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The Communication Complexity of Uncoupled Nash Equilibrium Procedures

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  • Sergiu Hart
  • Yishay Mansour

Abstract

We study the question of how long it takes players to reach a Nash equilibrium in "uncoupled" setups, where each player initially knows only his own payoff function. We derive lower bounds on the number of bits that need to be transmitted in order to reach a Nash equilibrium, and thus also on the required number of steps. Specifically, we show lower bounds that are exponential in the number of players in each one of the following cases: (1) reaching a pure Nash equilibrium; (2) reaching a pure Nash equilibrium in a Bayesian setting; and (3) reaching a mixed Nash equilibrium. Finally, we show that some very simple and naive procedures lead to similar exponential upper bounds.

Suggested Citation

  • Sergiu Hart & Yishay Mansour, 2006. "The Communication Complexity of Uncoupled Nash Equilibrium Procedures," Discussion Paper Series dp419, The Federmann Center for the Study of Rationality, the Hebrew University, Jerusalem.
    • Handle: RePEc:huj:dispap:dp419
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Fudenberg, Drew & Levine, David, 1998. "Learning in games," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 42(3-5), pages 631-639, May.
    2. Sergiu Hart, 2013. "Adaptive Heuristics," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Simple Adaptive Strategies From Regret-Matching to Uncoupled Dynamics, chapter 11, pages 253-287, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    3. Sergiu Hart & Andreu Mas-Colell, 2013. "A General Class Of Adaptive Strategies," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Simple Adaptive Strategies From Regret-Matching to Uncoupled Dynamics, chapter 3, pages 47-76, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    4. Foster, Dean P. & Young, H. Peyton, 2003. "Learning, hypothesis testing, and Nash equilibrium," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 45(1), pages 73-96, October.
    5. Aumann, Robert J., 1974. "Subjectivity and correlation in randomized strategies," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 1(1), pages 67-96, March.
    6. Sergiu Hart & Andreu Mas-Colell, 2013. "A Simple Adaptive Procedure Leading To Correlated Equilibrium," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Simple Adaptive Strategies From Regret-Matching to Uncoupled Dynamics, chapter 2, pages 17-46, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    7. Drew Fudenberg & David K. Levine, 1998. "The Theory of Learning in Games," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262061945, December.
    8. Sergiu Hart & Andreu Mas-Colell, 2013. "Uncoupled Dynamics Do Not Lead To Nash Equilibrium," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Simple Adaptive Strategies From Regret-Matching to Uncoupled Dynamics, chapter 7, pages 153-163, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    9. Stoltz, Gilles & Lugosi, Gabor, 2007. "Learning correlated equilibria in games with compact sets of strategies," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 59(1), pages 187-208, April.
    10. Germano, Fabrizio & Lugosi, Gabor, 2007. "Global Nash convergence of Foster and Young's regret testing," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 60(1), pages 135-154, July.
    11. Foster, Dean P. & Vohra, Rakesh V., 1997. "Calibrated Learning and Correlated Equilibrium," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 21(1-2), pages 40-55, October.
    12. Amotz Cahn, 2004. "General procedures leading to correlated equilibria," International Journal of Game Theory, Springer;Game Theory Society, vol. 33(1), pages 21-40, January.
    13. Dean P Foster & Peyton Young, 2006. "Regret Testing Leads to Nash Equilibrium," Levine's Working Paper Archive 784828000000000676, David K. Levine.
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    Cited by:

    1. Levin, Hagay & Schapira, Michael & Zohar, Aviv, 2008. "Interdomain routing and games," MPRA Paper 8476, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    2. J. Jordan, 2009. "Communication complexity and stability of equilibria in economies and games," Review of Economic Design, Springer;Society for Economic Design, vol. 13(1), pages 115-135, April.
    3. Yakov Babichenko, 2012. "Best-Reply Dynamics in Large Anonymous Games," Discussion Paper Series dp600, The Federmann Center for the Study of Rationality, the Hebrew University, Jerusalem.
    4. Tim Roughgarden, 2010. "Computing equilibria: a computational complexity perspective," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 42(1), pages 193-236, January.

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