The Judgment of the Council of Sages proceeds as follows: the king arranges the sages in a line and places either a white hat, black hat or a red hat on each sage's head. Each sage can see the color of the hats of the sages in front of him, but not of his own hat or of the hats of the sages behind him. Then one by one (in an order of their choosing), each sage guesses a color. Afterward, the king executes those sages who did not correctly guess the color of their own hat. The day before, the Council meets and decides to minimize the number of executions. What is the smallest number of sages guaranteed to survive in this case? [i]K. Knop[/i] P.S. Of course, the sages hear the previous guesses. See also [url]http://www.artofproblemsolving.com/Forum/viewtopic.php?f=42&t=530552[/url]

We have $10,000$ identical equilateral triangles. Consider the largest regular hexagon that can be formed with these triangles without overlapping. How many triangles will not be used?

On an exam there are 5 questions, each with 4 possible answers. 2000 students went on the exam and each of them chose one answer to each of the questions. Find the least possible value of $n$, for which it is possible for the answers that the students gave to have the following property: From every $n$ students there are 4, among each, every 2 of them have no more than 3 identical answers.

Ana and Beta play a turn-based game on a $m \times n$ board. Ana begins. At the beginning, there is a stone in the lower left square and the objective is to move it to the upper right corner. A move consists of the player moving the stone to the right or up as many squares as the player wants. Find all the values ​​of $(m, n)$ for which Ana can guarantee victory.

Arnaldo and Bernaldo play a game where they alternate saying natural numbers, and the winner is the one who says $0$. In each turn except the first the possible moves are determined from the previous number $n$ in the following way: write \[n =\sum_{m\in O_n}2^m;\] the valid numbers are the elements $m$ of $O_n$. That way, for example, after Arnaldo says $42= 2^5 + 2^3 + 2^1$, Bernaldo must respond with $5$, $3$ or $1$. We define the sets $A,B\subset \mathbb{N}$ in the following way. We have $n\in A$ iff Arnaldo, saying $n$ in his first turn, has a winning strategy; analogously, we have $n\in B$ iff Bernaldo has a winning strategy if Arnaldo says $n$ during his first turn. This way, \[A =\{0, 2, 8, 10,\cdots\}, B = \{1, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 9,\cdots\}\] Define $f:\mathbb{N}\to \mathbb{N}$ by $f(n)=|A\cap \{0,1,\cdots,n-1\}|$. For example, $f(8) = 2$ and $f(11)=4$. Find \[\lim_{n\to\infty}\frac{f(n)\log(n)^{2005}}{n}\]

Benji has a $2\times 2$ grid, which he proceeds to place chips on. One by one, he places a chip on one of the unit squares of the grid at random. However, if at any point there is more than one chip on the same square, Benji moves two chips on that square to the two adjacent squares, which he calls a chip-fire. He keeps adding chips until there is an infinite loop of chip-fires. What is the expected number of chips that will be added to the board?

$a_1,a_2,\ldots,a_n$ is a sequence of positive integers that has at least $\frac {2n}{3}+1$ distinct numbers and each positive integer has occurred at most three times in it. Prove that there exists a permutation  $b_1,b_2,\ldots,b_n$ of $a_i $'s such that all the $n$ sums $b_i+b_{i+1}$ are distinct ($1\le i\le n $ , $b_{n+1}\equiv b_1 $) [i]Proposed by Mohsen Jamali[/i]

On a square of a chessboard there is a pawn . Two players take turns to move it to another square, subject to the rule that , at each move the distance moved is strictly greater than that of the previous move. A player loses when unable to make a move on his turn. Who wins if the players always choose the best strategy? (The pawn is always placed in the centre of its square. ) ( F . L . Nazarov)

In a deck of $n > 1$ cards, some digits from $1$ to$8$are written on each card. A digit may occur more than once, but at most once on a certain card. On each card at least one digit is written, and no two cards are denoted by the same set of digits. Suppose that for every $k=1,2,\dots,7$ digits, the number of cards that contain at least one of them is even. Find $n$.

