Found problems: 622
Anana has an ordered $n$-tuple $(a_1,a_2,...,a_n)$ if integers. Banana may make a guess on Anana's ordered integer $n$-tuple $(x_1,x_2,...,x_n)$, upon which Anana will reveal the product of differences $(a_1-x_1)(a_2-x_2)...(a_n-x_n)$. How many guesses does Banana need to figure out Anana's $n$-tuple for certain?
A hunter and an invisible rabbit play a game on an infinite square grid. First the hunter fixes a colouring of the cells with finitely many colours. The rabbit then secretly chooses a cell to start in. Every minute, the rabbit reports the colour of its current cell to the hunter, and then secretly moves to an adjacent cell that it has not visited before (two cells are adjacent if they share an edge). The hunter wins if after some finite time either:[list][*]the rabbit cannot move; or
[*]the hunter can determine the cell in which the rabbit started.[/list]Decide whether there exists a winning strategy for the hunter.
[i]Proposed by Aron Thomas[/i]
For integers $m,n \ge 3$ we consider a $m \times n$ rectangular frame, consisting of the $2m+2n-4$ boundary squares of a $m \times n$ rectangle.
Renate and Erhard play the following game on this frame, with Renate to start the game. In a move, a player colours a rectangular area consisting of a single or several white squares. If there are any more white squares, they have to form a connected region. The player who moves last wins the game.
Determine all pairs $(m,n)$ for which Renate has a winning strategy.
Fix an integer $k>2$. Two players, called Ana and Banana, play the following game of numbers. Initially, some integer $n \ge k$ gets written on the blackboard. Then they take moves in turn, with Ana beginning. A player making a move erases the number $m$ just written on the blackboard and replaces it by some number $m'$ with $k \le m' < m$ that is coprime to $m$. The first player who cannot move anymore loses.
An integer $n \ge k $ is called good if Banana has a winning strategy when the initial number is $n$, and bad otherwise.
Consider two integers $n,n' \ge k$ with the property that each prime number $p \le k$ divides $n$ if and only if it divides $n'$. Prove that either both $n$ and $n'$ are good or both are bad.
Arnulfo and Berenice play the following game: One of the two starts by writing a number from $ 1$ to $30$, the other chooses a number from $ 1$ to $30$ and adds it to the initial number, the first player chooses a number from $ 1$ to $30$ and adds it to the previous result, they continue doing the same until someone manages to add $2018$. When Arnulfo was about to start, Berenice told him that it was unfair, because whoever started had a winning strategy, so the numbers had better change. So they asked the following question:
Adding chosen numbers from $1 $ to $a$, until reaching the number $ b$, what conditions must meet $a$ and $ b$ so that the first player does not have a winning strategy?
Indicate if Arnulfo and Berenice are right and answer the question asked by them.
On an infinite chessboard, a solitaire game is played as follows: at the start, we have $n^2$ pieces occupying a square of side $n.$ The only allowed move is to jump over an occupied square to an unoccupied one, and the piece which has been jumped over is removed. For which $n$ can the game end with only one piece remaining on the board?
There are $36$ cards in a deck arranged in the sequence spades, clubs, hearts, diamonds, spades, clubs, hearts, diamonds, etc. Somebody took part of this deck off the top, turned it upside down, and cut this part into the remaining part of the deck (i.e. inserted it between two consecutive cards). Then four cards were taken off the top, then another four, etc. Prove that in any of these sets of four cards, all the cards are of different suits.
(A Merkov, Moscow)
There is an empty table with $2^{100}$ rows and $100$ columns. Alice and Eva take turns filling the empty cells of the first row of the table, Alice plays first. In each move, Alice chooses an empty cell and puts a cross in it; Eva in each move chooses an empty cell and puts a zero. When no empty cells remain in the first row, the players move on to the second row, and so on (in each new row Alice plays first).
The game ends when all the rows are filled. Alice wants to make as many different rows in the table as possible, while Eva wants to make as few as possible. How many different rows will be there in the table if both follow their best strategies?
Proposed by Denis Afrizonov
Fix an integer $k>2$. Two players, called Ana and Banana, play the following game of numbers. Initially, some integer $n \ge k$ gets written on the blackboard. Then they take moves in turn, with Ana beginning. A player making a move erases the number $m$ just written on the blackboard and replaces it by some number $m'$ with $k \le m' < m$ that is coprime to $m$. The first player who cannot move anymore loses.
An integer $n \ge k $ is called good if Banana has a winning strategy when the initial number is $n$, and bad otherwise.
