An anti-phase game strategy
is often required to win in two-person sports. When we first learn any
two-person sport we are usually uncoordinated at first. In a ‘sport’ like
ballroom dancing we very quickly learn to get our movements in anti-phase with the
other person. It matters not which role who is playing predator (moving forward)
or prey (moving backwards). Alternating that phase relationship may result in
severe digital consequences.
Experts will intuitively
move to be coordinate phase, not just in ballroom dancing, but also in games such as
tennis when long rallies develop. Not counting shot misplacements, such rallies
are usually won by the player who moves to change the phase condition by moving in
a different direction to place the ball in a position unexpected by the
opposing player.
Kijima et al set out to study the way the dynamics and phase relationships
develop in a two-person game and they present their information in yesterday’s
PLoS ONE (1). They chose their university soccer team to learn a new game. (The
goalie was left behind to tend his net.)
The game they had to play
was called Play-Tag. It is played in a 5m square ring. (Why a square is called
a ring is a subject for another day.) Each player has a chunk of nylon fabric Velcroed
to each hip. The players have to rip off one of the tags of their opponent to
win. The game can be played to
exhaustion. The experimental program consisted of 10 trials for each pair.
At first the players were
uncoordinated as they played predator and prey and tried to work out the best
strategy – should they minimize the risk of losing a tag or maximize their
chance of gaining a tag?
These were all smart, able
sportsmen who are used to anticipating teammates and opponents movements, but
it took most of the trials before a general strategy evolved. The movement of
the pairs ended up in an anti-phase coordination as the strategy to minimize
their risk of loss took precedence. The result was that the anti-phase game
strategy moved towards deadlock and long games.
Predator-prey alternation occurred
with the players choosing a strategy in with neither have anything to gain by
only changing his own strategy if he does the risk is too great, hence the
deadlock until a mistake through something like fatigue occurs.
These sorts of insights
into game theories have applications to all sorts of other activities such as
business negotiations. Even election politics when deadlock comes to the
surface.
- http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0047911
