerbert419]

I think there's an exception to this, although it's almost impossible...

I don't think it's almost impossible - at least twice in the history of the game 2 rats have failed to finish the race, including this season. I think it's actually quite likely they are going to have to deal with this situation sooner or later.

Whether there is an established plan is another question. Your solution could work, but I would probably say that no rat "finished" in third so regardless where it ended up on the track they win the third prize by default. Some rats could have been faster and others might have stopped later, so it would be a mess I'd rather avoid.

To take it to an extreme level, if all the rats failed to cross the finish line I would give away the car. We'd also be looking to solve this issue pretty quickly.

[blozier2006]

I know in Stan's book, he mentioned about "rehearsing" before a taping. Wouldn't this include checking the games to ensure they're in working order before show time? And also, if Rat Race "flunked" a dry run like that, what could you sub into its place?

[gamesurf]

I don't think it's almost impossible - at least twice in the history of the game 2 rats have failed to finish the race, including this season. I think it's actually quite likely they are going to have to deal with this situation sooner or later.

Whether there is an established plan is another question. Your solution could work, but I would probably say that no rat "finished" in third so regardless where it ended up on the track they win the third prize by default. Some rats could have been faster and others might have stopped later, so it would be a mess I'd rather avoid.

To take it to an extreme level, if all the rats failed to cross the finish line I would give away the car. We'd also be looking to solve this issue pretty quickly.

At first my thought would be "If three rats don't finish, just stop tape, get five new rats and reshoot." After all, that's almost certainly what they've been doing with stopped Plinko chips, and I imagine it'd be kosher with S&P as long as they did something like putting it in the game's official rules to make it clear that they weren't doing it to favor any particular contestant.

But after thinking about it a little more that wouldn't work. What if the two rats that did finish happen to be the two the contestant picked? Wouldn't it suck for the contestant to have seemingly won a car and a large prize only to be told because they missed out on a chance to win something cheap like an Xbox One they have to scrap the results and try again? Would S&P be fine with it?

It doesn't seem like something they'd do. If a contestant had to give up the car they "won" just to try again for another chance at something insignificant, they'd be rightfully very angry, whether it's "legal" or not...so "award the prize by default" would be the next best option IMO.

[MSTieScott]

I know in Stan's book, he mentioned about "rehearsing" before a taping. Wouldn't this include checking the games to ensure they're in working order before show time?

Rehearsing primarily means looking at the staging of all of the prizes. Games are checked before rehearsal to make sure the lights and mechanics are in working order, but I don't think the day's five chosen rats are sent down the track ahead of time. I do know that as the game is being set up to be played, each lane is given a healthy blast of compressed air, but those little wind-up rats have minds of their own.

When the rules for Rat Race were being drafted, they included a plan for what to do if fewer than three rats finished the race. I don't want to say what that plan is (mostly because I'm not 100% sure I remember every "what if" perfectly correctly), but it's fair and would never result in the contestant not receiving a car if they selected the first-place rat in such a situation.

[PIRfanSince72]

If anything, I would think this would be a "technical win" situation if at least 3 rats didn't cross the finish line, regardless of where along the track the rat "puttered out".

[SteveGavazzi]

If anything, I would think this would be a "technical win" situation if at least 3 rats didn't cross the finish line, regardless of where along the track the rat "puttered out".

If anything, I'd think Scott, who actually worked at the show, would have told us if this were the answer.