"Well," remarked Princess Luna, surveying the damage before her, "we would have words with thee, Discord."
"C'mon, Moonbutt," chuckled Discord, spirit of Chaos. "You know Princess Celestia's birthday deserved no less than an absolute belter. The last three were so STUFFY."
He gave Luna a rather pointed look. "Also, it was Fluttershy who suggested I take care of entertainment for the day. Take it up with her."
"I shall," ground out Luna. "And now the entire southern tower is now completely flooded in custard."
Discord rolled his eyes. "Yes, I know. I was there. I promised no Chaos until the party was over. I'd like to go on record as saying it's not my fault the guests weren't fast enough to escape."
"Is that right?" Luna sighed. "Now then Discord, if you could rid all twenty-five stories of this tower of custard? Several ponies will need those rooms later."
Discord looked over at the stone monument he and the Princess were hovering at the top of. He could just about make out a green pony from what appeared to be the sixth floor jumping out of one of the windows, covered in yellow goop and screaming her lungs out.
Chuckling at the sight, he paused. "Seems a shame to waste all this, really..." Discord turned to Luna. "Say, how about we make a game of it?"
"A game?" Luna protested. "Discord, we need this tower back!"
"And you will," Discord raised his clawed hands up. "if you play."
Luna sighed. Truth be told, without the Elements of Harmony, there was very little they could do to actually stop Discord. True, his friendship with Fluttershy reined him in somewhat, but on the days when he was especially bored, it was hard to tell what he'd do next. He did at least promise to keep the Chaos to things that could be easily fixed.
"C'mon," pleaded Discord. "You slept through the party. Didn't even get to the party games part. And I had to be on my best behaviour until the end. Let me have this. Let YOU have this."
It took about a minute of silence, before Luna's face pulled a resigned look. "What are the rules?"
"Aw Moonbutt, you're the best!" cheered Discord. He clapped his hands together. "So! Here's how it goes. We've got twenty-five floors of custard to power through. You and I will take turns draining floors of custard, either one at a time, or three or four at a time."
"And how, pray, will I do that?" Luna asked. "Your Chaos is resistant to all my best banishment spells."
"With this." And with that, Discord conjured up a small plastic straw out of thin air with a snap of his fingers, and handed it to Luna. The straw was striped red and white.
Luna looked at the small plastic tool. "I will assume there's more to this. My stomach capacity has limits."
"Oh, it's special," Discord grinned. "Suck on it once, and it'll vacuum up all the custard in a room, and vanish inside the stomach. Hope you like the taste of cola, by the way."
"Cola?"
"Well, yes," Discord said, as though it were the most obvious thing in the world. "It's CHAOS custard. It won't taste like REGULAR custard. That would be dumb."
"Of course not," Luna said dryly. "And we are to take turns draining each storey of custard until it's entirely gone?"
"Basically," he confirmed. "But you win by draining the custard level to EXACTLY zero. No going over, princess. Oh, and you're not allowed to pass. You have to drain at least one storey every turn."
Luna paused. "So if I drain the custard exactly, I win? And what happens, pray, should I lose?"
"Then I'll flood the towers with custard again, and you'll have to start the game all over."
"WHAT!?"
"It's for the best!" Discord protested. "You just need to win once! That's all! Then I swear I and all my custard will be out of your mane!"
Deep down, the Princess of the Night knew she didn't have much of a choice. Refusing to indulge Discord and having to drain all the custard manually would take far too much time and resources. It stunk of a shell game, but she decided to bank on Discord's restraint regardless.
"Win just once?"
"Win just once."
Luna grimaced. "Restore everything inside to pre-custard condition afterwards, and I'll accept."
"Oh, I knew you'd say that," Discord smiled. "Tell you what. For being such a good sport, I'll let you go first. Take it away, Moonbutt."
The key to winning this game is either making the other player to drain the 20th storey or draining the 23rd storey ourselves. In order to maximize chance in winning, the first player should always start with 3. Try cleaning the 5th, 10th, or 15th to take advantage. If you can't, keep on draining 3 stories.
Example case: Luna(L) 3, Discord(D) 1, L 1, D 3, L 3, D 4, L 3, D 1, L 4, D 1, L 1, Luna wins
I remember similar game happening as one kind of gambling in Rise of Argonauts video game.
Also, apologies if my explanation is not clear enough
9206149
I don't upload answers until someone works out the answer I'm looking for. Fancy a bash at it?
9206058
Wouldn't work. He's always playing to give himself the best odds of winning, so in your proposed scenario he would actually lower the level by 4, not by 3, on the turn Luna first drains 1 floor.
Let's see if you can figure out why.
