Pennies on a Table
You pass away and, though you have not been a particularly bad person in life, you have not been a particularly good one either. Waiting in the reception room of hell, the devil comes out to meet you. “Well,” says the devil, “Since you have not been that bad, I am going to give you a chance to get out of here.” The two of you then enter another room off to the side of the reception. In the middle of the room is a giant circular table and next to the walls are many sacks of coins. The devil continues, “We are going to play a game. We will take turns putting coins down flat on the table. I will put down a coin and then you will put down a coin, and so on. The coins cannot overlap and they cannot hang over the edge of the table. The last person to put down a coin wins, or equivalently, the last person who can no longer put a coin down on the table loses. Since you have never played this game before, I will also let you decide if you want to play first.” Can you think of a winning strategy for the game?
Problem (and phrasing) communicated by Justin Bledin.
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