arXiv subjects

Silvia Heubach

Publications and source records attributed to Silvia Heubach.

11 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2026

On the $\mathcal{P}$-positions of some infinite families of Slow $A$-Nim

We introduce the game Slow $A$-Nim which generalizes a number of recently studied games. Slow $A$-Nim is played on $n$ stacks of tokens, and the set $A$ indicates the number of stacks a player can play on. Once a player has decided on the number $a$ of stacks, s/he will select any $a$ stacks and then remove one token from each stack. The last player to move wins. We give results on the $\mathcal{P}$-positions of Slow $A$-Nim for several infinite families. The results for $A = \{n-1\}$, which is the game Slow Exact $k$-Nim for $k=n-1$ extend recent results for small values of $n$. The other two families, $A=\{n-1,n\}$ and $A=\{1,n\}$ have not been previously studied. The $\mathcal{P}$-positions for $A = \{n-1\}$ and $A = \{n-1,n\}$ are closely related and have a very elegant description in terms of reduced positions, that is, positions for which unplayable tokens are disregarded. We also provide some general results that will be useful in the study of other sets $A$.

math.CO↗

arXiv2026

Necklace Games

We define and give results on the game NecklaceNim NN($n$,$k$) which is PathNim PN($n$,$k$) with an additional move allowed on the end vertices. This game arises as a sub-game in the context of solving CircularNim CN($n$,$k$) when $k-2$ consecutive stacks have been depleted, therefore its solution is critical to solving CircularNim. We solve the infinite families of NN($n$,$k$) when play is allowed on at least half the stacks.

math.CO↗

arXiv2026

The Invariance Reduction Process -- a New Tool to Solve Circular Nim and Related Games

We introduce the notion of invariant vectors of a game and develop the Invariance Reduction Process, which first uses reduction of positions via invariance and then zero and merge reductions of games to arrive at smaller, solved sub-games for closed subspaces of the positions. This process makes it much easier to prove that there are moves from N-positions to P-positions, and can also be used in some cases to show that there are no moves between P-positions. This process is suitable for all variations of the game Nim whose rule sets form a simplicial complex. We rephrase Simplicial Nim as Set Nim SN($n,A$) and derive results on the structure of the P-positions in terms of invariant vectors, without needing the background and notation of simplicial complexes. We also show that invariant vectors differ from the circuits used to describe the P-positions in Simplicial Nim and that invariant vectors have wider applicability compared to circuits. We apply the Invariance Reduction Process to derive results on the P-positions of the family of Path Nim games where play is allowed on at least half the stacks, as well as for the Circular Nim games CN($n,k$) with $n=7, k=3$ and $n=8,k=3$.

math.CO↗

arXiv2021

Circular Nim CN(7,4)

Circular Nim is a two-player impartial combinatorial game consisting of $n$ stacks of tokens placed in a circle. A move consists of choosing $k$ consecutive stacks and taking at least one token from one or more of the stacks. The last player able to make a move wins. The question of interest is: Who can win from a given position if both players play optimally? In an impartial combinatorial game, there are only two types of positions. An $\mathcal{N}$-position is one from which the next player to move has a winning strategy. A $\mathcal{P}$-position is one from which the next player is bound to lose, no matter what moves s/he makes. Therefore, the question who wins is answered by identifying the $\mathcal{P}$-positions. We will prove results on the structure of the $\mathcal{P}$-positions for $n = 7$ and $k = 4$, extending known results for other games in this family. The interesting feature of the set of $\mathcal{P}$-positions of this game is that it splits into different subsets, unlike the structure for the known games in this family.

math.CO↗

arXiv2019

Keeping Your Distance is Hard

We study the computational complexity of distance games, a class of combinatorial games played on graphs. A move consists of colouring an uncoloured vertex subject to it not being at certain distances determined by two sets, D and S. D is the set of forbidden distances for colouring vertices in different colors, while S is the set of forbidden distances for the same colour. The last player to move wins. Well-known examples of distance games are Node-Kayles, Snort, and Col, whose complexities were shown to be PSPACE-hard. We show that many more distance games are also PSPACE-hard.

