Jeroen Donkers wrote: > -- CALL FOR PARTICIPATION --- <...snip...> > What is RoShamBo? > ----------------- > > RoShamBo is a game played all over the world. In Japan, where it is very > popular, it is called Jan Ken and in the USA and England they call it > Rock-Paper-Scissors. The game is quite simple. Two players sit facing each > other and on a sign they first stamp three times with the right fist in the > open left hand and then they simultaneously make a gesture with their right > hand. <...snip...> > Computer-RoShamBo! > ------------------ > The purpose of the competition is to write a Java program that can play > RoShamBo. Your program will play against all other participating programs > and the program winning the most games is the champion.
Forgive me for being skeptical, but enlighten me, please ... won't the wins be based purely on random luck rather than any outstanding mathematical logic, or rather than any outstanding computer programming? If so, what is the point of declaring a champion? > When you write a RoShamBo program you must keep the following in mind. From > a mathematical point of view, the best approach is to play randomly (with > equal probability on the three gestures). In the long term, nobody can beat > you then. However, this does not help you in a competition like this, > because we do not play long enough. Therefore, > you should try to predict the moves of your opponent and react on that, or > you should try to be smarter than your opponent. So, if you had an infinite number of turns, the best strategy is to use equal probability on each outcome. No problem, I understand that. But because you play a finite number of turns, some other strategy might be better ... this is where I'm having trouble understanding ... could someone give an example of why a non-equal-probability strategy here works in the short run better than an equal-probability strategy would work? -- Paige Miller Eastman Kodak Company [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.kodak.com "It's nothing until I call it!" -- Bill Klem, NL Umpire "When you get the choice to sit it out or dance, I hope you dance" -- Lee Ann Womack . . ================================================================= Instructions for joining and leaving this list, remarks about the problem of INAPPROPRIATE MESSAGES, and archives are available at: . http://jse.stat.ncsu.edu/ . =================================================================
