A REAL-WORLD STOCHASTIC TWO-PERSON GAME

Abstract

This article discusses a real-world application of a terminating two-person stochastic game. The problem comes from a Dutch television game show in which two finalists play a dice game. Each player chooses a number of dice to be rolled. The score of the roll is added to the player's total provided that none of the dice showed the outcome one. The first player reaching a prespecified number of points is the winner. This article discusses the computation and the structure of an optimal strategy.