So I was playing Rock, Paper, Scissors with my daughter the other day. (It was her idea; I didn’t tell her about the game, my previous blog post about Rock, Paper, Scissors, nor about the new rpsmatch.com site). She won, and I lost a few rounds. Then I noticed: she wasn’t using “Paper”!

So I  thought of this variation on the game: one player is not allowed to use one of the weapons. All other rules stay the same.

To make it more interesting, the other player would not know which weapon is not allowed. How to do that? The handicapped player chooses one card from 3, each card showing a different weapon. The player is not allowed to use that weapon. Only after the winner is determined is the card shown to the other player for verification. If the handicapped player cheated by using the forbidden weapon, then they lost!

I doubt this change gives the non-handicapped player an advantage.  But you never know. The number of draws should decrease, though. Then again, maybe not. Would be nice to figure it out (mathematically)!