Luna does 3
Discord will do 1
Luna does 1
Discord does 4
L does 3
D does 1
L does 4
D does 3
L does 3
D does 1
L does 4
D does 1
L does 1
And i believe thats the optimal strat for discord, correct me if im wrong
i feel discord set us up, ITS IMPOSSIBLE,if we go first that is
Ok so it is possible, but i cant predict discord so all i can say is this start with 4 and make sure there will be 2,7,9,14,16 or 21 left on his turn
H-m-m-m... If I know what Discord would do (which I doubt, but still), then he'll try to win. Assume, Her Lunar Majesty drains 1 or 4 floors, then Discord shall complete to 5 floors (by draining 1 or 4 as well). Repeat 4 times -- and Discord wins, and Luna loses, thus replay. If she drains 3 floors, then, should Discord choose to drain either 1 or 4 floors, her lunar Majesty may : choose to drain 1 floor -- then 3 + 1 + 1 = 5 floors are drained and turns get reversed; -- choose to drain 3 floors -- then 3 + 4 + 3 = 10 floors are drained and turns get reversed again; -- or Luna-Discord-Luna drain 3 + 3 + 4 = 10 floors.
So Luna might want to fool Discord by leaving, say, 10 floors undrained, and then to resort to changing turns. But, after a LOT of contemplating (), I've figured it out, that Luna might want to be resorting to either 1 or 4, thus letting Discord complement it to 5 floors... then, when only 5 floors remain, she drains 3 floors without as much as batting an eye! I do think, that Discord wanting to win means, he won't want to screw everything up, when his turn is the last... He'd be left with only one option: letting Luna win... by draining just one floor. Then Luna wins by draining the only floor left!
But, if Discord wins just by not letting Luna win...
Down below are my thoughts for historical purposes. Maybe, they contain the grain of truth, should my answer be not correct?..
Should Discord not notice, they'd drain, say, Luna 3, then Discord 3, and Luna 4 (or then Discord 4, and Luna 3). VoilĂ ,the princess of the night hath beaten the Lord of Chaos!!!(Wha-a-at, no Luna smiley??!) Now, if Discord should notice, that turns were going to be changed (because he's dastardly cunning), then he might drain just one floor. But Luna'd be prepared for that! She'd just drain one floor herself, thus leaving Discord with 5 floors to drain! Now, if he didn't drain 3 floors,Her Lunar Majesty would win!But she knows all to well, that Discord is too cunning to be fooled... so she might want to leave just 15 floors undrained. She then tries to change turns and succeeds, draining either 5 or 10 floors out of 15. But then Discord would want to win. Indeed, if Discord is left with 5 floors, he just screws everything up by draining 3 floors! And if he does end up with 10 floors, then he takes it down to 5 floors, which he'll screw up anyway!Yeah, so Luna should start with draining either 1 or 4, then Discord'd complete it to 5 -- 20 floors left. Now Luna tries to change turns. End she up draining 5 floors, Discord would try to change turns himself, because, if he didn't, then Discord-Luna would drain 3 times 5 = 15 floors, which would bring it down to exactly 0 floors left to drain -- with Luna's turn being the last one! See above case Luna is left with 15 floors and tries to change turns -- Discord'd make her lose anyway.Now let us say, it's 20 floors left and it's Luna's turn. She tries to change turns an ends up draining 10 floors. Now it's Discord's turn, and we saw, how it would end for Luna, should she try changing turns at 10 floors left (but there were certain scenarioes, where Luna'd have won). So, if Discord tried to change turns... Wait, then he'd win anyway!In any case, there ARE ways for the lunar princess to beat the Lord of Chaos....What would happen, if she tried changing turns from the beginning? Discord would want to try to be the last to make his move. He might want to make turns change every 5 floors, so that he were the last to drain the tower. However he is not the one responsible for what Luna might do. Yeah, but he could fix this by playing for complement (i. e. making 1- or 4-floor drains), and then just screw it up...But what would happen, if Luna responded to this by draining 3 floors?Luna only drains 3 floors, Discord -- 4: Luna's left with 3 more to drain at the end.Luna -- 3, Discord -- 3: same.Luna -- 3, Discord -- 1: Discord wins, when only 5 floors are left.3-1-3-3 (10) or:3-3-3-1 (10) -- either is good for Discord;3-4-3 (10) makes turns change, Discord should do this, when 15 floors are left;4-1 (5)4-3-4-4 (15)4-4-4-3 (15)1--4 (5)1--3-1 (5) -- turns change;1--1-1--1-1 (5) -- turns change;1--1-1--3-1--3 (10)1--1-1--4-1--1-1 (10), turns change;So, 3--4-3, then Discord wants to do the same: 3-1. 11 are left, Discord restores balance: 1-3. Discord can't drain 4, for Luna will win, but, if he drained 3, she'd win as well, so he must drain just 1, and there'll be NO way she could win!Therefore: 3--4-3--3-1--1-4. Discord can't drain 3, but the other two options are fine.Therefore: 3--4-3--3-1--1-1--?1-!4->1--