A Probabilistic Take-Away Game
Tony W. H. Wong and Jiao Xu
Department of Mathematics
Kutztown University of Pennsylvania
Kutztown, PA 19530
USA
Abstract:
Alice and Bob are playing a very simple game. Each of them starts with
a pile of n chips, and they take turns to remove 1 or 2 chips from
their own pile randomly and independently with equal probability. The
first player who removes all chips from their pile is the winner. In
this paper, we find the winning probability for Bob and analyze a new
integer sequence. We also show that this game is highly disadvantageous
to the second player, which is counter-intuitive. Furthermore, we study
several variations of this game and determine the winning probability
for Bob in each case.
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(Concerned with sequences
A265919
A265920.)
Received May 11 2016; revised versions received May 30 2017; January 21
2018. Published in Journal of Integer Sequences, August 22
2018.
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