Consider two integers $n,n' \ge k$ with the property that each prime number $p \le k$ divides $n$ if and only if it divides $n'$. Prove that either both $n$ and $n'$ are good or both are bad.
Let $n$ be a given positive integer. Sisyphus performs a sequence of turns on a board consisting of $n + 1$ squares in a row, numbered $0$ to $n$ from left to right. Initially, $n$ stones are put into square $0$, and the other squares are empty. At every turn, Sisyphus chooses any nonempty square, say with $k$ stones, takes one of these stones and moves it to the right by at most $k$ squares (the stone should say within the board). Sisyphus' aim is to move all $n$ stones to square $n$.
Prove that Sisyphus cannot reach the aim in less than
\[ \left \lceil \frac{n}{1} \right \rceil + \left \lceil \frac{n}{2} \right \rceil + \left \lceil \frac{n}{3} \right \rceil + \dots + \left \lceil \frac{n}{n} \right \rceil \]
turns. (As usual, $\lceil x \rceil$ stands for the least integer not smaller than $x$. )
There are 60 empty boxes $B_1,\ldots,B_{60}$ in a row on a table and an unlimited supply of pebbles. Given a positive integer $n$, Alice and Bob play the following game.
In the first round, Alice takes $n$ pebbles and distributes them into the 60 boxes as she wishes. Each subsequent round consists of two steps:
(a) Bob chooses an integer $k$ with $1\leq k\leq 59$ and splits the boxes into the two groups $B_1,\ldots,B_k$ and $B_{k+1},\ldots,B_{60}$.
(b) Alice picks one of these two groups, adds one pebble to each box in that group, and removes one pebble from each box in the other group.
Bob wins if, at the end of any round, some box contains no pebbles. Find the smallest $n$ such that Alice can prevent Bob from winning.
[i]Czech Republic[/i]
White and black checkers are put on the squares of an $n\times n$ chessboard $(n\ge2)$ according to the following rule. Initially, a black checker is put on an arbitrary square. In every consequent step, a white checker is put on a free square, whereby all checkers on the squares neighboring by side are replaced by checkers of the opposite colors. This process is continued until there is a checker on every square. Prove that in the final configuration there is at least one black checker.
Monica and Bogdan are playing a game, depending on given integers $n, k$. First, Monica writes some $k$ positive numbers. Bogdan wins, if he is able to find $n$ points on the plane with the following property: for any number $m$ written by Monica, there are some two points chosen by Bogdan with distance exactly $m$ between them. Otherwise, Monica wins.
Determine who has a winning strategy depending on $n, k$.
[i](Proposed by Fedir Yudin)[/i]
Santa Claus plays a guessing game with Marvin before giving him his present. He hides the present behind one of $100$ doors, numbered from $1$ to $100$. Marvin can point at a door, and then Santa Claus will reply with one of the following words:
$\bullet$ "hot" if the present lies behind the guessed door,
$\bullet$ "warm" if the guess is not exact but the number of the guessed door differs from that of the present’s door by at most $5$,
$\bullet$ "cold" if the numbers of the two doors differ by more than $5$.
At least how many such guesses does Marvin need, so that he can be certain about where his present is?
Marvin does not necessarily need to make a "hot" guess, just to know the correct door with $100\%$ certainty.
Five identical empty buckets of $2$-liter capacity stand at the vertices of a regular pentagon. Cinderella and her wicked Stepmother go through a sequence of rounds: At the beginning of every round, the Stepmother takes one liter of water from the nearby river and distributes it arbitrarily over the five buckets. Then Cinderella chooses a pair of neighbouring buckets, empties them to the river and puts them back. Then the next round begins. The Stepmother goal's is to make one of these buckets overflow. Cinderella's goal is to prevent this. Can the wicked Stepmother enforce a bucket overflow?
[i]Proposed by Gerhard Woeginger, Netherlands[/i]
The numbers $1, 2, ..., 2020$ and $2021$ are written on a blackboard. The following operation is executed:
Two numbers are chosen, both are erased and replaced by the absolute value of their difference.
This operation is repeated until there is only one number left on the blackboard.
(a) Show that $2021$ can be the final number on the blackboard.
(b) Show that $2020$ cannot be the final number on the blackboard.
(Karl Czakler)
There are two bowls on the table, in one there are $p$, in the other $q$ stones ($p, q \in N*$ ). Two players $A$ and $B$ take turns playing, starting with $A$.
