Probability IntegerSolution AMC10/12 Difficult
2020


Problem - 4748

Jason rolls three fair standard six-sided dice. Then he looks at the rolls and chooses a subset of the dice (possibly empty, possibly all three dice) to reroll. After rerolling, he wins if and only if the sum of the numbers face up on the three dice is exactly $7$. Jason always plays to optimize his chances of winning. What is the probability that he chooses to reroll exactly two of the dice?


Let the numbers shown in Jason's first roll be $a \le b \le c$, respectively. Then,

  • If $a+b+c=7$, then Jason will not re-roll.
  • If Jason re-roll three dices, the probability of having a sum of $7$ equals to the number of positive integer solution of $x+y+z=7$ divided by $6^3$ which is $\frac{5}{12}$
  • If Jason re-roll two dices and leaving one showing $x$ where $1 \le x \le 6$, then he must have the sum of the two re-rolled dice be $(7-x)$ in order to win. This event occurs at a probability of $\frac{6-x}{36}$. (This conclusion can be verified by calculating the results for $x=1$, $2$, $\cdots$ etc.)
  • If follows that if $a+b < 7$, it is always wise to re-roll just one dice which gives a winning probability of $\frac{1}{6}$ which is larger than re-rolling two or three dices.

Therefore, we only need to consider the case where $a+b \ge 7$. This is the only scenario when Jason may choose to re-roll two dices. In this case, because his winning probability is $\frac{6-x}{36}$ where $x$ is the remaining number, it is always wise to leave the smallest number $a$ alone. However, as $\frac{6-4}{36} < \frac{5}{12}$, if the smallest number is at least $4$, then it is wise for Jason to re-roll all three dices. This means the final result equals to the probability when $a + b \ge 7$ and the smallest number $a$ is no more than $3$.

  • When $a=1$, we must have $b=c=6$. There are totally $3$ qualified ways.
  • When $a=2$, we have $5\le b\le c$. There are totally $3+6+3=12$ qualified ways.
  • When $a=3$, we have $4\le b\le c$. There are totally $3+6+6+3+6+3=27$ qualified ways.

These number are calculated by listing all the possible combinations such as $(1, 6, 6)$. Then if all the three numbers are different, there will be totally $3!=6$ different ways for each combination. If two numbers are the same, then there are only $3$ ways (let the unique number to choose from one of the three position positions.)

Hence, the final answer is $$\frac{3+12+27}{6^3}=\boxed{\frac{7}{36}}$$

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