The $8 \times 8$ board is covered with the same shape as in the picture to the right (each of the shapes can be rotated $90^o$) so that any two do not overlap or extend beyond the edge of the chessboard. Determine the largest possible number of fields of this chessboard can be covered as described above. [img]https://cdn.artofproblemsolving.com/attachments/e/5/d7f44f37857eb115edad5ea26400cdca04e107.png[/img]

Two players by turn paint the circles on the given picture each with his colour. At the end, the rest of the area of each of small triangles is painted by the colour of the majority of vertices of this triangle. The winner is one who gets larger area of his colour (the area of circles is taken into account). Does any of them have winning strategy? If yes, then who wins? \[ \begin{picture}(60,60) \put(5,3){\put(3,0){\line(6,0){8}} \put(17,0){\line(6,0){8}} \put(31,0){\line(6,0){8}} \put(45,0){\line(6,0){8}} \put(10,14){\line(6,0){8}} \put(24,14){\line(6,0){8}} \put(38,14){\line(6,0){8}} \put(17,28){\line(6,0){8}} \put(31,28){\line(6,0){8}} \put(24,42){\line(6,0){8}} \put(1,2){\line(1,2){5}} \put(15,2){\line(1,2){5}} \put(29,2){\line(1,2){5}} \put(43,2){\line(1,2){5}} \put(8,16){\line(1,2){5}} \put(22,16){\line(1,2){5}} \put(36,16){\line(1,2){5}} \put(15,30){\line(1,2){5}} \put(29,30){\line(1,2){5}} \put(22,44){\line(1,2){5}} \put(13,2){\line( \minus{} 1,2){5}} \put(27,2){\line( \minus{} 1,2){5}} \put(41,2){\line( \minus{} 1,2){5}} \put(55,2){\line( \minus{} 1,2){5}} \put(20,16){\line( \minus{} 1,2){5}} \put(34,16){\line( \minus{} 1,2){5}} \put(48,16){\line( \minus{} 1,2){5}} \put(27,30){\line( \minus{} 1,2){5}} \put(41,30){\line( \minus{} 1,2){5}} \put(34,44){\line( \minus{} 1,2){5}} \put(0,0){\circle{6}} \put(14,0){\circle{6}} \put(28,0){\circle{6}} \put(42,0){\circle{6}} \put(56,0){\circle{6}} \put(7,14){\circle{6}} \put(21,14){\circle{6}} \put(35,14){\circle{6}} \put(49,14){\circle{6}} \put(14,28){\circle{6}} \put(28,28){\circle{6}} \put(42,28){\circle{6}} \put(21,42){\circle{6}} \put(35,42){\circle{6}} \put(28,56){\circle{6}}} \end{picture}\]

Let $n$ be an integer greater than 2. A positive integer is said to be [i]attainable [/i]if it is 1 or can be obtained from 1 by a sequence of operations with the following properties: 1.) The first operation is either addition or multiplication. 2.) Thereafter, additions and multiplications are used alternately. 3.) In each addition, one can choose independently whether to add 2 or $n$ 4.) In each multiplication, one can choose independently whether to multiply by 2 or by $n$. A positive integer which cannot be so obtained is said to be [i]unattainable[/i]. [b]a.)[/b] Prove that if $n\geq 9$, there are infinitely many unattainable positive integers. [b]b.)[/b] Prove that if $n=3$, all positive integers except 7 are attainable.

Determine whether it's possible to cover a $K_{2012}$ with a) 1000 $K_{1006}$'s; b) 1000 $K_{1006,1006}$'s. [i]David Yang.[/i]

For $n \ge 2$, consider $n$ boxes aligned from left to right. In each box, one puts a ball that can be red, blue or white such that the following condition is fullled: [i]Each box is neighboring at least one box containing a ball of the same color.[/i] We denote by $I_n$ the number of such congurations. a) Determine $I_{11}$. Justify your answer. b) Find, with proof, the general formula for $I_n$.

Let $n,a,b,c$ be natural numbers. Every point on the coordinate plane with integer coordinates is colored in one of $n$ colors. Prove there exists $c$ triangles whose vertices are colored in the same color, which are pairwise congruent, and which have a side whose lenght is divisible by $a$ and a side whose lenght is divisible by $b$.

Let positive real numbers $ a,b$ satisfy $ b \minus{} a > 2.$ Prove that for any two distinct integers $ m,n$ belonging to $ [a,b),$ there always exists non-empty set $ S$ consisting of certain integers belonging to $ [ab,(a \plus{} 1)(b \plus{} 1))$ such that $ \frac {\displaystyle\prod_{x\in S}}{mn}$ is square of a rational number.

