Sequential Majoritarian Blotto Games

33 Pages Posted: 5 Jun 2018

See all articles by Tilman Klumpp

Tilman Klumpp

University of Alberta, Department of Economics

Kai A. Konrad

Max Planck Institute for Tax Law and Public Finance; Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR); CESifo (Center for Economic Studies and Ifo Institute for Economic Research); IZA Institute of Labor Economics

Multiple version iconThere are 2 versions of this paper

Date Written: June 4, 2018

Abstract

We study Colonel Blotto games with sequential battles and a majoritarian objective. For a large class of contest success functions, the equilibrium is unique and characterized by an even split: Each battle that is reached before one of the players wins a majority of battles is allocated the same amount of resources from the player's overall budget. As a consequence, a player's chance of winning any particular battle is independent of the battlefield and of the number of victories and losses the player accumulated in prior battles. This result is in stark contrast to equilibrium behavior in sequential contests that do not involve either fixed budgets or a majoritarian objective. We also consider the equilibrium choice of an overall budget. For many contest success functions, if the sequence of battles is long enough the payoff structure in this extended games resembles an all-pay auction without noise.

Keywords: Blotto games, dynamic battles, multi-battle contest, all-pay auctions

JEL Classification: D72, D74

Suggested Citation

Klumpp, Tilman and Konrad, Kai A., Sequential Majoritarian Blotto Games (June 4, 2018). Working Paper of the Max Planck Institute for Tax Law and Public Finance No. 2018-5, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3190035 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3190035

Tilman Klumpp

University of Alberta, Department of Economics ( email )

Edmonton, Alberta T6G 2R3
Canada

Kai A. Konrad (Contact Author)

Max Planck Institute for Tax Law and Public Finance ( email )

Marstallplatz 1
Munich, 80539
Germany

HOME PAGE: http://www.tax.mpg.de/en/pub/home.cfm

Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR)

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CESifo (Center for Economic Studies and Ifo Institute for Economic Research)

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Munich, 81679
Germany

IZA Institute of Labor Economics

P.O. Box 7240
Bonn, 53072
Germany

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