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Given a tree $T=(V,E)$ on $n$ vertices, we consider the $(1 : q)$ Maker-Breaker tree embedding game ${\mathcal T}_n$. The board of this game is the edge set of the complete graph on $n$ vertices. Maker wins ${\mathcal T}_n$ if and only if…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2010-10-15 Asaf Ferber , Dan Hefetz , Michael Krivelevich

We examine two-player games over finite weighted graphs with quantitative (mean-payoff or energy) objective, where one of the players additionally needs to satisfy a fairness objective. The specific fairness we consider is called 'strong…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2025-01-30 Ashwani Anand , Satya Prakash Nayak , Ritam Raha , Irmak Sağlam , Anne-Kathrin Schmuck

We give tolerant testers with sublinear query complexity in the adjacency-list model for Unique Games. Prior tolerant testers required structural assumptions such as expansion or clusterability. For Unique Games, the tester distinguishes…

Data Structures and Algorithms · Computer Science 2026-05-19 Yuichi Yoshida

We introduce a new positional game called `Toucher-Isolator', which is a quantitative version of a Maker-Breaker type game. The playing board is the set of edges of a given graph G, and the two players, Toucher and Isolator, claim edges…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2019-03-28 Chris Dowden , Mihyun Kang , Mirjana Mikalački , Miloš Stojaković

Motivated by the controller placement problems in software-defined networks and the fair division principles of classical "cake cutting", we investigate the following two-player zero-sum game. In our model, a defender places a limited…

Computational Complexity · Computer Science 2026-05-19 Grzegorz Gutowski , Konstanty Junosza-Szaniawski , Antonio Lauerbach , Alexander Wolff

In the eternal domination game, an attacker attacks a vertex at each turn and a team of guards must move a guard to the attacked vertex to defend it. The guards may only move to adjacent vertices and no more than one guard may occupy a…

The deduction game may be thought of as a variant on the classical game of cops and robber in which the cops (searchers) aim to capture an invisible robber (evader); each cop is allowed to move at most once, and cops situated on different…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2025-10-30 Andrea C. Burgess , Nancy E. Clarke , Shannon L. Fitzpatrick , Melissa A. Huggan

We study the $(a:b)$ Maker-Breaker subgraph game played on the edges of the complete graph $K_n$ on $n$ vertices, $n,a,b \in \mathbb{N}$ where the goal of Maker is to build a copy of a specific fixed subgraph $H$. In our work this is a…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2024-06-18 Adnane Fouadi , Mourad El Ouali , Anand Srivastav

The domination game is played on a graph $G$ by two players, named Dominator and Staller. They alternatively select vertices of $G$ such that each chosen vertex enlarges the set of vertices dominated before the move on it. Dominator's goal…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2013-07-23 Boštjan Brešar , Paul Dorbec , Sandi Klavžar , Gašper Košmrlj

In this paper we study a variant of the solitaire game Lights-Out, where the player's goal is to turn off a grid of lights. This variant is a two-player impartial game where the goal is to make the final valid move. This version is playable…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2024-11-14 Eugene Fiorini , Maxwell Fogler , Katherine Levandosky , Bryan Lu , Jacob Porter , Andrew Woldar

We study a version of the lights out game played on directed graphs. For a digraph $D$, we begin with a labeling of $V(D)$ with elements of $\mathbb{Z}_k$ for $k \ge 2$. When a vertex $v$ is toggled, the labels of $v$ and any vertex that…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2026-02-04 T. Elise Dettling , Darren B. Parker

We study the impartial game PAP (``permutations avoiding patterns''), in which players take turns choosing patterns to avoid. We define a set of length $k$ patterns, $B_k$, and show that it is the unique minimal monotone-forcing subset of…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2026-03-18 Henning Ulfarsson

A subset of the vertex set of a graph is geodetically convex if it contains every vertex on any shortest path between two elements of the subset. The convex hull of a set of vertices is the smallest convex set containing the set. We study…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2025-05-14 Bret J. Benesh , Dana C. Ernst , Marie Meyer , Sarah K. Salmon , Nandor Sieben

Neighborhood Lights Out is a game played on graphs. Begin with a graph and a vertex labeling of the graph from the set $\{0,1,2,\dots, \ell-1\}$ for $\ell \in \mathbb{N}$. The game is played by toggling vertices: when a vertex is toggled,…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2020-07-08 Lauren Keough , Darren Parker

This paper proposes a new lens for studying threshold games played on networks when the thresholds are heterogeneous. These are games where agents have two possible actions, and prefer action 1 if and only if enough of their neighbours…

Theoretical Economics · Economics 2025-08-07 Alastair Langtry , Sarah Taylor , Yifan Zhang

The domination game is an optimization game played by two players, Dominator and Staller, who alternately select vertices in a graph $G$. A vertex is said to be dominated if it has been selected or is adjacent to a selected vertex. Each…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2023-02-03 Leo Versteegen

In the m-\emph{Eternal Domination} game, a team of guard tokens initially occupies a dominating set on a graph $G$. An attacker then picks a vertex without a guard on it and attacks it. The guards defend against the attack: one of them has…

Discrete Mathematics · Computer Science 2018-10-16 Ioannis Lamprou , Russell Martin , Sven Schewe

Computing the winning set for B{\"u}chi objectives in alternating games on graphs is a central problem in computer aided verification with a large number of applications. The long standing best known upper bound for solving the problem is…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2015-03-19 Krishnendu Chatterjee , Monika Henzinger

We study a variant of the classical cop-robber game played on compact metric graphs, where each edge is assigned a positive length and identified with a real interval of corresponding length. In this setting, both the cop and the robber…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2025-12-23 Daniel Berend , Michael D. Boshernitzan

Let $r \ge 4$ be an integer and consider the following game on the complete graph $K_n$ for $n \in r \mathbb{Z}$: Two players, Maker and Breaker, alternately claim previously unclaimed edges of $K_n$ such that in each turn Maker claims one…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2020-02-10 Anita Liebenau , Rajko Nenadov