Fictitious play

In game theory, fictitious play is a learning rule first introduced by George W. Brown. In it, each player presumes that the opponents are playing stationary (possibly mixed) strategies. At each round, each player thus best responds to the empirical frequency of play of their opponent. Such a method is of course adequate if the opponent indeed uses a stationary strategy, while it is flawed if the opponent's strategy is non-stationary. The opponent's strategy may for example be conditioned on the fictitious player's last move.