SleepingDragons
An elaborate Gold Saucer Guide

Mini Cactpot

Mini Cactpot is a scratch lottery game which can be played three times per day from the daily reset on. Each ticket costs 10 MGP and the rewards can be anywhere from 36 MGP up to 10.000 MGP.

How to play it

Once you’ve purchased a ticket, the mini game will start. You will see a ticket with a 3×3 field on the left side and a table on the right side. That table tells you how many MGP you will get based on the possible scores you can get. The field on the left side is the place to get the scores. It starts with one field already uncovered and you have to choose three more fields to uncover, before you have to make one final choice of which row you want to count as your final score. 

As you can see on the picture, the highest possible payout is 10.000 MGP if you chose a row containing 1, 2 and 3. The next highest payout with 3.600 MGP is a row containing 7, 8 and 9. Note that you can choose a row even if you have not uncovered any field of it at all.

Therefore the trick is to estimate the most successful row based on the fields uncovered.

There are many ways to approach this whole mechanic. Some people choose random fields and take wild guesses. Others use mini cactpot solvers on the internet or make their own excel sheets. And others again try to be strategic while not counting on any outside help.

Personally, I fall into that last category and while everyone can chose on their own how to go about it, I will tell you here my own strategy:
At first I check which field is already uncovered and which number it has. Usually, I then uncover the middle field no matter what. If any of the already uncovered or the middle field contains a 1, 2 or 3, I try to check out the surrounding fields, to see if I can uncover the 123 jackpot row. If none of my starting fields contain any of those three numbers, I check one of the corners that are furthest away from the starting field. That way I can feel out the rows, I haven’t had a single number for yet. If I get a 1, 2 or 3 in there, I choose the opposite end of that row. If I have a second number of that combo, I will choose that row as my final row. If it is not, I will choose the other row with the two unknowns, in hopes that it might contain the missing numbers. However if either of the three numbers appear in a way that it is foreseeable that there won’t be any 123 combo at all on the ticket, I will try to estimate where a 789 combo could be based on what I’ve uncovered. If that combo is also not possible, I will try to see what else I could get that can still give me a decent amount.

Jumbo Cactpot

Jumbo Cactpot is the big lottery of the game. The chances of hitting the jackpot are very very low but even without the jackpot, it is still a worthwhile investment to play every week.

How to play it

Jumbo Cactpot can be played every week. If you visit the cactpot square in the Gold Saucer you will see a counter with multiple npcs. At [NPC name] you can purchase up to three jumbo cactpot tickets. The first one will cost 100 MGP, the second 150 MGP and the third 200 MGP. So in total you have to spend 450 MGP for the maximum amount of tickets.

When you purchase a ticket, it will ask you to choose a 4-digit-number for said ticket. It doesn’t matter what number you choose and you can even let the game randomize it for you. All tickets can have the same number or each one a different one. All of that is entirely up to you.

The tickets will be valid until the next Saturday when the winning numbers will be revealed. The winning number will get the jackpot which can easily fall into the millions of MGP. For every non-winning ticket, the amount of MGP won will depend on the digits matched with the winning number. For this, the game will check the very last (most-right) digit of your ticket. If it does not match with the last digit of the winning ticket, you will get the consolation prize – which still usually is somewhere around 1000~ MGP (therefore making back the price of all tickets with just one consolation prize). If the last digit matches, it will check for the second last digit. If it doesn’t match, you will get the 4th prize. If it matches it moves on to the third digit and if not, you get 3rd prize. The same continues for every digit and the whole process gets repeated for each individual ticket.

It is therefore up to you if you are willing to bet everything unto one number for all three tickets (hitting a really big jackpot if you do) or betting on different numbers to maybe land in different price ranges with each ticket.

After the winning numbers have been revealed. You have time until the next drawing to turn in your tickets for the prize money at [NPC Name] at the counter to the left. Note that, if you turn in your ticket within the first hour after the drawing, you get a bonus on your rewards for a fast turn-in. If you fail to turn in your tickets before the next drawing, your tickets will become invalid and are lost forever. 

While all drawings on all data centers happen on Saturdays, the times for different data centers vary. Here is a short overview which data centers have their drawings at which times:

Data CenterPSTESTCET
Elemental
Gaia
Mana
4 AM7 AM2 PM
Light12 PM3 PM10 PM
Aether
Primal
6 PM9 PM4 AM
Chaos11 AM2 PM9 PM
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