how do you "play" this promotion?

a casino sends a promotion. You swipe your players card and the screen tells you that you are guaranteed $200 of free play, or you can "gamble" on a different free play amount?

there are three possible prizes: $100, $500, $1000.

No additional info. I have no idea if its a random draw, or if the "winning amount" has been pre determined. I dont know if they limited the number of $1,000 or $500 "winners."

how would you "play" this?

Find out more information. Equal weighting and I gamble for the larger amount. Heavily weighted towards $100 and I take the $200 free play.

If the least you can get is only half the original amount, I'd definitely take the gamble and go for the possibly higher amount.

I would let the rewards booth know that I was "double booked" and see if I qualified instantly for at least $500.

Kaypea, I like what you said. I wonder if they would reveal that or give the typical answer... "I dont know." Has anyone played anything like this before? And whats happened?

This is truly a no-brainer.
One goes go for the big prize.

OK, . . . here's the logic.
1. Realize that there is a big prize:
2. Go for it !
QED

(n.b. There's an awful lot of complicated statistics and stuff like "expected values" and "risk of ruin" and "long term expectations" and consideration of one's "gambling grubstake" and "permutations and combinations to compute one's odds of winning", and lot-more-shit-like-that-there behind most analyses of one's best choice in a true gambling situation. But NOT here ! What the Hell is one in Las Vegas for . . . anyway?)

DonDiego... is $200 in the hand worth $100, $500 or $1,000 in the bush???

It's most likely that the majority of people will get the $100 in free play. You will have to play through the money though anyways before cashing it out and it's gambling so why not go for the bigger amount? I would risk $100 in free play for the chance of a bigger amount of free play. It's not cash in hand so I say take the risk.

I would take the $200.

I bet its a split like...

90% = $100
9% = $500
1% = $1,000