Simplified three player Kuhn poker

We study a very small three player poker game (one-third street Kuhn poker), and a simplified version of the game that is interesting because it has three distinct equilibrium solutions. For one-third street Kuhn poker, we are able to find all of the equilibrium solutions analytically. For large eno...

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Main Author: Billingham, John
Format: Monograph
Published: Arxiv 2017
Online Access:https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/44077/
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author Billingham, John
author_facet Billingham, John
author_sort Billingham, John
building Nottingham Research Data Repository
collection Online Access
description We study a very small three player poker game (one-third street Kuhn poker), and a simplified version of the game that is interesting because it has three distinct equilibrium solutions. For one-third street Kuhn poker, we are able to find all of the equilibrium solutions analytically. For large enough pot size, P, there is a degree of freedom in the solution that allows one player to transfer profit between the other two players without changing their own profit. This has potentially interesting consequences in repeated play of the game. We also show that in a simplified version of the game with P>5, there is one equilibrium solution if 5<P<P∗≡(5+sqrt(73))/2, and three distinct equilibrium solutions if P>P∗. This may be the simplest non-trivial multiplayer poker game with more than one distinct equilibrium solution and provides us with a test case for theories of dynamic strategy adjustment over multiple realisations of the game. We then study a third order system of ordinary differential equations that models the dynamics of three players who try to maximise their expectation by continuously varying their betting frequencies. We find that the dynamics of this system are oscillatory, with two distinct types of solution. We then study a difference equation model, based on repeated play of the game, in which each player continually updates their estimates of the other players' betting frequencies. We find that the dynamics are noisy, but basically oscillatory for short enough estimation periods and slow enough frequency adjustments, but that the dynamics can be very different for other parameter values.
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institution University of Nottingham Malaysia Campus
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publishDate 2017
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spelling nottingham-440772024-08-15T15:22:28Z https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/44077/ Simplified three player Kuhn poker Billingham, John We study a very small three player poker game (one-third street Kuhn poker), and a simplified version of the game that is interesting because it has three distinct equilibrium solutions. For one-third street Kuhn poker, we are able to find all of the equilibrium solutions analytically. For large enough pot size, P, there is a degree of freedom in the solution that allows one player to transfer profit between the other two players without changing their own profit. This has potentially interesting consequences in repeated play of the game. We also show that in a simplified version of the game with P>5, there is one equilibrium solution if 5<P<P∗≡(5+sqrt(73))/2, and three distinct equilibrium solutions if P>P∗. This may be the simplest non-trivial multiplayer poker game with more than one distinct equilibrium solution and provides us with a test case for theories of dynamic strategy adjustment over multiple realisations of the game. We then study a third order system of ordinary differential equations that models the dynamics of three players who try to maximise their expectation by continuously varying their betting frequencies. We find that the dynamics of this system are oscillatory, with two distinct types of solution. We then study a difference equation model, based on repeated play of the game, in which each player continually updates their estimates of the other players' betting frequencies. We find that the dynamics are noisy, but basically oscillatory for short enough estimation periods and slow enough frequency adjustments, but that the dynamics can be very different for other parameter values. Arxiv 2017-04-25 Monograph NonPeerReviewed Billingham, John (2017) Simplified three player Kuhn poker. Working Paper. Arxiv. (Unpublished)
spellingShingle Billingham, John
Simplified three player Kuhn poker
title Simplified three player Kuhn poker
title_full Simplified three player Kuhn poker
title_fullStr Simplified three player Kuhn poker
title_full_unstemmed Simplified three player Kuhn poker
title_short Simplified three player Kuhn poker
title_sort simplified three player kuhn poker
url https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/44077/