So…how does this game work anyway?
A Keynesian Beauty Contest with a twist: the game mechanics of Pic One
The Keynesian Beauty Contest is a concept introduced by John Maynard Keynes in an attempt to explain the behavior of investors in the stock market. The idea is that one isn’t trying to price securities based on fundamental value but on what everyone else in the market perceives to be their fundamental value.
Keynes asked readers to imagine a newspaper contest where they attempted to choose the most attractive face among six. If you chose the girl who won the most votes, you shared a prize with your fellow voters.
The most simplistic way of playing the game is to pick the girl you like the most. However, the immediate and obvious strategic improvement is to guess what the other players in the game would think. Taking the concept further, you can try to guess what the other players in the game will think knowing that people are trying to play the second-level strategy. Similar to poker, the best strategy to play is probably one level ahead of your opponents.
Pic One has similar strategies and meta-strategies — but with a twist. We introduce the element of luck so no one is guaranteed a victory. Even if you’re just 1% of the vote, you can still win! Your chance is determined by the vote so you still want to assess what the crowd is doing.
Imagine you pick a round of three between Emma, Grace, and Sophie (from left to right) with 100 voters betting 0.01 ETH each.
- 30 players choose Emma
- 45 players choose Grace
- 25 players choose Sophie
Pic One’s betting is entirely peer-to-peer with the odds determined parimutuelly. Pic One takes a 2% fee so 0.98 ETH is up for grabs.
In this round of the game, here’s what the payouts would look like:
- Emma voters can each win 0.98/30 = 0.0327 ETH
- Grace voters can each win 0.98/45 = 0.0218 ETH
- Sophie voters can each win 0.98/25 = 0.0392 ETH
Each card’s chances of winning are determined by their odds. Emma voters will win the pot 30% of the time, Grace voters 45% of the time, and Sophie voters 25% of the time. The lower chance you have of winning, the higher potential payout and vice versa.
Maybe you like the idea of trying to win BIG even if your chances are somewhat lower. Instead of being forced to pick what you think everyone’s favorite is, you can go the other way and pic against the trend. Or if you like to play it safe and win more frequently, you can follow the crowd. The choice is YOURS!
But don’t forget, people may be aware that you’re trying to do this which could change their votes too!
Since Emma was the leftmost card, her numbers for the RNG are allocated first, followed by Grace and Sophie. Since Emma was the leftmost card, her numbers for the RNG are allocated first, followed by Grace and Sophie.
The distribution is from [0,100] calculated as a 16 point floating number. Emma gets 0.000000000000001 to 30, Grace 30.00000000000001 to 75, Sophie 75.00000000000001 to 100.
Wherever the RNG lands determines the winner! You can check that the event was correct with our verifier here:
https://jsfiddle.net/picOne/ayu9hjmz/2/
For more details on the seeding event and an article on provably fair games, check out these links:
