Can Maths Help You Win at Games?

Can maths help you win at games?In this AfterMaths Summer Special, Jon and Becky explore the line between luck and strategy — and whether understanding the maths behind a game can actually give you an advantage.They take in Rock Paper Scissors, Noughts & Crosses, chess, a deceptively simple counting game, the chessboard-and-rice problem, expected value, roulette and the mathematics hiding inside Monopoly.Along the way: why some apparently random games aren’t quite random, why exponential growth gets ridiculous remarkably quickly, why the house tends to win at casinos, and how a little probability might improve your chances during family game night.Maths can’t guarantee that you’ll win every game.But it might make people considerably less keen to play Monopoly with you.