Anne has thought of a finite set $A \subseteq \mathbb{R}^2 $ . Bob does not know how many elements $A$ has, but his goal is to completely determine $A$. To achieve this, Bob can chooseany point $b \in \mathbb{R}^2 $ and ask Anne how far it is from$ A$ . Anne replies with the distance, defined as $min \{d(a, b) | a \in A\}$. (Here $d(a, b)$ denotes the distance between points $a, b \in \mathbb{R}$ .) Bob can ask as many questions of this type as he wants, until he can determine A with certainty. a) Can Bob achieve his goal with finitely many questions? b) What if Anne tells Bob in advance that all points of A have both coordinates in the interval$\ [0, 1]\ $? Note: $\mathbb{R}^2$ is the set of points in the plane.

Darryl has a six-sided die with faces $1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6$. He knows the die is weighted so that one face comes up with probability $1/2$ and the other five faces have equal probability of coming up. He unfortunately does not know which side is weighted, but he knows each face is equally likely to be the weighted one. He rolls the die $5$ times and gets a $1, 2, 3, 4$ and $5$ in some unspecified order. Compute the probability that his next roll is a $6$.

A weighted complete graph with distinct positive wights is given such that in every triangle is [i]degenerate [/i] that is wight of an edge is equal to sum of two other. Prove that one can assign values to the vertexes of this graph such that the wight of each edge is the difference between two assigned values of the endpoints. [i]Proposed by Morteza Saghafian [/i]

Let $n \ge 3$ be an integer. A frog is to jump along the real axis, starting at the point $0$ and making $n$ jumps: one of length $1$, one of length $2$, $\dots$ , one of length $n$. It may perform these $n$ jumps in any order. If at some point the frog is sitting on a number $a \le 0$, its next jump must be to the right (towards the positive numbers). If at some point the frog is sitting on a number $a > 0$, its next jump must be to the left (towards the negative numbers). Find the largest positive integer $k$ for which the frog can perform its jumps in such an order that it never lands on any of the numbers $1, 2, \dots , k$.

Given an equilateral triangle, cut it into four polygonal shapes so that, reassembled appropriately, these figures form a square.

A field is made of $2017 \times 2017$ unit squares. Luffy has $k$ gold detectors, which he places on some of the unit squares, then he leaves the area. Sanji then chooses a $1500 \times 1500$ area, then buries a gold coin on each unit square in this area and none other. When Luffy returns, a gold detector beeps if and only if there is a gold coin buried underneath the unit square it's on. It turns out that by an appropriate placement, Luffy will always be able to determine the $1500 \times 1500$ area containing the gold coins by observing the detectors, no matter how Sanji places the gold coins. Determine the minimum value of $k$ in which this is possible.

For some positive integer $n$, there exists $n$ different positive integers $a_1, a_2, ..., a_n$ such that $(1)$ $a_1=1, a_n=2000$ $(2)$ $\forall i\in \mathbb{Z}$ $s.t.$ $2\le i\le n, a_i -a_{i-1}\in \{-3,5\}$ Determine the maximum value of n.

There are $n$ parallel lines on a plane, and there is a set $S$ of distinct points. Each point in $S$ lies on one of the $n$ lines and is colored either red or blue. Determine the minimum value of $n$ such that if $S$ satisfies the following condition, it is guaranteed that there are infinitely many red points and infinitely many blue points. [list] [*] Each line contains at least one red point and at least one blue point from $S$. [*] Consider a triangle formed by three elements of $S$ located on three distinct lines. If two of the vertices of the triangle are red, there must exist a blue point, not one of the vertices, either inside or on the boundary of the triangle. Similarly, if two of the vertices are blue, there must exist a red point, not one of the vertices, either inside or on the boundary of the triangle. [/list]

Let $ A \equal{} (a_{ij})$, where $ i,j \equal{} 1,2,\ldots,n$, be a square matrix with all $ a_{ij}$ non-negative integers. For each $ i,j$ such that $ a_{ij} \equal{} 0$, the sum of the elements in the $ i$th row and the $ j$th column is at least $ n$. Prove that the sum of all the elements in the matrix is at least $ \frac {n^2}{2}$.