Comparing Strategies to Play a 2-Sided Dominoes Game

Abstract

This work presents four agents with different strategies to play a version of the 2-sided dominoes game, usually played in Minas Gerais state, Brazil. This incomplete information game must be played with two players and the goal is to discard all tiles first according to the rules. Each pair of agents was tested in a computational experiment, for 1,000,000 matches, in order to evaluate the individual effectiveness. In the first strategy, the agent uses random rules to select an adequate tile, the second agent observes the tiles already on the table and on its hand and selects one using a simple probability information computed in an amateur way, the third strategy also observes the tiles on the table and on the hand, and computes a probability information using the two end tiles of the table and the candidates opposite values in order to decide which one must be thrown, in the last strategy, the agent uses the third strategy and the Boltzmann exploration with a roulette wheel to select the tile. The results showed that the last strategy is the best and that even the random strategy is capable to win a significant number of matches.