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kyrvin  ·  2989 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Red vs. Blue

I'm either overthinking this or we're missing some vital piece of information.

If Red is compelled to play under penalty of death, then Red doesn't care what move he makes as he gets no points either way. From Blue's perspective, Red then has a 50/50 chance between moves 1 and 2. As such, Blue has to choose between a 50/50 shot at 3 points or 6 points, or a 50/50 shot at 5 points or 4 points. This is a question of how risk averse Blue is, since he averages 4.5 points either way.

If Blue has to pay Red to play, and assuming Red can refuse to play (thus denying Blue any points), then Red would demand 2 points to play at the minimum, as that's the only way Blue is guaranteed to win any points (move 1, 1 becomes 0 for Blue if Red demands 3 points). However, even if Red demands 3 points, It still comes down to how risk averse Blue is, does Blue choose move 2, winning either 5 points or 4 points and paying 3 points to Red, making his outcome either 2 points or 1 point, or does Blue choose move 1 and risk getting 0 points for the chance winning 3 points.

This seems to be a question of how risk averse Blue is since Red's payoff isn't determined by which move he/she makes.