If ever Dan challenges you to a game of Chainmail Jousting, don’t do it. Just don’t do it! He has a system…
—Paul Siegel, Wandering DMs
I was properly warned. But when I got an email from Wandering DMs co-host Dan Collins earlier this week with the subject line: “Jousting Sunday?,” did I heed the warning? Of course not, I’m an adventurer after all.
This week on Wandering DMs, Dan and I tilt in the lists. My strategy is based on an analysis of Chainmail’s Jousting Matrix, described in “Strategy on the Jousting Matrix.” I rank each aiming point and defensive position using a simple point system.
Dan’s strategy is based on the Nash equilibrium. It’s a math thing. Dan is a math guy. Essentially, as Dan explains, the goal of calculating the Nash equilibrium is to “optimize the possibly-infinite sequence of ‘if you know that I know that you know that I know…’ decisions.” Or, as I understand it, Dan fed the Jousting Matrix to the machine, which coughed up the optimal strategy for winning a joust, and Dan turned the results into a weighted table.
It’s an age-old scenario: a human does a thing well until some other human builds a machine that does it better, faster, stronger… I’m not talking Steve Austin. I’m talking less fictional characters against automated opponents: John Henry vs. the steam drill, Garry Kasparov vs. Deep Blue, Jeopardy! champions vs. Watson.
In all these cases—guess what—the machine wins! Have I got a chance…?
