Escalator Jackpots at Dragonfish

Dragonfish Escalator Jackpots – How They Work

Escalator jackpot promotions are amongst the most popular of all bingo promotions and it’s not hard to see why; bingo games become much more exciting when there is a substantial jackpot that is guaranteed to drop within a specified time frame.

UK bingo players are used to this type of promotion being run at Playtech bingo sites at Christmas and surrounding other public holidays, but now there’s an escalator jackpot promotion being run when you wouldn’t normally expect it, in the depths of January.  And it’s not Playtech running it, it’s Dragonfish.

The promotion is called Must Drop JP and if you’re an active player at a Dragonfish bingo site you may see it advertised in a pop-up immediately after you log in to the lobby.  It doesn’t seem to be advertised anywhere else though (which is why we’re giving you a heads up, in case you’re a Dragonfish player who hasn’t logged in recently or you haven’t seen the ad in the lobby).

Here’s how it works:

• The promotion runs from 7pm every evening until 4th February 2024 in the Top of the Shop 90 ball bingo room (aka Linked and Loaded 90).
• The number of calls within which full house must be won for the progressive jackpot to drop is normally 32.
• Starting from 7pm, the ball count is incremented by one each game i.e. 33 in the first game, 34 in the second game and so on.  A game plays every 6 minutes and the ball count continues to increment until the jackpot drops.
• The jackpot goes to the full house winner or winners of the game it drops in (unlike the Playtech promotions where there’s a community share).
• The progressive jackpot is seeded at £2000 and grows gradually with the ticket sales from each game.  When it drops, it’s reseeded at £2000 and the ball count is reset to 32 ready for the next evening’s escalator.
• All of the games also have regular 1 line, 2 line and full house prizes.
• Tickets for all of these games are priced at 5p each and there’s a maximum purchase of 96 tickets.  As there’s no schedule buy at Dragonfish, if you want to buy tickets for these games you will need to be in the bingo room shortly before each game starts.

But just when is the jackpot likely to drop?  Under the normal condition of 32 or fewer calls, it’s extremely unlikely to drop (the chance of any given ticket winning full house in 32 calls is less than 1 in 80 million) but as the evening goes on and the ball count goes up, it gets less and less unlikely.

By 9pm, the ball count has gone up to the point where the chance of any given ticket winning full house in the requisite number of calls is around 1 in 10,000 and by 10pm it’s a mere 1 in 500.  And this is the stage where the number of tickets in play becomes all important; if there’s more than 10,000 tickets in play at 9pm (unlikely but possible depending on how many players are pulled in by the lure of the jackpot) and the jackpot hasn’t already dropped it becomes more likely than not that the jackpot will drop in the current game.

If that crossover point hasn’t been reached at 9pm, it will certainly be reached at some point in the next hour or so as in a promotion like this, it would be very odd if there weren’t many more than 500 tickets in play!

Roughly speaking then, we would expect the jackpot to drop some time between 9pm and 10pm most evenings.  That’s not to say it can’t drop earlier – it can, especially if ticket sales are high – but it’s unlikely to be much before 9pm.  And at the other extreme, we’ve all been in 90 ball games where bingo took 65 or more calls but with the number of tickets we expect to be in play that too is very unlikely.

It’s great to see Dragonfish running a promotion like this giving players the chance to win a substantial prize, as there hasn’t been much of that in their bingo rooms recently.

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Sue Dawson

Creating iGaming content since 2013 - bingo and slots specialist

Sue Dawson has been writing about (and playing) online bingo and slots since 2013, putting her unique spin on everything.  She has…

Sue Dawson has been writing about (and playing) online bingo and slots since 2013, putting her unique spin on everything.  She has written pieces for iGaming industry news sites, appeared on and moderated panels at industry events and on podcasts, helped to judge industry awards and is a member of iGB Executive, a high level industry think tank.  In her spare time she enjoys gaming, hiking, dancing, watching motorsport and reading science fiction.

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