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Race between a second five and seeing both four and six

Question

A fair die is rolled repeatedly and the results are recorded. Rolling stops at the first moment when either the value 55 has appeared twice in total (not necessarily in a row), or both a 44 and a 66 have appeared at least once each. What is the probability that the stopping reason is the pair of 55s?

Short answer

718\tfrac7{18}. Ignore 1s, 2s and 3s: each relevant roll is a 4, 5 or 6 with probability 13\tfrac13, and repeating an already-seen 4 or 6 changes nothing. If the first relevant roll is a 5, the fives win with probability 13+23⋅12=23\tfrac13+\tfrac23\cdot\tfrac12=\tfrac23; if it is a 4 or 6, they win with probability 12⋅12=14\tfrac12\cdot\tfrac12=\tfrac14. Hence 13⋅23+23⋅14=718\tfrac13\cdot\tfrac23+\tfrac23\cdot\tfrac14=\tfrac7{18}.

Adapted from QuantQuestions.io; question and answer rewritten by SelfMadeQuant.com.

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