[Math] Probability in deck of only face cards.

probability

I want to find the probability that in a deck of only face cards (jacks, queens, kings, each with their standard 4 suits), you draw exactly 2 queens and exactly 2 kings. Only 4 cards are being drawn.

Also, the same question again but where each queen has a king of the same matching suit. I was thinking we use counting for this so would the first one just be 5 divided by 13 choose 4? Where 5 is the permutations of the four cards (2 queens and 2 kings). For the second I am not so sure, any pointers?

Best Answer

Our mini-deck has $12$ cards. There are $\binom{12}{4}$ equally likely ways to choose $4$ cards from this deck.

Now we count the favourables, the hands that have $2$ Queens and $2$ Kings.

The $2$ Queens can be chosen from the $4$ available in $\binom{4}{2}$ ways. For each way of choosing $2$ Queens, there are $\binom{4}{2}$ ways to choose the $2$ Kings. Thus the total number of favourables is $\binom{4}{2}\binom{4}{2}$.

For the probability, divide.

For the second problem, there are $\binom{4}{2}$ ways to choose the $2$ Queens. Once this is done, the Kings are determined, since they must be of the same suits as the chosen Queens. Thus the number of favourables in the "suits must match" problem is just $\binom{4}{2}$.