cs.CC↗

arXiv2016

A misère play $\star$-operator

We study the $\star$-operator (Larsson et al. 2011) of impartial vector subtraction games (Golomb 1965). Here we extend the notion to the misère-play convention, and prove convergence and other properties; notably more structure is obtained under misère-play as compared with the normal-play convention (Larsson 2012).

math.CO↗

arXiv2015

Building Nim

The game of nim, with its simple rules, its elegant solution and its historical importance is the quintessence of a combinatorial game, which is why it led to so many generalizations and modifications. We present a modification with a new spin: building nim. With given finite numbers of tokens and stacks, this two-player game is played in two stages (thus belonging to the same family of games as e.g. nine-men's morris): first building, where players alternate to put one token on one of the, initially empty, stacks until all tokens have been used. Then, the players play nim. Of course, because the solution for the game of nim is known, the goal of the player who starts nim play is a placement of the tokens so that the Nim-sum of the stack heights at the end of building is different from 0. This game is trivial if the total number of tokens is odd as the Nim-sum could never be 0, or if both the number of tokens and the number of stacks are even, since a simple mimicking strategy results in a Nim-sum of 0 after each of the second player's moves. We present the solution for this game for some non-trivial cases and state a general conjecture.

cs.DM↗

arXiv2012

Circular Nim Games

A circular Nim game is a two player impartial combinatorial game consisting of n stacks of tokens placed in a circle. A move consists of choosing k consecutive stacks, and taking at least one token from one or more of the k stacks. The last player able to make a move wins. We prove results on the structure of the losing positions for small n and k and pose some open questions for further investigations.

math.CO↗

arXiv2009

Avoiding substrings in compositons

A classical result by Guibas and Odlyzko obtained in 1981 gives the generating function for the number of strings that avoid a given set of substrings with the property that no substring is contained in any of the others. In this paper, we give an analogue of this result for the enumeration of compositions that avoid a given set of prohibited substrings, subject to the compositions' length (number of parts) and weight. We also give examples of families of strings to be avoided that allow for an explicit formula for the generating function. Our results extend recent results by Myers on avoidance of strings in compositions subject to weight, but not length.

math.CO↗

arXiv2006

Partially ordered patterns and compositions

A partially ordered (generalized) pattern (POP) is a generalized pattern some of whose letters are incomparable, an extension of generalized permutation patterns introduced by Babson and Steingrimsson. POPs were introduced in the symmetric group by Kitaev [Partially ordered generalized patterns, Discrete Math. 298 (2005), 212-229; Introduction to partially ordered patterns, Discrete Appl. Math., to appear], and studied in the set of $k$-ary words by Kitaev and Mansour [Partially ordered generalized patterns and $k$-ary words, Annals of Combinatorics 7 (2003) 191-200]. Moreover, Kitaev et al. [S. Kitaev, T. McAllister and K. Petersen, Enumerating segmented patterns in compositions and encoding with restricted permutations, preprint] introduced segmented POPs in compositions. In this paper, we study avoidance of POPs in compositions and generalize results for avoidance of POPs in permutations and words. Specifically, we obtain results for the generating functions for the number of compositions that avoid shuffle patterns and multi-patterns. In addition, we give the generating function for the distribution of the maximum number of non-overlapping occurrences of a segmented POP $τ$ (that is allowed to have repeated letters) among the compositions of $n$ with $m$ parts in a given set, provided we know the generating function for the number of compositions of $n$ with $m$ parts in the given set that avoid $τ$. This result is a $q$-analogue of the main result in [S. Kitaev, T. Mansour, Partially ordered generalized patterns and $k$-ary words, Annals of Combinatorics 7 (2003) 191-200].

math.CO↗

arXiv2003

Counting rises, levels, and drops in compositions

A composition of $n\in\NN$ is an ordered collection of one or more positive integers whose sum is $n$. The number of summands is called the number of parts of the composition. A palindromic composition of $n$ is a composition of $n$ in which the summands are the same in the given or in reverse order. In this paper we study the generating function for the number of compositions (respectively palindromic compositions) of $n$ with $m$ parts in a given set $A\subseteq\NN$ with respect to the number of rises, levels, and drops. As a consequence, we derive all the previously known results for this kind of problem, as well as many new results.

math.CO↗