Minicourse, 2019 Fall Semester

Description

Miloš Stojaković (University of Novi Sad): Introduction to Positional Games

Short summary: Positional Game Theory provides a solid mathematical footing for a variety of two-player games of perfect information, usually played on discrete objects (like graphs), with a number of applications in other branches of mathematics and computer science. The field is just a few decades old, and it has experienced a considerable growth in recent years. Our goal is to introduce some basic concepts and notions, followed by recent results and numerous open problems.
The prerequisites include undergraduate knowledge of discrete mathematics and probability, and the lectures could be of interest to people with a wide range of backgrounds and different levels of seniority.
Topics that will be covered include: definition and types of positional game, Tic-Tac-Toe generalizations, some general criteria determining the winner, positional games on graphs, several standard games on graphs (Connectivity, Perfect Matching, Hamiltonicity, Fixed Graph), biased games and threshold biases, Avoider-Enforcer games - strict and monotone, positional games on random boards.

Organized by MTA-ELTE CoGe.

Time, place and credits

When: 2019 September 2-6, each day from 10-12.

Where: ELTE Déli Tömb, 3-607

Credits: ELTE PhD and MSc students can take the course in Neptun to receive credits. Neptun code and name: posgam1u0_m17ex, Bevezetés a pozíciós játékokba.