×

The switch operators and push-the-button games: a sequential compound over rulesets. (English) Zbl 1390.91077

Summary: We study operators that combine combinatorial games. This field was initiated by Sprague-Grundy (1930s), Milnor (1950s) and Berlekamp-Conway-Guy (1970-80s) via the now classical disjunctive sum operator on (abstract) games. The new class consists in operators for rulesets, dubbed the switch-operators. The ordered pair of rulesets \((\mathcal{R}_1, \mathcal{R}_2)\) is compatible if, given any position in \(\mathcal{R}_1\), there is a description of how to move in \(\mathcal{R}_2\). Given compatible \((\mathcal{R}_1, \mathcal{R}_2)\), we build the push-the-button game \(\mathcal{R}_1 \circledcirc \mathcal{R}_2\), where players start by playing according to the rules \(\mathcal{R}_1\), but at some point during play, one of the players must switch the rules to \(\mathcal{R}_2\), by pushing the button ’. Thus, the game ends according to the terminal condition of ruleset \(\mathcal{R}_2\). We study the pairwise combinations of the classical rulesets Nim, Wythoff and Euclid. In addition, we prove that standard periodicity results for Subtraction games transfer to this setting, and we give partial results for a variation of Domineering, where \(\mathcal{R}_1\) is the game where the players put the domino tiles horizontally and \(\mathcal{R}_2\) the game where they play vertically (thus generalizing the octal game 0.07).

MSC:

91A46 Combinatorial games

References:

[1] Abrams, Lowell; Cowen-Morton, Dena S., Periodicity and other structure in a colorful family of nim-like arrays, Electron. J. Combin., 17, 1 (2010), electronic only - Research Paper R103, 21 p · Zbl 1200.91055
[2] Albert, Michael H.; Nowakowski, Richard J.; Wolfe, David, Lessons in Play: An Introduction to Combinatorial Game Theory (2007), A.K. Peters · Zbl 1184.91001
[3] Berlekamp, Elwyn; Conway, John H.; Guy, Richard K., Winning Ways for Your Mathematical Plays, vols. 1-4 (2001), A.K. Peters, Ltd. · Zbl 1005.00004
[4] Brešar, Boštjan; Dorbec, Paul; Klavzar, Sandi; Košmrlj, Gašper, How long can one bluff in the domination game?, Discuss. Math. Graph Theory, 37, 2 (May 2017) · Zbl 1359.05081
[5] Bouton. Nim, Charles L., A game with a complete mathematical theory, Ann. of Math., 3, 1/4, 35-39 (1901) · JFM 32.0225.02
[6] Burke, Kyle, Combinatorial game rulesets
[7] Cole, A. J.; Davie, A. J.T., A game based on the Euclidean algorithm and a winning strategy for it, Austral. Math. Gaz., 53, 386, 354-357 (1969) · Zbl 0186.25303
[8] Collins, David; Lengyel, Tamás, The game of 3-Euclid, Discrete Math., 308, 7, 1130-1136 (2008) · Zbl 1133.91010
[9] Chan, Wai Hong; Low, Richard M., An atlas of N- and P-positions in ‘Nim with a Pass’, Integers, 15 (2015) · Zbl 1397.91105
[10] Conway, John H., On Numbers and Games, vol. 6 (1976), IMA · Zbl 0334.00004
[11] Duchêne, Eric; Dufour, Mathieu; Heubach, Silvia; Larsson, Urban, Building nim, Internat. J. Game Theory (2015) · Zbl 1388.91075
[12] Eric Duchêne, Marc Heinrich, Quotients for push-button games, Private communication.; Eric Duchêne, Marc Heinrich, Quotients for push-button games, Private communication.
[13] Duchêne, Eric; Rigo, Michel, Invariant games, Theoret. Comput. Sci., 411, 3169-3180 (2010) · Zbl 1198.91051
[14] Flanigan, Jim, One-pile time and size dependent take-away games, Fibonacci Quart., 51-59 (1982) · Zbl 0515.90081
[15] Fraenkel, Aviezri S., Wythoff games, continued fractions, cedar trees and Fibonacci searches, Theoret. Comput. Sci., 29, 49-73 (1984) · Zbl 0557.90107
[16] Fraenkel, Aviezri S., The Raleigh game, Integers, 7, 2, A13 (2007) · Zbl 1178.91037
[17] Grundy, Patrick M., Mathematics and games, Eureka, 2, 5, 6-8 (1939)
[18] Gurvich, Vladimir A., On the misere version of game Euclid and miserable games, Discrete Math., 307, 9, 1199-1204 (2007) · Zbl 1108.91019
[19] Horrocks, David G. C.; Nowakowski, Richard J., Regularity in the \(G\)-sequences of octal games with a pass, Integers, 3, Article G01 pp. (2003) · Zbl 1048.91028
[20] Huggan, Melissa; Nowakowski, Richard J., Conjoined games: Go-Cut and Sno-Go, Games of No Chance, 5 (2017), in press · Zbl 1444.91063
[21] Ho, Nhan Bao, Variations of the game 3-Euclid, Int. J. Comb. (2012) · Zbl 1235.91035
[22] Holshouser, Arthur; Reiter, Harold; Rudzinski, James, Dynamic one-pile Nim, Fibonacci Quart., 41, 3, 253-262 (2003) · Zbl 1093.91013
[23] Holshouser, Arthur; Reiter, Harold; Rudzinski, James, Pilesize dynamic one-pile Nim and Beatty’s theorem, Integers, 4, Article G03 pp. (2004) · Zbl 1081.05005
[24] Larsson, Urban; Rocha, Israel, Eternal Picaria, Recreat. Math. Mag., 4, 7, 119-133 (May 2017)
[25] Morrison, Rebecca E.; Friedman, Eric J.; Landsberg, Adam S., Combinatorial games with a pass: a dynamical systems approach, Chaos, 21, 4 (December 2011) · Zbl 1317.91008
[26] Mullen, Todd, The Self-Referential Games Minnie and Wynnie and Some Variants (2016), Dalhousie University, Master’s thesis
[27] Siegel, Aaron N., Combinatorial Game Theory, Graduate Studies in Mathematics, vol. 146 (2013), American Mathematical Society · Zbl 1288.91003
[28] Silber, Rober, A Fibonacci property of Wythoff pairs, Fibonacci Quart., 14, 4, 380-384 (1976) · Zbl 0361.10011
[29] Sprague, Richard, Über mathematische Kampfspiele, Tohoku Math. J., 41, 438-444 (1935) · Zbl 0013.29004
[30] Stromquist, Walter; Ullman, Daniel, Sequential compounds of combinatorial games, Theoret. Comput. Sci., 119, 2, 311-321 (1993) · Zbl 0781.90110
[31] Wythoff, Willem A., A modification of the game of Nim, Nieuw Arch. Wiskd., 7, 199-202 (1907) · JFM 37.0261.03
This reference list is based on information provided by the publisher or from digital mathematics libraries. Its items are heuristically matched to zbMATH identifiers and may contain data conversion errors. In some cases that data have been complemented/enhanced by data from zbMATH Open. This attempts to reflect the references listed in the original paper as accurately as possible without claiming completeness or a perfect matching.