Well, random still works in the ideal world, but according to these guys [cite to arxiv PDF] you can follow the tells that apparently–to them–we all have.
Comments anyone? What do they call specialists in this field?–I wonder if SD has any lurking about.
From my experience with PRS, fencing, and kendo, where you have an instant to make a choice that basically results in win or death, I don’t think that the answer is to read the other person’s body language (or “tells” as you might call them) so much as very quickly guessing what the other person is going to choose to do given what I know about them, their experience level, and what they did in the previous runs.
People aren’t very good random number generators. Most people, when it comes to PRS, have a pretty simple pattern that they’ll go through. They will also mostly start with the same hand. So if you know the start and you know the progression, you’re basically set to kick their butt. A good fencer knows what you’re going to come at him with and chooses his move based on that. If he can read your body language, then the amount of guess work involved goes down, but fundamentally he’s still just forecasting what you’re going to do based on what he knows and has observed about you.
Good ol’ rock…nothing beats that.
A purely uniform random strategy can’t win, and can’t lose. Any other strategy can be beat by an appropriate corresponding strategy. Therefore, you should always attempt to determine what strategy your opponent is using, and to use the corresponding winning strategy. If you do this and your opponent does not, you will win. If you both attempt to do this, you’ll both end up playing randomly, and will eventually end up tying (though you might lose a few in the short term, if your opponent is better at strategy-recognition than you are).
Let me put this in a bit of context. Standard game theory studies the interactions of members of the species homo economicus, who are very similar to actual humans but a bit more calculating (like how a flood is a bit wet). This paper is studying how we play the game, describing how our strategies differ from that of an idealized actor, and proposing a relatively simple model that describes how we play.
That paper is a bit over my head, but would I be right in saying that a winning strategy might be to assume that an opponent will repeat any winning play, and not repeat a losing play?
What do The Professor and Mary Ann have to do with Game Theory and Poker Strategy?
“PRS”? You guys call it paper, rock, scissors? That’s just plain weird.
RPS is a game.
PRS is an electric guitar maker (very good one!)
Don’t confuse the two!
You could say that, but only with a suitable definition for “a play”. A play might be “Throw Rock”, for instance, but it might also be “Throw whatever beats what my opponent just threw”.
Did they address Rock, Paper, Scissors, Lizard, Spock?
I do. I was never able to keep the order straight, so I ended up with the ordering which slid off the tongue easiest, instead of the common order.
Is your head made of rock?
My strategy is to play randomly the first go, then just repeat whatever the other player did every subsequent go. Seems to work OK.
with a paper hat:)
Unless, of course, your opponent figures out that that’s your strategy, in which case they can win every time.