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69 votes
7 answers
17k views

What is a chess piece mathematically?

Historically, the current "standard" set of chess pieces wasn't the only existing alternative or even the standard one. For instance, the famous Al-Suli's Diamond Problem (which remained ...
1 vote
1 answer
147 views

Name for an easy combinatorial game

What is the name of the following combinatorial game: Two players, moving in turn. Positions: $0,1,2,\ldots$. Moves: $n\longmapsto n-1$ or $n\longmapsto \lfloor n/2\rfloor$ if $n>0$. No move for $0$...
3 votes
4 answers
2k views

A chess question of W.T. Tutte [closed]

In "Graph theory as I have known it", p.12, Knights Errant, the late Tutte mentions as an aside the chess question "Does either Black or White have a certain win from the initial ...
6 votes
0 answers
186 views

Combinatorial game similar to Sprouts

Is there a name for the following combinatorial game? Is there a solution which player has a winning strategy? Basically this game is "Sprouts without midpoints". One starts with $n$ points in the ...
3 votes
1 answer
337 views

Minimal Birthdays

In combinatorial game theory: The birthday of a game is defined recursively as 1 plus the maximal birthday of its options, with the zero game having birthday 0. Suppose we define the quasi-birthday ...
5 votes
0 answers
306 views

Generalization of Sprague-Grundy Theorem

In my research on Combinatorial Game Theory, I used a certain theorem that is essentially a generalization of the Sprague-Grundy theorem. Because the result hinges too much on the work of others to be ...
1 vote
0 answers
168 views

What is known about infinite diminished disjunctive compounds of loopfree partizan combinatorial games?

Background Basic theories of loopy (normal-play) games which may go on forever under the usual disjunctive sum (the game ends when there are no moves available for you in any component on your turn) ...
1 vote
0 answers
389 views

Has anyone seen this version of ring toss (combinatorial object) before?

In reference to a question on work of Westzynthius and another question relating to Jacobsthal's function, I have formed a game which I immodestly call Paseman's Ring Toss. I hope that it has been ...
3 votes
1 answer
1k views

Sprague-Grundy sequence for the ruler game

Consider the game "Ruler", which is defined as follows. We start with finitely many coins in a line. A move in this game consists of turning over any number of coins, but they must be consecutive, ...