Complexity Results about Nash Equilibria
Abstract
Noncooperative game theory provides a normative framework for analyzing strategic interactions. However, for the toolbox to be operational, the solutions it defines will have to be computed. In this paper, we provide a single reduction that 1) demonstrates NP-hardness of determining whether Nash equilibria with certain natural properties exist, and 2) demonstrates the #P-hardness of counting Nash equilibria (or connected sets of Nash equilibria). We also show that 3) determining whether a pure-strategy Bayes-Nash equilibrium exists is NP-hard, and that 4) determining whether a pure-strategy Nash equilibrium exists in a stochastic (Markov) game is PSPACE-hard even if the game is invisible (this remains NP-hard if the game is finite). All of our hardness results hold even if there are only two players and the game is symmetric. Keywords: Nash equilibrium; game theory; computational complexity; noncooperative game theory; normal form game; stochastic game; Markov game; Bayes-Nash equilibrium; multiagent systems.
- Publication:
-
arXiv e-prints
- Pub Date:
- May 2002
- arXiv:
- arXiv:cs/0205074
- Bibcode:
- 2002cs........5074C
- Keywords:
-
- Computer Science - Computer Science and Game Theory;
- Computer Science - Computational Complexity;
- Computer Science - Multiagent Systems;
- I.2.11
- E-Print:
- In Proceedings of the 18th International Joint Conference on Artificial Intelligence (IJCAI-03), Acapulco, Mexico, 2003