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The game of Hangman is a classical asymmetric two player game in which one player, the setter, chooses a secret word from a language, that the other player, the guesser, tries to discover through single letter matching queries, answered by…

Computational Complexity · Computer Science 2020-05-05 Jérémy Barbay , Bernardo Subercaseaux

We study the complexity of solving two-player infinite duration games played on a fixed finite graph, where the control of a node is not predetermined but rather assigned randomly. In classic random-turn games, control of each node is…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2026-01-13 Sarvin Bahmani , Rasmus Ibsen-Jensen , Soumyajit Paul , Sven Schewe , Friedrich Slivovsky , Qiyi Tang , Dominik Wojtczak , Shufang Zhu

Consider QBF, the Quantified Boolean Formula problem, as a combinatorial game ruleset. The problem is rephrased as determining the winner of the game where two opposing players take turns assigning values to boolean variables. In this…

Computational Complexity · Computer Science 2014-12-31 Kyle Burke

We consider the following modification of annihilation game called node blocking. Given a directed graph, each vertex can be occupied by at most one token. There are two types of tokens, each player can move his type of tokens. The players…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2021-03-05 Dariusz Dereniowski

We consider the computational complexity of Hearthstone which is a popular online CCG (collectible card game). We reduce a PSPACE-complete problem, the partition game, to perfect information Hearthstone in which there is no hidden…

Computational Complexity · Computer Science 2023-05-23 Zhujun Zhang

The game domination number is a graph invariant that arises from a game, which is related to graph domination in a similar way as the game chromatic number is related to graph coloring. In this paper we show that verifying whether the game…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2016-06-20 Boštjan Brešar , Paul Dorbec , Sandi Klavžar , Gašper Košmrlj , Gabriel Renault

The winning condition of a parity game with costs requires an arbitrary, but fixed bound on the cost incurred between occurrences of odd colors and the next occurrence of a larger even one. Such games quantitatively extend parity games…

Logic in Computer Science · Computer Science 2023-06-22 Alexander Weinert , Martin Zimmermann

We study algorithmic complexity of solving subtraction games in a~fixed dimension with a finite difference set. We prove that there exists a game in this class such that any algorithm solving the game runs in exponential time. Also we prove…

Computational Complexity · Computer Science 2020-01-14 Vladimir Gurvich , Michael Vyalyi

Poker is a large complex game of imperfect information, which has been singled out as a major AI challenge problem. Recently there has been a series of breakthroughs culminating in agents that have successfully defeated the strongest human…

Artificial Intelligence · Computer Science 2022-06-28 Sam Ganzfried , Max Chiswick

In numerous positional games the identity of the winner is easily determined. In this case one of the more interesting questions is not {\em who} wins but rather {\em how fast} can one win. These type of problems were studied earlier for…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2008-06-03 Dan Hefetz , Michael Krivelevich , Miloš Stojaković , Tibor Szabó

In many multiagent environments, a designer has some, but limited control over the game being played. In this paper, we formalize this by considering incompletely specified games, in which some entries of the payoff matrices can be chosen…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2021-04-30 Markus Brill , Rupert Freeman , Vincent Conitzer

Infinite games where several players seek to coordinate under imperfect information are deemed to be undecidable, unless the information is hierarchically ordered among the players. We identify a class of games for which joint winning…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2015-07-29 Dietmar Berwanger , Anup Basil Mathew

We analyse the computational complexity of finding Nash equilibria in turn-based stochastic multiplayer games with omega-regular objectives. We show that restricting the search space to equilibria whose payoffs fall into a certain interval…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2015-07-01 Michael Ummels , Dominik Wojtczak

In his list of open problems, Martin Erickson described a certain game: "Two players alternately put queens on an n x n chess board so that each new queen is not in range of any queen already on the board (the color of the queens is…

History and Overview · Mathematics 2014-04-22 Thomas Jenrich

$\textit{Magic: The Gathering}$ is a popular and famously complicated trading card game about magical combat. In this paper we show that optimal play in real-world $\textit{Magic}$ is at least as hard as the Halting Problem, solving a…

Artificial Intelligence · Computer Science 2019-04-24 Alex Churchill , Stella Biderman , Austin Herrick

We introduce and study pawn games, a class of two-player zero-sum turn-based graph games. A turn-based graph game proceeds by placing a token on an initial vertex, and whoever controls the vertex on which the token is located, chooses its…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2025-04-09 Guy Avni , Pranav Ghorpade , Shibashis Guha

The Possible-Winner problem asks, given an election where the voters' preferences over the set of candidates is partially specified, whether a distinguished candidate can become a winner. In this work, we consider the computational…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2018-02-27 Batya Kenig

Delay games are two-player games of infinite duration in which one player may delay her moves to obtain a lookahead on her opponent's moves. For $\omega$-regular winning conditions it is known that such games can be solved in…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2018-03-30 Felix Klein , Martin Zimmermann

We present a Monte Carlo simulation study of the Bhikar-Sawkar card game, a non-deterministic game structurally similar to the classic Beggar-My-Neighbour, which is fully deterministic. Although both games share a common setup, key…

Other Statistics · Statistics 2025-06-05 Mihir Durve

Poker is ideal for testing automated reasoning under uncertainty. It introduces uncertainty both by physical randomization and by incomplete information about opponents hands.Another source OF uncertainty IS the limited information…

Artificial Intelligence · Computer Science 2013-01-30 Kevin B. Korb , Ann Nicholson , Nathalie Jitnah