![]() ![]() There's no guarantee that using the strategy will invariably result in success. ![]() Round 3: Don plays scissors, I play rock. Round 2: Don plays paper, I play scissors. Or if you're a stupid teenager, you could basically ensure your friends never have children again by gaming a few rounds of rock-paper-balls. Whoa. Yes - assuming that Chinese players are the same as Western ones, you too could exploit these patterns to gain a significant edge in rock-paper-scissors. Zhijian and co say that players who win tend to stick with the same action while those who lose switch to the next action in a clockwise direction (where R → P → S is clockwise)." On average, the players in all the groups chose each action about a third of the time, which is exactly as expected if their choices were random."But a closer inspection of their behavior reveals something else. If a loss is worth nothing and a tie worth 1, the winning payout varied from 1.1 to 100."The results reveal a surprising pattern of behavior. To test how this incentive influenced the strategy, Zhijian and co varied the payout for different groups. From MIT's Technology Review summarizes the experiment, which sorted 360 students into 60 groups of six players who played 300 rounds each: "As an incentive, the winners were paid in local currency in proportion to the number of their victories. ![]() Researcher Zhijian Wang at China's Zhejiang University and his colleagues have demonstrated that people actually follow a pattern when playing the game, allowing anyone to become an absolute bet-ruining beast in a matter of seconds. Game theorists have basically hacked rock-paper-scissors and may have ruined it forever. While patterns do emerge during gameplay, they are neutralized by the unpredictability of the other player’s choice.The news: It's impossible to consistently win in a pure game of rock-paper-scissors, right? The best you can do is guess randomly, hoping that the statistically even odds will work out slightly in your favor.Christie's won because as the Chairman's daughters said "Everyone chooses scissors." X Research source X Research source In fact, Sotheby's and Christie's Auction Houses once played the game to decide who would auction an $18M art collection and earn a nearly $3M commission. Rock, Paper, Scissors can be used to decide anything from what movie you see with your friends to who should inherit a collection of priceless paintings. ![]() The idea is that both players have an equal chance of winning, making the game random but fair. In most cases, Rock, Paper, Scissors is played as a means to help make a choice or put an end to a disagreement. Maybe you’re trying to decide who gets the last slice of pizza or who should be first in line to try out a new waterslide. Unless you’re playing for amusement, some issue will normally be hanging in the balance. Think of an issue that needs to be settled. ![]()
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