Are the lifelines have their own weakness???

[Minh Dang]

Despite that the lifelines were made to help contestants in the game, sometime using it might ended up backfired them. I have seen the Wiki mentioned scenario where 50:50 didn't help a lot, which make me feeling if other lifelines could also have their weakness.

As far as I see, Ask the Audience and Switch the Question also have their weakness. For AtA, this photo, along with 50:50 one:



For Switch, it's obvious weakness is it can changed into a question that contestant STILL can't answered. Kaun Banega Crorepati have a "category" system that allowed contestant to choose their favorite category, but 2 things:
1: Even their favorite category have something they don't know. Having the "category" system only make it a bit more helpful. Also, only 11 available categories, some still a bit too general.
2: The "Superpower" version in Kids Week defeated the "category" system purpose because the category for new question are random.

Now talk about other lifeline that the game provided. Are they also have their weakness? And which one is a bit overrated?(meaning that it have too many weakness that not many contestants would optimized it, but appear frequent in the Set of 3/4-3/4 lifelines that everyone begin with in most of version of Millionaire)

[RegisFan]

The only lifelines that are guaranteed to improve your odds of winning are 50:50 and Double Dip. Things can still go sideways with both, but at least you know with certainty that you’re not being misled.

Ask the Audience, Ask the Expert, Ask the Host, Three Wise Men, and Phone a Friend are only as helpful as the people providing the assistance. Switch the Question may or may not end up working in your favor. With those Lifelines, you’re rolling the dice and hoping for a good outcome without any guarantees of success.

[tarrantnam]

As a matter of fact, every lifeline has its weakness.
Double Dip: It's 50:50, but it's self-operated. And if they choose two wrong answers that they think are right...
Other things depend on the audience, or the player's friend, or the experts, or h-o-s-t.
And sadly, two lifelines with less and more weaknesses, I think, are two in Shuffle: Jump the Question (to make sure the player passes the question) and Crystal Ball (for what purpose does the player know the value of the question?)
[P/s: Power Paplu is not included here, because it basically becomes any of the previously mentioned help.]

[greekmillionairefan]

If the majority of the audience doesn't know the correct answer for a question and the player is about to opt for a wrong answer before deciding to get "ask the audience" lifeline,it is possible that many members audience are affected by the contestant's initial wrong guess and vote for that answer too, resulting to a wrong result. It has happened a few times on the greek version.

Another weakness is that nowadays, at least in greek version, "Phone-a-friend" has to be one specific person that is accompanying the contestant in the studio and it is isolated in a special booth during the filming, in order to eliminate cheating by googling the question, meaning that the contestant relies only on this specific person's knowledge. It is more like a "Plus one" lifeline, rather than the traditional "phone-a-friend" lifeline in the past seasons where the contestant could choose who would he call between 3-4 different people,depending on who had the highest possibility of knowing the correct answer

[kplewisvox]

Lifelines are not supposed to be a sure thing. Sometimes the audience or the phone-a-friend doesn't know. Sometimes 50:50 leaves the two you were debating. Sometimes you switch the question for another that you don't know. That's the game.