Who's turn:
$\bullet$ takes a stone from one of the bowls
$\bullet$or removes one stone from each bowl
$\bullet$ or puts a stone from one of the bowls into the other.
Whoever takes the last stone wins.
Under what conditions can $A$ and under what conditions can $B$ force the win?
The answer must be justified.
Let $N\geq 4$ be a fixed positive integer. Two players, $A$ and $B$ are forming an ordered set $\{x_1,x_2,...\},$ adding elements alternatively. $A$ chooses $x_1$ to be $1$ or $-1,$ then $B$ chooses $x_2$ to be $2$ or $-2,$ then $A$ chooses $x_3$ to be $3$ or $-3,$ and so on. (at the $k^{th}$ step, the chosen number must always be $k$ or $-k$)
The winner is the first player to make the sequence sum up to a multiple of $N.$ Depending on $N,$ find out, with proof, which player has a winning strategy.
Two players in turn put two or three coins into their own hats (before the game starts, the hats are empty). Each time, after the second player duplicated the move of the first player, they exchange hats. The player wins, if after his move his hat contains one hundred or more coins. Which player has a winning strategy?
Player Zero and Player One play a game on a $n \times n$ board ($n \ge 1$). The columns of this $n \times n$ board are numbered $1,2,4,\dots,2^{n-1}$. Turn my turn, the players put their own number in one of the free cells (thus Player Zero puts a $0$ and Player One puts a $1$). Player Zero begins. When the board is filled, the game ends and each row yields a (reverse binary) number obtained by adding the values of the columns with a $1$ in that row. For instance, when $n=4$, a row with $0101$ yields the number $0 \cdot1+1 \cdot 2+0 \cdot 4+1 \cdot 8=10$.
a) For which natural numbers $n$ can Player One always ensure that at least one of the row numbers is divisible by $4$?
b) For which natural numbers $n$ can Player One always ensure that at least one of the row numbers is divisible by $3$?
Let $n$ be a positive integer. Bolek draws $2n$ points in the plane, no two of them defining a vertical or a horizontal line. Then Lolek draws for each of these $2n$ points two rays emanating from them, one of them vertically and the other one horizontally.
Lolek wants to maximize the number of regions in which these rays divide the plane. Determine the largest number $k$ such that Lolek can obtain at least $k$ regions independent of the points chosen by Bolek.
There are 60 empty boxes $B_1,\ldots,B_{60}$ in a row on a table and an unlimited supply of pebbles. Given a positive integer $n$, Alice and Bob play the following game.
In the first round, Alice takes $n$ pebbles and distributes them into the 60 boxes as she wishes. Each subsequent round consists of two steps:
(a) Bob chooses an integer $k$ with $1\leq k\leq 59$ and splits the boxes into the two groups $B_1,\ldots,B_k$ and $B_{k+1},\ldots,B_{60}$.
(b) Alice picks one of these two groups, adds one pebble to each box in that group, and removes one pebble from each box in the other group.
Bob wins if, at the end of any round, some box contains no pebbles. Find the smallest $n$ such that Alice can prevent Bob from winning.
[i]Czech Republic[/i]
Let $m$ and $n$ be positive integers. Player $A$ has a field of $m \times n$, and player $B$ has a $1 \times n$ field (the first is the number of rows). On the first move, each player places on each square of his field white or black chip as he pleases. At each next on the move, each player can change the color of randomly chosen pieces on your field to the opposite, provided that in no row for this move will not change more than one chip (it is allowed not to change not a single chip). The moves are made in turn, player $A$ starts. Player $A$ wins if there is such a position that in the only row player $B$'s squares, from left to right, are the same as in some row of player's field $A$.
Prove that player $A$ has the ability to win for any game of player $B$ if and only if $n <2m$.
Given $n \ge 2$ points on a circle, Alice and Bob play the following game. Initially, a tile is placed on one of the points and no segment is drawn.
The players alternate in turns, with Alice to start. In a turn, a player moves the tile from its current position $P$ to one of the $n-1$ other points $Q$ and draws the segment $PQ$. This move is not allowed if the segment $PQ$ is already drawn. If a player cannot make a move, the game is over and the opponent wins.
Determine, for each $n$, which of the two players has a winning strategy.
There are two boxes containing balls. One of them contains $m$ balls, and the other contains $n$ balls, where $m, n > 0$. Two actions are permitted:
(i) Remove an equal number of balls from both boxes.
(ii) Increase the number of balls in one of the boxes by a factor $k$.
Is it possible to remove all of the balls from both boxes with just these two actions,
1. if $k = 2$?
2. if $k = 3$?