Nash Equilibrium

[Gabriel]

I was reading through the game documentation last night when I found an interesting bullet point under Rule SC14

Ties are allowed. In the event of a tie, all 4 teams get the total of the scores of both the RED and BLUE alliances.

Maybe I'm misreading this but that tieing the game will effectively double everyone's score!

This revalation got me thinking, maybe instead of competing with each other the best solution is for the teams to "rig the match" before the game begins. What if all 4 teams work together on a plan to tie each other. They can then use their resources to help each other out, getting a higher score.

I realize that this works much better in theory than in practice, and that it will take some VERY careful planning and execution to succeed, but does anyone think its worth a shot? What if each team got half the tubs in their scoring zone, a stack of say, 3 and allowed 1 robot per team on the endzone at the end (and pushed the last odd tub out of play)? By my quick calculation, each team should be able to get 100 points, thus making each teams final score 200.

The problem is that in order to prevent backstabbing there would need to be some deterrent. How about an informal agreement between a group of teams to "watch each others backs" if one team agrees to enter into this "tieing scenario" and then backstabs another team, they would then have say 8 other teams unwilling to cooperate with them. This alliance is a good way for teams to help each other out "graciously and proffessionally" thus giving everyone a chairmens award advantage.

I don't know, maybe I'm crazy, but maybe cooperation is the best way of going about this game

i understand that to mean that both teams get thier score plus the opponents score..... if you win you get your own score plus TWICE the opponents score.... so winning is still better

besides, it takes all the fun out of it if you rig the match

[n[ate]vw]

Friendly competition would be a lot more exciting than worrying about backstabbing and making sure scores always end up tied.

[Andy A.]

'Rigging' the match is a really good idea in some cases.

Last year, when one of our allies was completley dead, we relized that we had no chance of winning. So we talked to the other teams, and we worked out the match so that we got about 40 points and they got the win. That 40 points was more then we would have gotten had we tried to fight them, and 40 points was acutally higher then most scores for winning teams. Every team one, two of them just won 3 times more.

So ya, the other teams moved up, but we were still over them in standings and our dead ally managed to get a good score with out moving an inch.

I wouldn't use this strategy for every match, but under some circumstances it makes more sense to rig it so everyone wins.

-Andy A.

p.s. It's not cheating.

[Anthony X.]

Gabriel:

You are right that "cooperation" gives the best possible outcome for the group. However, this is not the Nash Equilibrium of this game (in general). The Nash equilibrium is actually the exact opposite where both alliances compete as much as possible with each other because the situation presented is basically a "Prisoners' Dilemma" situation (a very simple to understand yet fascinating problem in game theory).

However, you did hint at a way to avoid the Prisoners' Dilemma, which is to setup a group of teams to "watch each others' backs". This, in theory (see "Iterated Prisoners' Dilemmas"), would tend to increase cooperation but in reality may not because setting up such a group of teams for such a small number of matches (only 5-7 matches per team per event) is rather difficult (not to mention preventing backstabbing from within the group itself )

This is not to say that there won't be any rigged matches though because I am sure that situations will arise in which backstabbing is not advantageous or in which two alliances are really bound by "morality" or "loyalty" which math can't quite seem to model yet .

Just thought I'd put in my 2 cents.

Anthony.

[Colin U.]

I really have to agree with Gabriel it could be a great idea but in physical practice it would be close to impossible with out a great deal of preperation. I doubt that would be possible with every team in the match, And for that matter the entire competition.

[illumanat'i]

while i agree it is a good idea, its not really gracious professionalism... and since you already crossed the line, it would be hard to trust the other team unless you know the people on it (maybe a highschool right next to yours or something)

actually getting the boxes perfectly set up would be kinda hard, and when one box is counted because its corner is in, the other team might whine about how you broke the deal and no one should trust you and blah blah blah

all in all i think ties are more trouble than their worth (fortunately, or some teams can get an easy ticket to the top)

[JJG13]

I don't like the idea of "cooperative victory". Teams that use this will get more qualifing points than much better teams not. I have a good solution. Both teams should get no points if the score is tied. This would add some interesting changes and you wouldn't want to tie for the most points.

[MRL180YTL2002]

Backstabbing....we haven't seen that (starts to cough). Back in 2000, "Big Jimmy" and S.P.A.M. were up, out on the Enstein stage. We couldn't carry any balls so we made a deal with the other alliance that they's carry it. (The most our alliance could score was 10, 5 for each bot on the ramp as we could not hang, so the most they could get was 30 QP) Now they decided to pull away before we could load our last ball and then they double crossed us by putting one of our balls into their trough. In the end we beat them. It was one on one. We won that match, two defensive bots on the ramp. The other alliance, one was on its side and the other pitfully trying to get on the ramp.

RESISTANCE IS FUTILE!!!!!

DO NOT UNDERESTIMATE THE POWER OF S.P.A.M.!!!!!

WE WILL WE WILL S.P.A.M. YOU!!!!!!

(Hey, we even S.P.A.M.med the governor of Florida, Jeb Bush....and watched the security people cringe cause we placed a bumper sticker on his back that read "I LOVE S.P.A.M. 2K")