The additive three-action friendly-versus-antagonistic discrepancy criterion

From papers

Let S={s3,s2,s1}S=\{s_3,s_2,s_1\} with s3<s2<s1s_3<s_2<s_1, and suppose the largest subtraction is additive:

s1=s3+s2.s_1=s_3+s_2.

Let a friendly/antagonistic discrepancy mean a difference between the FvF and AvA self-interest games. Additive discrepancy conjecture. There exists a heap with a friendly/antagonistic discrepancy if and only if

s2s3k\frac{s_2}{s_3}\neq k

for every kNk\in\mathbb{N}. When this holds, the first such heap is

x=(i+2)s2+is1=is3+(2i+2)s2,x=(i+2)s_2+is_1=is_3+(2i+2)s_2,

where iNi\in\mathbb{N} satisfies

i+1>s2s3>i.i+1>\frac{s_2}{s_3}>i.

The statement is based on the paper's computational investigation and is presented without a proof.

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Sources & referencesView supporting material

Primary source

Anjali Bhagat, Tanmay Kulkarni, Urban Larsson and Divya Murali, “Tie-breaking in self interest cumulative subtraction games”, arXiv:2510.24280 (2026).

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